hpiguy

If you want a great plane that's made 100% in the USA, go Stevens Aeromodels. Easy to build kits, fly great and made in CO, USA. I have two of his kits and will be ordering more. Granted, he also sells GWS stuff to power it, but so what. GWS has always worked well for me at half the price of the American "branded" items made in China.

As for the Chinese stuff being better in quality control, yeah, you pay more for the PZ brand, but it is REALLY that much better? You pay $199, I pay $59, are you getting a $140 better plane? I guess my personal opinion is no. It is marginally better in quality and the directions are in better English and that's it. I'm not willing to pay some guy $140 to talk to me on the phone if my ESC doesn't work. For my $59 plane, I can just buy a new ESC for $6 if it fails or a new motor for $8 and servos for $1.99 and get back in the air. And what is the chance of 23 ESCs or 17 motors or 70 servos going bad to equal the price?

Hobby City/King will warranty their items as well by the way, so your claim that they are hard to deal with is false. Send them an email, you send the ESC back, they send you a new one.

I guess, in the end, I buy what I want, you buy what you want. For the same price we each spend on the hobby, I'll have three times as many different planes to have fun with is all. [8D]

When I biff my $59 plane into the ground, I won't cry nearly as much as you do for the $199 plane. And when it's in the trash, the garbage man doesn't care what foam was used.

Having fun out there is the main point of the hobby!

Wheelnut

My Feedback: (81)

Thanks for everyone's opinions. We are all entitled to one

My problem is I want to have one of everything. I want to see what it is like to fly each and every plane, Except for the gas and nitro, you can have that. I used to like it, but after going electric, I will never go back.

I wish the Manufactures in the US would get competitive, but they have huge hoops to jump through like liability insurance, workman's comp, unemployment insurance. Ridiculous real estate prices, the list goes on and on. I feel sorry for them, but that doesn't mean I should suffer.
We, the middlemen of this Country already suffer enough.
The best advice I could give to US suppliers, is to go for low margin high volume sales. and good luck to ya

hpiguy

I also like that the Chinese companies listen to us and make what WE want, not what a guy in marketing who doesn't even fly or drive r/c THINKS we want. Such as PZ making the new micro Cub three channel when everyone wanted it four channel. Or Great Planes making the Playmate with only a junk radio/charger when we wanted it bindable to other radios they sell.

The Chinese guys for example with the Heng Long r/c tanks. Each time we ask for a new model, they make it really detailed and sell it for a reasonable price with the features we asked for.

LarryV

I have two of the Stevens Aeromodel Soar Stick wings which were very nice to build and fly great and I'm about to order the "FredE" for my grand kids. I have had to return a charger and a battery to Hobby City. It took me about three weeks to get the RMA then over three months to get the replacements. To me this is entirely too long to wait and when you figure in the shipping cost and aggravation factor its better for me to buy locally. If I buy from my local hobby shop, if something is wrong they will either fix it or replace it immediately.

Wheelnut

My Feedback: (81)

The time Factor doesn't bother me, and it has never taken me 3 weeks to get my stuff from Hobbycity. I plan ahead. When I order, I order extra stuff that I might need for any of my planes. It is all so cheap, I can order twice the stuff and still pay half the price. All of my planes are foam park flyers and will all take relativly the same stuff. As for the plane itself, it is cheaper to buy a whole new plane than it is to buy seperate wings or a fuse.
Another very important piece of this puzzel, is I don't have time to build nor to I like to build. I like to fly. So ARFs are best for me. I like PNP the best. Just put my receiver in and go fly. Try to get one of those in the US for $59.00..........ha good luck

I checked out Stephens models and he doesn't have any ARFs or PNPs, so his stuff isn't going to work out for me. Thanks anyway.

hpiguy

That must be very nice having them take care of things. MyLHS has some good guys in it, but most are not into park flyers, and when youdo want a park flyer, you are seen as a newb or lower class than the big nitro kit builders.

And when something breaks, you are told "Call the manufacturer, they handle the warranty on those toys".

Wheelnut

My Feedback: (81)

My Local hobby shop doesn't have anything as far as plane parts that I ever need. They always say, I can order it for you. Ha.. I can order it myself for less

illustry

I have had this plane for a few years - got off ebay.  Have put well over 100 flights on it and it's one of my favorites.  I have crashed and rebuilt at least 20 times and it was/is a fantastic "trainer" for a low-wing.  I never used anything other than the servos as far as electronics though.  I would expect the stock setup to be barely flyable.  My setup is a 2212-13 from BP hobbies, 9x5 GWS prop, 1350ma 20c lipo, and some customization to the nose to create a more accurate SNJ look - cut off about 2 inches of foam, and added a painted cowl from the electrifly corsair in place of the original.  Note the mods in the pic - really makes it look a million times better.  If I had lost it, I would have bought another, but I have never seen a crash that this EPO couldn't be rebuilt from.  A great plane.

Wheelnut

My Feedback: (81)

Welcome to the club
I still have mine as well and it is a great plane and is still one of my favorites