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Over Priced Foam Arfs
The Chinese will go to great lengths to destroy American companies by undercutting prices until they drive the competition out of business. And the reverse is also true. Chinese companies will grossly overcharge when they have no competition. We are seeing that with all the foam ARFs,especially the smaller indoor planes. Is a piece of die cut or moulded foam weighing 8 oz. worth $89.00 US. This is outrageous. There are no servos or receivers included although it may include a tiny brushless motor that may be worth a few dollars. I am convinced the box it comes in is worth more than the airplane itself. Yet most modelers won t think twice about buying these kits. Wal-mart is selling a toy model airplane with a 2 ft. wingspan that sells for $12.00 US and it has as much foam and labour that the units we see in the hobby store. The local hobby stores and distributors are not making the huge profitsits the Chinese manufacturers that are overcharging and taking advantage of the fact that there are no US companies competing with them.
Why can t we make this stuff here for alot less-then the Chinese will lower their prices but I would still pay a little more to get a domestic product where I can get some decent service. |
RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
are you referring to a specific model?
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RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
The tooling costs money. I have bought several of the 8 to 10 buck kids gliders at Wal Mart and converted them to RC, a lot of fun for very little money. However, the fit and finsh on them is extremely poor and that's why they don't cost much to produce.
The ARFs that you are refering to are much higer quality and so require very high quality moulds to create them. The foam is dirt cheap but the machine parts to make them are pretty expensive. But using GWS as an example, they paid off the moulds for all of the airplanes they make long ago so the profit margin for them is very high while others who are just starting production still have to pay for all of the tooling. I do agree though that the cost of foam models is much higher than it should be. |
RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
Actually, the Chinese factories do not make much money. It's the distributor here that gets rich. They turned to China to make more money. They stopped supporting the local manufacturers.
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RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
You mean to say we are overpaying for our hobby-grade quality made products when we could just buy something for much less at the Walmart??? I thought getting a quality product that has replacable or upgradable parts, a warranty, and decent customer service was why we were paying more rather than getting a super cheap POS toy that might not even fly straight or be rendered useless within a week with no recourse but to realize we wasted our money. We are a country built on capitalism and if someone could do it and there were money to be made they would. Unfortunately even if we wanted to produce a comparable product here due to the way our government handles regulating the import industry we could never hope to compete with China. Comparing something from Walmart to a real hobby product is like comparing a KIA to a Porsche. Yeah, there's a big difference in price and although they are both cars with four wheels, there might just be a big difference in the quality and function of the product. Quality always comes with a cost. When you pay a cheap price you will always get a cheap product, but that may be all one needs to see if they want to continue on and purchase something better the next time around. Hopefully you have fun rather than frustration with it. Its your dollar to spend however you choose. have no regrets about your decision and enjoy!
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RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
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ORIGINAL: jimjeep You mean to say we are overpaying for our hobby-grade quality made products when we could just buy something for much less at the Walmart??? I thought getting a quality product that has replacable or upgradable parts, a warranty, and decent customer service was why we were paying more rather than getting a super cheap POS toy that might not even fly straight or be rendered useless within a week with no recourse but to realize we wasted our money. We are a country built on capitalism and if someone could do it and there were money to be made they would. Unfortunately even if we wanted to produce a comparable product here due to the way our government handles regulating the import industry we could never hope to compete with China. Comparing something from Walmart to a real hobby product is like comparing a KIA to a Porsche. Yeah, there's a big difference in price and although they are both cars with four wheels, there might just be a big difference in the quality and function of the product. Quality always comes with a cost. When you pay a cheap price you will always get a cheap product, but that may be all one needs to see if they want to continue on and purchase something better the next time around. Hopefully you have fun rather than frustration with it. Its your dollar to spend however you choose. have no regrets about your decision and enjoy! |
RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
Can you post more detailed photos of those models-what a great ideaI want to convert one of those to R/C.
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RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
ORIGINAL: topspin ORIGINAL: jimjeep You mean to say we are overpaying for our hobby-grade quality made products when we could just buy something for much less at the Walmart??? I thought getting a quality product that has replacable or upgradable parts, a warranty, and decent customer service was why we were paying more rather than getting a super cheap POS toy that might not even fly straight or be rendered useless within a week with no recourse but to realize we wasted our money. We are a country built on capitalism and if someone could do it and there were money to be made they would. Unfortunately even if we wanted to produce a comparable product here due to the way our government handles regulating the import industry we could never hope to compete with China. Comparing something from Walmart to a real hobby product is like comparing a KIA to a Porsche. Yeah, there's a big difference in price and although they are both cars with four wheels, there might just be a big difference in the quality and function of the product. Quality always comes with a cost. When you pay a cheap price you will always get a cheap product, but that may be all one needs to see if they want to continue on and purchase something better the next time around. Hopefully you have fun rather than frustration with it. Its your dollar to spend however you choose. have no regrets about your decision and enjoy! |
RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
ORIGINAL: jimjeep ORIGINAL: topspin ORIGINAL: jimjeep You mean to say we are overpaying for our hobby-grade quality made products when we could just buy something for much less at the Walmart??? I thought getting a quality product that has replacable or upgradable parts, a warranty, and decent customer service was why we were paying more rather than getting a super cheap POS toy that might not even fly straight or be rendered useless within a week with no recourse but to realize we wasted our money. We are a country built on capitalism and if someone could do it and there were money to be made they would. Unfortunately even if we wanted to produce a comparable product here due to the way our government handles regulating the import industry we could never hope to compete with China. Comparing something from Walmart to a real hobby product is like comparing a KIA to a Porsche. Yeah, there's a big difference in price and although they are both cars with four wheels, there might just be a big difference in the quality and function of the product. Quality always comes with a cost. When you pay a cheap price you will always get a cheap product, but that may be all one needs to see if they want to continue on and purchase something better the next time around. Hopefully you have fun rather than frustration with it. Its your dollar to spend however you choose. have no regrets about your decision and enjoy! It needs a bit more elevator surface, I cut it too small but on the next one I'll make the entire elevator articulate. Other than that it flys nice, it's pretty fast and with just ailerons and elevator turns good. Next one will also have a rudder. I'm actually thinking about twin 70mm fans on one but I am planning a twin prop version right now, same motors as the Floater Jet and 6X props. Should be speedy. Oh, I forgot to mention there is a filberglass tube that runs through the wings with the servo extention wires, the rod is one piece and runs all the way through the fuse. Wthout that the wings would break for shure. |
RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
ORIGINAL: saraholt61 Can you post more detailed photos of those models-what a great ideaI want to convert one of those to R/C. I don't have any really good pictures of this one. I'll post some more detailed photos of my next build. I use a soldering iron and thin hard drawn copper wire as a foam cutter, I also use this to hollow it out. Then I tape components in and on the plane to determine the CG. Once that's done I just button it up and fly. The yellow flap on the bottom is the battery hatch made from plywood and nylon hinges. I use Velcro to keep it closed and it works fine. Next one is going to be a twin engine. One thing is, you have to use carbon fiber or fiberglass rods in the wings or they will snap. These things are ultra cheap and were only made to be gliders, the wings are thick but weak. |
RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
Maybe this could morph into another thread, but there was a couple of articles in some older mags that converted these Walmart type foamies to a two channel .049 powered glider. I think one used fiberglass reinforced packing tape instead of carbon fiber rod, and glued the joins with silicone glue, although I think now the poly U glue might be better and replacing the .049 with a brushless motor. (3 channel OOOooo) You don't have to buy expensive foamies, Hotwires are easy to make. I have to agree that some are kind of overpriced for what you get. Pretty stickers make them worth twice the price?!!
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RE: Over Priced Foam Arfs
When you see the manufactures and distributors blowing out stock of older models you get an idea how much these things actually cost them and how much profit there is in them.
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