ORIGINAL: krashkart
I had not built anything in over 30 years, then it was a full kit.
Many things have changed and I was not fully equipped so when I got back into this I bought a Hangar 9 Ultra Stick 40. It was not too bad overall but it did have some problems I had to work through.
I crashed that one and decided to get back to a trainer so I bought their Alpha 40. It's supposed to support up to a 72 4 stroke but believe me when I say it's really tough to make things fit up right.
I could deal with the factory motor mount not working for the larger motor, big deal I just picked up another that fit in the same location and took up no more space than that original mount.. But regardless of what I tried carb linkage was a nightmare. I finally gave up and went to a Sullivan Golden Rod (wire rope) to get it to fit up and function properly. I also had to go with a DuBro 4 stroke carb linkage adapter but it worked great until I had to
bolt it all in the plane and found the edge of the plywood around the motor mount was just too close to allow that linkage system to work without some major cuts on the fuse.
So I turned the carb around, and it turned over the linkage and around on the carb 6 ways from Sunday. I was even willing to relocate the Sullivan Wire to another location but It was really tough so I had to hack up the fuse. I did not like doing that but it served no function forward of the firewall anyway.
So after installing the gas tank I went to put the hatch on the bottom of the plane using the two screws supplied into bind
nuts and I could not get one of the screws started. Simple right? I found the blind not was not installed right, not sunk into the wood mount and had to re-secure it and couple of times trying to get it to stay in place. What I did not notice is that when I was trying to screw into the
blind nut even after I had it secured the corner brace that held the blind nut had not even been glued in place at the factory and it was moving around on me! So I glued it into place so I could accomplish that difficult task of installing two screws that should have taken 30 seconds took several minutes of trying to fugure out what was going on..
When installing the gas tank in the factory installed bracket I noted that I had to push down just a little on the sleeve for the nose wheel steering. I did not notice until I had the tank secured in place per instructions with CA and braces that little press was just enough to bind the linkage for the steering![img][/img]
So now i will have to get more sleeving and reinstall and relocate the nose wheel steering which will not be fun with the tank secured in place by glue.
You know, I built planes from kits years ago and never had these kind of problems and I don't think you should have them on an ARF in particular. It's apparent the people that put some of these things together just don't care.
I am wishing now that I had just gone with a full kit and spent the extra money getting geared up for full building again.
I can tell you this, after the minor problems noted with the Ultra Stick and now what I consider more than just nuisance items on the the Alpha 40 I will never buy a Hangar 9 ARF product again.
I understand your frustration with Hanger 9. It is only my experience that Hanger 9 over all puts out the best ARF aircraft. The covering is another issue, but all other ARF manufactures have the same problem of not having enough Ultra or Mono overlap on the edges. If I'm not careful, I have had Ulta pull right off the edges of the wing tip!
When I built some of the Hanger 9 ARF kits I seldom had any issues getting engines and servos to fit. I usually used equivalent equipment that was suggested in the manual, when I try to highly mod the plane then I can run into serious issues.
It's like this, and I've seemed to notice that one ARF kit can be a bad one, then I spend the money and buy another of the same kit, then it's a good one. It's like if I buy a Monday-Thursday kit I'll get a good one with no problems, and if I get a Friday or Saturday kit I'll have issues.
You are right when it comes to building that building a kit is better than buying a ARF, because when I build a kit it's me alone who is in control of the quality from start to finish. I have a ARF right now on my shelf that I've striped to bare bones. I had to ask myself if the ARF was worth it before I started, and I said yes because my Grandmother willed me the airplane and the the ARF has been discontinued for over 8 years.
I'm starting to get great satisfaction in building tough or bad ARF aircraft, it improves my building skills and teaches me patience. I build aircraft for people as a small buisness and I've seen some interesting ARF designs. Don't get frustrated, when I do I walk away from it for a few days. Usually when I come back to that problematic ARF, I usually come up with a good solution on how to make it all work out.
ARF doesn't always mean ( Almost Ready to FLY ) does it?
Pete