Well? What's the worst kit ever made and why?
For me it was the origional GP Slowpoke. It had the worst wood I've ever seen.

Never ran into a kit that I didn't like. Some are just more work than others.

I have to agree on the Slow Poke. I am finishing the 15 size one as we speak and it has been terrible. Great Planes really dropped the ball on this one. The other one that is a real lousy kit is the Jack Stafford L 19 Bird Dog. Nothing fit what so ever. I have spent the price of the kit again in replacement balsa. I have been told that the new owners have redone it and fixed all the problems. Hopefully so as it makes into a nice plane. Good Luck, Dave

Ditto!

lanier comet, about 80% plastic

Same here the GP slow poke .15 bad engineering and bad wood. The tail which should be light is made out of die cut 3/16 balsa that is so hard it could pass as pine, plus the wing tips are a horrible design.[:'(]
Zach

Going back in history a bit, but the worst kit(s) ever produced were from Berkley.

Orline Tomahawk. Weak structure, hard wood blocks, soft wing spars.

Don

Berkeley kits were GREAT.

Still are. I still build them. Fantastic engineering.

Berkley:

Agreed. The engineering was great, the subjects where great. But.....the wood was like pine and I doubt they ever sharpened the machine that die "smashed" the parts. As a kid, I remember having to scrounge up the money to go buy good balsa so I could cut all new parts. They were terrible kits.

Bish

Nothing compares to the A&A/ Nosen kits. The early Bud Nosen kits were fair but the A&A reproductions are true builder kits--you take the parts and make your own parts!

I know these kits are a lot smaller but anything from Guillows was really bad. They did have some of the best die-crunching around though. Then there was a Jetco kit that was all made of wood that looked like balsa, but weighed in like oak. Sterling had some bad kits too. The Sterling Corsair had real bad wood. The plans and drawings were great.

Dru.

I'm building the GP slowpoke .20 right now and I'm really enjoying it! Knowing is half the battle, so I reinforced the wingtips with a little bit of CF and now there isn't an issue.

I have to agree that the lanier comet kit was horrible.

The One That Gave me The Most Trouble Was The GP Sporster Biplane.The Alining and setup Of The top Wing Was Hell.It Was All Sodered Together[:'(]

The GP Skybolt has the same problem that your Sportster has, bad design.... On the othe hand, has any of you built the Lanier Laser 200? bad wood all around, the fuse sides have this wood that cannot be sanded, and if you have a rough landing it will explode like confety. lanier has some of the worst kit ever, good plans and design, but the materials are really bad

I have to admit, I built the GP skybolt and I have nightmares about it. Not because it was a bad kit, but because it was a difficult kit. My arms were so tired from all of the sanding...but it sure came out purty!!!

I built the Lanier Laser 200. Twice. It remains one of my favorite kits. Excellent design, excellent flyer, excellent materials. The fuse sides are Luan mahogany plywood (as in door skins) very rigid for good, accurate alignment, lightening holes are cut in the aft section. MUCH better than any lite ply for its purpose. I thought the landing gear structure was well designed and took some less than perfect landings in stride. It is, ultimately a superb flyer and not designed to take much abuse. Just my opinion.

I have built kits since the early '60s, and I believe the GP Skybolt to be one the best I have ever built. Yes it is complicated, but the fit was fantastic and I loved the way it flew. I had no problems with the Lanier laser 200. The one I built was 1/4 scale and was a very good kit.

You guys don't realize what good kits we have now. In the 1940s and 1950s we got kits with parts printed on balsa sheets and you cut them out. Die cutting was a revalation until the dies got dull, turning them into "die crunch" as many of the popular Sterling CL kits were.

My first kit was a Comet kit in 1962 or so (I was about 7 or 8) ...exactly as you described. Thank God I discovered Goldberg Models shortly after that or I would have turned to another hobby! LOL!!!

Don

My vote has to go for the World Engines Cosmo 25. The cut outs in the lite ply were a good 1/4" off and the fuse sides were warped worse than anything I have ever seen. I wound up not even using the fuse.

Turbo

Transman11- AWESOME, love that bipe!!

My vote would be...............the wood....... Some/most of the newer kits, GP, Goldberg, TF,Lanier-etc, have such bad wood. I flew my old GP Patriot into the ground, and got one of the "newer" kits. Let me just say , I was heading to the LHS for some new wood. IT was Actually Amazing how bad the wood quality was, and how much I didn't use. I love to build, so problems are actually fun at times, but bad wood sucks... [:'(][:@]

I think I would rather have excellent wood , and have to cut on the blue lines.........

My worst kit was an ACE 4-40 mid-wing sport plane. It was originally a costruction article in Model Aviation, as was its bigger sibling, the 4-60. Ace then picked up the planes for production.

The lite-ply fuse sides and bottom were so badly warped that you couldn't get the fuse to assemble straight. I glued it up and took it back apart 3 times before I gave up - the parts did make good templets to scratch-build a fuse out of balsa. The worked out resonably well as the fuse planes for this kit were printed 1/2 size and there was no Kinkos with their nifty enlarging copier to make full size plans then. Once I got the plane together it was a nice gentle sport plane with a Saito 45 for power.

Anything by Aerotech UK..... all foam mouldings. No-one ever told them they were supposed to FIT together

I had their P-38 and a friend still has their B-25. The instructions for both kits were 90% identical. Fortunately they are no more!!

Regards
Scott

Being a challenge to build doesn't make a kit bad. I did a GP Super Skybolt for a guy and it was a lot of work but came out beautifully. That sexy curved fuselage doesn't come easy! All the parts fit, the plans were good and the instruction manual complete. You really can't ask for more.

Many of the older kits seem to be fine at the beginning of a production run and then go bad as the dies dull. Laser cutting should end that problem eventually.

Ed is right about the kits from the old days, too. I have a set of Comet Sailplane ribs that were so bad (crunched from some real hard, dark, stringy balsa) that my grandfather just used them for patterns, cutting his own ribs from some decent wood.