Super08

My Feedback: (2)

Thanks Ken, I hope their response is positive. I have a feeling they may shy away though. Most still want a cheap ARF. The standard of living is going up in China and I expect the prices of ARF's to rise as well which may make kits attractive again in the future.

jpmorgan

My Feedback: (12)

I saw a kit go for $305 plus shipping the other day on ebay! Somebody wanted one BAD!!!
I too would buy a 1000 and probably put an AGM 30cc on it. I've got 6 Hitec Digitals just sitting in my Safe doing nothing...
Or to build it as a Twin!

JP

N410DC

I would like to join, if there is room. I just got back into the hobby after a 20 year hiatus. I had an Ultra Sport 40 ARF as one of my last planes, back in the 1990's. Out of a dozen or so planes, it was my favorite, by far.

Anyone know where one might find the ARF version? I saw one on eBay a few weeks ago, but that's about it. I may try building the kit at some point, if an ARF is not in the cards.

RCKen

My Feedback: (9)

I know there were enough interest in the 60 to make it worthwhile to them because they actually did a second run on kits. Great Planes wouldn't have done that if there if the sales weren't there to support it. Back then I asked if there was any chance that we would see a US 1000 run and Art told me we would probably see see snow on the equator first. I take that as a sign that it's not likely that we'll see a US 1000 kit run from GP. But I can always talk to Art about it. I'll see Art in Toledo April 4-6 at the show. I'll report what he has to say.

One of my side projects that I've been working on it is a "cheap" CNC router. When I get that done one thing I want to do is copy off a Ultra Sport 60 or 1000. The reason I want to copy it is for the twin that we were talking about about. I would be great for copying all of the parts from kit and reproduce them for a twin. But once I have a 1000 scanned in I can reproduce them as I need them. Don't ask me to copy them for you because I won't unless I have the blessing from Great Planes (That's actually how I met Art Pesch, I'll tell you the story if you ask me). But by the copyrights on the Ultra Sport I can produce as many Ultra Sports for myself as I want, and I can definitely do a twin for sure

Let me clear up one thing about myself. I do a lot of things "cheap". Anybody that knows me personally knows why I am the way that I am. I always find the most inexpensive way that I can to do things. Is it because I don't have the money?? Not at all. Money really doesn't have a lot to do with it. My mom grew up as a farmer's daughter. Anybody who grew up in that lifestyle knows that they never spend money if they can find ways of doing it otherwise, and they never EVER throw anything away. And my mom passed down to me. And that's how I do things in this hobby. So when I do things like trying to design and build a CNC router I do with that in mind. I could easily go out and buy a CNC router and do it that way. However, in my real world business of running a computer shop we recycle computers and equipment so I am stripping down the printers for the stepper motors and controllers inside to build a CNC router out of to build myself a CNC router.

Ken

Quikturn

My Feedback: (12)

For those that want a US1000 real bad, perhaps you could enlarge plans from a US60 to build the fuselage and have Eureka cut some foam cores for it.

http://www.eurekaaircraft.com/foamwings/wing-u.htm

i would like to see how those rounded nacelles are made for the twin. If anyone can share that I would appreciate it.

RCKen

My Feedback: (9)

Be very very careful here. This is exactly how I initially met Art Pesch from Great Planes. A laser cutting outfit I know was cutting the Ultra Sport from RCM plans and the lawyers at Hobbico contacted him and shut him down. I called Art and we had many discussions about this. This is where I learned about all the legalities of plan copyrights work. It's legal for me as an individual obtain the plans for an Ultra Sport, but since Great Planes owns the copyright to those plans it's illegal for another company such as Eureka to make money off of those plans. And trust me, Great Planes will go after them if they think that they are making money from them. I know that stinks but that's the world that we live in.

Ken

sdcranford

My Feedback: (4)

Which seems kind of silly since they're not trying to make money on the US1000 as of right now. I already have 2x 60 size and 1x 40 size. I'd buy at least 2 1000s if they made the kit again.

BelAirBob

N410DC, I think Tower still has the US40 and 60 kits. You may want to get one while you can and save back if you can not find an ARF. These were all pretty easy to build and a self build one usually holds up much better than an ARF

Quikturn

My Feedback: (12)

Eureka only cuts foam core wings for all the US series. Great Planes/Hobbico doesn't do that. Some people prefer to build them that way anyways. Just order and/or buy the plans on your own and enlarge them to US1000 size is all I said. If someone wants a US1000 bad enough that would be one way to go.

Seems a shame Hobbico will not produce the kit. They should at least sell plans for it then.

ascalise

My dad and I built a US100 back in the early 90's and put a brand new OSMAX 1.08FSR in it. We wore that engine out twice flying that plane. I still have the plane after all these years it has never crashed. Since then it has had an ST2500 back to the OS108 and now has an ST2300. I didn't like the plane with either ST in it, it never flew or ran the same. The only ST engine i've had that was worth a crap was the 45ABC. I'm just now getting back in to the hobby and would really like to squeeze a gas engine in my US1000. I am so far behind in this hobby now I don't even know where to start.

Sandyt

Hi guys. Just finished reading all 89 pages of the thread . I was lucky enough to buy one of the original US 1000's that were ever built, as its the one that GP used for the pictures in the manual! It was used by Hobbico as one of their demo planes when they went to the shows, so it was covered beautifully and equipped with the OS FS-120 SP supercharged engine. I got it in 1998. I used to TRY to fly it with some regularity, but I was never able to keep that 120 running reliably. I probably only landed it under power about once in ten flights haha. Well, I got tired of seeing it just hang on the wall, so about a year ago I swapped out the 120 SP for an OS 120 AX two stroke, which has more power than the four stroke and about 100 times the reliability. Plus it is much lighter.

I would post some pictures, but after all these years it badly needs to be recovered. I have a bunch of ugly patches on the wing as I wasn't going to go to the effort of recovering it if the 120 AX didn't work out. I hope to get it done in the next year or so, but I have several projects ahead of it. BTW, I also replaced the old mechanical retracts with some HD Robarts, and they have worked flawlessly flying off paved runways.

Glad to see that there are still a bunch of guys flying these planes. I would be proud to be part of the brotherhood, but I am not exactly sure what number is up next?

SandyT

jrf

My Feedback: (551)

Ken:

Great Planes does NOT own the rights to the RCM plans. RCM does. He must have been using the kit plans. I suppose that is a distinction without a difference, because he shouldn't have made them from either set, but the RCM plans are still available to anyone who wants to build an UltraSport 1000.

Jim

RCKen

My Feedback: (9)

Jim,
Actually, they do. Trust me, I have made this very same argument with Hobbico/Great Planes because they were stopping a kit cutter from cutting a kit that I wanted to get a copy of. And that is where I met Art Pesch. We spent a lot of time on the phone, and then later on in person in Toledo when I finally got to meet him in person, and he explained to me in detail. Here's how it legally breaks down. Yes, RCM owns the copyright to the Ultra Sport. And as an individual and I purchase the plans from RCM, heck I can even get them out of the original RCM magazine, and I can cut my own kit from those plans to my heart's content. And that it perfectly legal. However, Great Planes has purchased FROM RCM the commercial copyright to those plans. And that commercial copyright means that Great Planes, AND ONLY Great Planes, can use the plans to produce a commercially produce a kit. They have basically locked out anybody else from using those plans to make kits from. It's done all the time with many different kits in this hobby and it's not something new that was done just for this kit here. Yes, you can buy a copy of the Ultra Sport 1000 plans for yourself and you can cut your own kit. But what you can't legally do is start cutting that kit and selling it to make money on it.

If you think I am making this up you are more than welcome to do the exact same research I did in all of this. Trust me, I didn't like to see Great Planes stopping a kit cutter from making a kit I wanted. I called Art every name in the book and told him that if they didn't like it then they should produce the kit again. Anyway, tomorrow morning call Hobbico (217-398-3630) and ask for Art Pesch. Ask him about the Ultra Sport and the RCM copyrights and he will be more than happy to explain to you the legalities at play here. You will find that Great Planes does have legal rights in play and they will take actions if they feel companies are breaking what is at play here.

Ken

smkrcflyer

So can you make changes to the US60 plans let's say as a twin and sell them?

jrf

My Feedback: (551)

smkrcflyer: Yes, you can. The language of the law say that the new item must not be "substantially the same". A twin certainly is not.

Ken; I have a greater interest in the ownership of those RCM plans than you might think, since I drew them. I don't remember the exact arrangement that was made with Great Planes at the time (it was a long time ago) but I think I will call Art Pesch and see if he can refresh me.

By the way, Great Planes has trademarked the name "Ultra Sport". No one can use that commercially.

Jim

Quikturn

My Feedback: (12)

I suppose you could make improvements to the plans/design and call it something else. Case in point: Sig Four Star 60 & BTE Venture.

Personally I'd move the canopy further back and maybe add spring gear to the fuselage just forward of the wing.

RCKen

My Feedback: (9)

Personally I wouldn't change anything at all to the design one bit. I don't know if any of you have seen the Ultra Sport + that came out a while back. I was put out by Great Planes and like you all here there were a lot of little tweaks to it that were done to the design. And I can tell you I have never seen a more utter failure when it came to a plane. Let's face it, the Ultra Sport is a plane that just got it all right, and and if you go and start making changes to the design you're very likely to design out that special "mojo" that made the plane so special to start with.

As far as the legalities of changing the design and the selling it as something else. Sure, you can do that. I can take a Ford F-150 and make changes to it and call it something else and sell it. But I'm still going to hear from Ford's legal department somewhere in the process.

Ken

tassiemark

Hi again, I posted yesterday about what appears to be an Ultrasport clone coming from VQ models,I thought I might grab a pic and show you,for those that want an ARF this looks like an Ultrasport copy to me,if it is currently being sold here in Australia there is no reason why it wont be available in the US either,some might prefer it not to be of course,however I have seen pics with the battery fitted under the removable canopy so electric is finally not a problem for this type of bird if one so wished to go down that track.

Twin_Flyer

My Feedback: (4)

if its too close a copy I bet it wont be available here.

Tower carries the Phoenix brand but not the entire line. A few come close to the Goldberg Tiger (even called a Tiger) but tower wont import them.

http://phoenixmodel.com/Product.aspx?CatId=88

Wouldn't be surprised its due to it being too close a copy (Tiger 3)!

Probably be too much to order form a hobby show down under and have it shipped to the states, Love ARC type kits!

Bill S.

N410DC

I agree. If GP has no current or future plans to produce kits to the public, why won't they let someone else do it?! They can't argue that they are loosing money (or that they will loose money in the future.)

Not a bad idea. After reading this thread, it seems GP may pull the kits off the market at some point.

tassiemark

The thing is down here GP kits are EXPENSIVE to say the least for what they are,SIG is available when new shipments come in but I suspect GP kits are shipped en mass and maybe only every year or three to the distributor here so they can afford to sit on them for a while at high prices, if I can get an ARC clone complete with hardware that the kit wont even include for around $100 less than the US kit it will be a no brainer to get the ARC clone, then check it out and add extra glue or re-inforcement where necessary
in its bare bones (maybe do it as an electric) and cover it with a much nicer covering than what VQ provide ( ie not their cruddy stick on covering) as I have plenty of rolls of Ultracote and Monokote not doing anything at the moment.
But I do promise not to ever call it an Ultrasport though! hehe

WI53072

I was thinking of putting together a .60 size Ultra Sport but am hesitant to mess with glow anymore. Is there a good electric conversion?

rglgatortail

My Feedback: (7)

Quote from RCKen in post #1 "We ask that all proudly display their Ultra Sport Brotherhood # in their signature lines. Let's all tell the world about this great plane and bring more into the brotherhood!!!"


Updated Roster

1. Ken Isaac - RCKen
2. Mike Buzzeo - Minnflyer
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152. winybakken
153. jpmorgan
154. Scully7272
155. balsatermite

That number is yours remember to put it in your signature

Navy18

My Feedback: (4)

Great to see you back on Ken… I thought Minnflyer was an excellent example of what RC modelling is all about; enthusiasm and a willingness to help. I would like to follow your thread as well.

scottrc

You got me thinking of trying a .60 electric.

In regards to the 1000, with the push for big planes, it is surprising GP wouldn't look at another production run of the 1000. I don't neither the storage space or transportation space for the big planes so I've been happy with the .40 and .60.