Seems there were lots of foam ARF's back in the 1970's and 1980's. Cox had a RTF 210 Centurion that was very popular. Midwest and Sureflite had lots of foam ariplanes. Although not ARF's by todays definition, they were considered ARF's back then. The MRC Trainer Hawk was a good one.

I had a Lanier Jester. It fluttered and cracked all over. I had it less than one year and had to yank out my equipment and gave it away.

EZ's were the ARF's we all lusted for, but they were very expensive. $300 for a 40 size Decathlon was big bucks in the early 80's. But the EZ's did become more affordable in the late 80's and I had several. They flew great. But after a few years, their leaky firewalls allowed enough fuel to blow into the nose compartment to make them weak. And they were virtually unrepairable if you did crash one. But I did love them. In fact, I have an EZ VooDoo in the box right now.

As nice as the EZ ARFs were, I think that todays ARFs are better. EZ did offer a great variety. Their little 25 size Reno racers were wonderful and fast. Their F16 was a bullet. But EZs were foam board wrapped around a minimul wood structure and had many plastic parts that tended to crack. When an EZ airplane got to be 5 or 6 years old, you really wondered how much longer it would hold together. But hey, you can't fly all the worlds airplanes if the ones you have last forever.