dodgers72

My Feedback: (1)

John

"Being swallowed by the big two" could be looked at in different ways.

I realize Horizon hasn't bought out any of the fore mentioned companies but the way I see it "The big two" are the big two because of their leadership in the market. Not just with planes,with all aspects of hobby in general. Hobby superstores if you will.

Lets compare them to Lowes and HomeDepot and Sig to Ace hardware. The Big Guys next to the small guy. With any big business,the bigger it gets the less personal it becomes and instead is more about profit. The people leading the companies aren't in touch with the customers and make decisions based on a piece of paper with charts and numbers on it. At most Ace stores the Owners are often there and want happy customers and it shows.

To me Sig is also like Ace "the small guy" and still very personal. I hear what your saying with your son building the kit and not wanting to take the extra time to sand and finish his model. Chinese products do make it harder to justify building a kit verses assembling an arf. Instant gratification is more and more common. The satisfaction I get with a kit verses an arf is 10 fold. I can stand back after a day of flying and say I built that from a box of wood, it's my creation. Its really to bad he didn't finish his plane I'll bet he would have also had more of a personal attachment to it then his arfs.


Chris

blw

My Feedback: (3)

I disagree totally with the young generation characterization. I instruct a course at a university that it titled as an intro to UAV construction. We originally built LT-40s and Somethin Extras. The students ate it up. They all loved building. I usually had about 25-30% females on the roster. Now, we had to shorten down the build time and I combined the build semester with the learn to fly semester. We have some time in the syllabus to build and I always ask their opinions on building, or doing something else. They all want to build. At the end of the semester, they all want longer times for building airplanes. The future model builders are out there. The ARF market may have made it seem that building is some utopia only for the most patient people that they will never meet. Just my opinion and experience with the college aged ones.

John Redman

My Feedback: (8)

I see your point Chris. Good info all around. We try our best to still listen to the customer and provide them with the best serrvice we can, both from a repair position as well as future products. We have countless people in the field talking to customers at events, trade shows, flyin's etc.

I also still love to build and always will. The gratification as you say is something we cannot get anywhere else. The local clubs are filled with these guys across the country as well. The problem is this is the minority of the business now a days. I really wish it wasn't, but it is.

As for my son, I really wish he would have finished it as well. He loved all of his ARF's that he came up through. He can rig flight controls, set up retacts, and gear up a model. To him that is where he prefers to deliver his "building" as he calls it. Not the same as mine and he is amazed when he watches what I create at times. What he loves is the flying part of it. He flies nearly every day regardless of weather. I have watched him fly in the rain while standing in the garage so the transmitter doesn't get wet. Crazy watching a T-28 come in on final into the driveway and into the garage.

@ blw: I understand that you had a class where students signed up for and paid to build. My question would be would all students in the university want to do that? I sincerelt doubt it. The .5% yes, but the 99.5% no. Hard to acccept the position of one classroom where one had to pay to be a part of as a generalization of what most would like to do. I have a good idea of what our numbers are in the industry and believe me, the kit deal is a thing of the past. When I pay for something I tend to approach it with enthusiasm as well.

I will continue to build until I die. Another unique note is what the new age of modelers calls a kit today. The ARF as we know it is the kit of today. A box of balsa is called scratch building where as in 1980 most who weren't in the hobby would call it a kit. People built stuff then, they do not build today. It is funny, I had a few moderles tell me a few years back that out RTF models were not ready to fly because you had to attach the wing and charge the battery. They felt that was an ARF. New perspective maybe?

Rv7garage

My Feedback: (10)

John- sent you a PM

jquid

Same here, loved just nailing the landings with my Kobra!

carddfann

Another thing I see with only ARF's is that most people just throw them away when they crash (assuming its not a pile of toothpicks) when they could be repaired in an afternoon and for less $$. Replacement arf parts are expensive. The problem is these folks have never ever built a model before so they have no clue how to repair and reapply covering. A few weeks ago, I crashed my 4 star due to interference. Wing had minor damage (which is surprising the way it tumbled) but fuse was broken in half, firewall ripped out, and other structural damage from the nose to half way back. Other guys at the field that day, strictly arf owners (never built), told me to throw it away or order a new fuse. Instead, I rebuilt it in a couple of evenings after work and had it right back out and it only cost me a roll of Monokote and a little glue. I had a bag of scrap balsa and ply (I don't throw any scrap away) to handle the rebuild. All you see now is the seam between the original covering and the new covering. I never looked to see what a new fuse would cost, but I'm positive its more than what I spent to fix it. My Fox engine needed another muffler and needle valve from where it nosed into the hard ground and tumbled several feet, but was ok other than that. The way it crashed reminded me of the wipeout in the old 6 Million Dollar Man opening.

eddieC

My Feedback: (2)

Not always so.  I build kits and also own a few ARFs. Many ARFs are built so light, in deference to e-power, that they suffer much more in a crash than kit-built aircraft. I dorked a Tango ARF a few weeks ago and what should have been a nose-low hard arrival just about destroyed the lite-ply fuse. It folded like a house of cards. [X(] To repair it would be a stem-to-stern undertaking and make it much heavier so, since everything else is OK, will wait on the back-ordered fuse. $75 tho..., ouch.

Twin_Flyer

My Feedback: (4)

I have a Kougar, Kavalier and a Citabria.

All great flying planes.

One of the reason Sigs ARF's disappeared is the company who was making them started to make crap, which started to give Sig a real bad name, so they dropped the line.

They have been sold I think two times now?

Unfortunately, I think, Hobbico, Great Planes, et al, see the market as ARFs #1, as that is what is selling.

I was happy when they bought Goldberg, thinking the kits would continue to be available. Of course that changed to saddened when they were gone...

I also remember reading a comment from GP in one of the magazines several years ago, that stated some of the companies they purchased actually contacted them, asking "Hey, want to buy us?" as an alternative to closing outright...

Bill S.

John Redman

My Feedback: (8)

As found most ARF's cannot take the abuse of a solid built kit model of yester-year. Main reason for this is the use of chinese light ply for starters. It is weak to say the least. Light ply from the US is a much higher grade adn stronger, not to mention the use of 5 ply birch plywood as doublers and such in some klt makes. The ARF's will just crunh and the easiest thing to do is to replace the part. Very similar to the older detroit cars from the 60 - 80's to the newer cars of today. Weights are down with lighter and thinner metal in the car. Better engineering allows them to handle crashes better than our old monsters of the past. Evolution is the word. It is continually happening.

I will say I doubt that anyone out there will ever get an ARF of today to last like a quality Sig, Bridi, Great Planes, Top Flite, or Goldberg kit of yesterday. Those models would go for years! The ARF's of today go for a few years, but now many if flown a lot.

dbacque

My Feedback: (3)