Have no fear, gaRCfield, we all appreciate your enthusiasm. It's good to hear that you're having so much fun and progressing through various levels of difficulty so quickly.

I've avoided replying in this thread a couple of times up until now. I think the AX-series two strokes from O.S. Max are terrific engines. They're not exactly bargains, but they're well made and very user friendly.

If you spend the rest of your life flying nothing but O.S. Max engines, well, that wouldn't be the worst thing you could do. Don't be so quick as to declare O.S. as the only brand of two stroke worth considering, however.

Enya engines provide good power and are light weight while perhaps offering the best metallurgy of any RC engines on the market. They last for decades and epitomize reliability and durability. Webra two-strokes are lighter weight and more powerful than comparable O.S. Max two-strokes. They run powerfully and reliably on little-to-no nitro and are very durable as well. Jett, Rossi, Fox, HP, Nelson, and others all have similar virtues that place them above and beyond O.S. Max for a number of reasons.

A great number of specialty glow engine manufacturers enjoy a thriving business despite O.S. Max's high market visibility and lower pricing. If O.S. Max were really the best engines on the market for all categories of flight, then these companies would be folding up.

Other competitors offer similar power and reliability and significantly lower prices. I run Super Tigre and Magnum engines and I think they're terrific products. I can't honestly say that they're as good as O.S. Max with regard to ease of use, but they're very good and not too much more difficult to break in and tune as O.S. Max.

Thunder Tiger is another story. Thunder Tiger engines are, in my experience, every bit as good as O.S. Max with regard to ease of tuning and break in. They come with a better warranty than O.S. Max (3 years vs. 2 years) and will generally last longer than a comparable O.S. Max engine. The only thing that O.S. Max has over Thunder Tiger is a wider variety of available models; Thunder Tiger doesn't offer .55 or .75 two-strokes, for example.

I happily own the TT Pro .46, GP-40, GP-61, and F-91s engines and all of them are terrific, reliable, and easy-to-tune. If I were offered my choice of the TT Pro .46 or the O.S. Max .46 AX for a project, I'd take the TT Pro .46.

There are a lot of great engine brands out there that are at least as good as O.S. Max including Saito, YS, Enya, Webra, Fox, HP, K&B, Jett, Rossi, and Nelson. That having been said, if I had to fly only a single brand of engine, I would fly Thunder Tiger.

Your 1.20 AX is a terrific engine and perhaps one of the best values in the entire O.S. Max lineup. I'm glad you're enjoying it and I hope it provides you with terrific flying for many years to come.