I did, very long ago.

[link=http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_418054/anchors_418054/mpage_1/key_meter%252Cplans/anchor/tm.htm#418054]2 meter plans[/link]

[link=http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/Typhoon_2000_%28TEMPEST%29_modifications_thread/m_1925854/tm.htm]Tempest[/link]

Trouble is, I'm a part time professional builder and I keep running into this crap. ZN, PL all of them have problems. That's why I have pretty much stopped building for others, I am sick and tired of having to redesign someone else's crap. Wing tubes that break out after 100 flights, firewalls that are just HOSED, delamination, cracks, ridiculous balance and coupling issues, and yes...GREAT (non existant) customer service. And all I hear is how great these things are.....good god people.

I am sick of it, so I am doing something else, on my own. I'm reminded of a scene from Animal House: "THANK YOU SIR MAY I HAVE ANOTHER!!" **WHACK**

No thanks, but y'all enjoy

-Mike

If you guys who are needing parts will give me a call and tell me what parts you are needing from PL, I will ask them to include them in my next shipment of planes expected to arrive at the end of March.

Thanks,

Russell Honea
www.patternproz.com

Thanks Russ, I'm pursuing the problem from a number of angles. Mike

I'm not sure if my comments fit into the thread here, but I called CA Models direct last month about some missing balsa from my Widebody kit. They sounded upset that something was wrong with the kit and were very friendly. About 4 days later, an express shipment from Argentina arrived with everything that I had listed as missing from the kit. I know that express packages aren't cheap from S. America.

FWIW, Patrick Lemonier (PLProd) has declared his bankruptcy late November and is currently being liquidated to pay his debts.
My source is one of his own message posted in the following French forum.
http://forum.modelisme.com/viewtopic...=229960#229960

Regards.

Mike just relax, after 300 or 400 trouble free cheep gas flights on your new Abbra you will see the light, don't loose faith just yet.

Can I use you as a reference?

Good luck, Russ!


How about a replacement fuselage for my Partner which they promised me... and a chin cowl for a Smaragd which I gave them my credit card number for and (LUCKILY) haven't charged me for it?

Ben,

That is NOT what I wanted to hear....

As far as I know, it's true. PL is in a state of flux. Russ may have different information, but then Russ is a distributor of sorts.

As for the rest of us, it's getting silly. On one hand yeah it's cool to have all those euro kits floating around, but on the other hand, what if you need replacement parts? Hey it happens to everybody. Ya lose a canopy over the swamp, your chin cowl shreds off, or you just have a bad off runway landing and poof...you need parts.

They just aren't readily available. What do you do, not fly and wait 3-6 months (or more) praying you'll get lucky? Or order a set of wings (because the wing tubes wallowed out at the end of the tube and almost snapped a panel), pay for it, and then....I kid you not....2 years later have never seen them? Even though they were paid for, and they said "oh they shipped, I can't help you check with the shipper" (who knows nothing BTW)....true story, and one of many (and that was ZN!)

It's getting stupid. The more we rely on high end, overseas airframes, the more we put ourselves at thier mercy.

Or maybe even this: Hey let's get a Focus 2! Umm oh wait they're gone, and my bet is they won't be coming back...just like the Focus 1 and the Temptation....but hey there's the Brio!!! Of course, we haven't heard anything about that since last September...last year sometime......

Some of you guys say there are more options than ever, I say there are less than when I first started the current 2 meter pattern 4 years ago. If you want super high dollar stuff that you have to wait a year to get and then can't get parts for it, sure it's there. But not much else. I'd say the only semi-promising planes now are the Arresti (which is heavy) and the Icepoint (which is basically a Tai Ji with slight mods).

It looks bleak, and getting bleaker every time someone


ahh screw it, rant off.

BTW welcome to RCU Derek, and post more!!! This is where "we" live.

-Mike

Mike,

I am glad that you found a solution for yourself, but there are two problems with it:
1) It does not scale. That is, you could not make a wood Tempest or whatever thing you are working on fast enough, with quality that would suit discriminating customers like myself. Additionally, you would have a difficult time making a reasonable profit, so you would not pursue it in the first place.

2) It is not good enough. We want better stuff. PL and ZN have the formula that we want. They are light, durable, easy to build and finish, the parts fit, and they fly really well. I know several guys who like myself don't sweat the price and purchase two at a time because we appreciate the extra quality. We don't want a heavy wood roach.

Sorry to be blunt, but that is what I am thinking. You don't really have a viable solution. If all I had to choose from was your wood plane, I would stop flying pattern.

Now the Abbra looks like it is a good value for the money, but I am skeptical about whether it has the quality that I am interested in. I'm not impressed by the photos. The weight and size fit the formula. The paint does not, but that does not really matter. What matters is how it flies.

PL, ZN, BN Models and Oxai fit the formula. There are other kits that are a reasonable fit for the money, but the money is not my big concern. Quality is my biggest concern. These guys manufacturing and distributing pattern planes deserve to make a profit. I'm all for subsidizing their effort so that they can provide high quality planes.

Derek, sorry to hear about your troubles. I know of one other person that ordered direct recently that had the exact same experience. Order from a respected distributor so that you are shielded from bad business and bad luck. Do not order direct. Buy two at a time so that you do not have to wait for the next one.

Mike, Pizza, Dick, frugalmaniacs, et. al. -- that is the way I see it. I'm sure you disagree, but there are a lot of consumers like me who are just being quiet about the issue. Money for us is NOT the biggest factor. We demand much better planes like those that I mentioned.


David

DFlynt, I'll be blunt too.

My heavy "wood roaches" are about 10 lbs and under, and have a record of 13 wins, one international, and only 2 placings that weren't first PERIOD. Lower classes yes, but I'll take my wood "roaches" any day of the week over your $1600 can't get parts pieces of garbage. I build the darned things for a living, I should know wth I'm talking about. How are you doing up there in master land? Those euro planes helping you any? Or are they just kool? Legitimate question.

Furthermore, you have never seen my planes up close, so how would you know anything about the quality? Because they're wood? Then why is it everyone raves about the quality of the Japanese planes, and yet they are ALL wood?

If you think ANY plane by ZN or PL is "durable" then you don't fly nearly as much as I do. My #1 roach has almost 800 flights on it since last June, and the only difference is I lost a chin cowl.

One last detail, you may have noticed I'm not the only one. Would you like to know how many copies of those tempest drawings I've mailed out? Hundreds. MANY hundreds. My oh my there's a lot of roaches out there, so obviously our roaches have some appeal. Don't be suprised if you see a couple at the worlds this year, I know of a few teams who are building them.

I found your last post to be downright insulting, ill informed, and somewhat concieted.

Let's see how my roaches do over the next coupel of years shall we?

-Mike

Edit in: I also wanted to add that I'm an A&P, specializing in structures and composites on heavy commercial jets. So I know a few things about composites. I mess with pattern planes because I like the challenge, and I know a few things about building airplanes. I find the notion that "we" want better stuff is very ill informed. "we" do want better stuff, but from what I've seen lately, it ain't the same "we" you seem to be referring to. I'm not selling jack, I'm simply sharing some drawings that make a good plane better. I noticed Bill Ahrens did pretty well with a T2K this past year....

Soon I'll offer up some stuff for people that want something like this, but believe me, I'm not anticipation getting guys like you to build it. But the guys in those 2 threads, (and for every one of them there's 100 that don't post), will have a viable option to these euro kits that people like you are raving about. I never said the plane itself sucked, but they have just as many problems as any other plane, and on 3 different designs the factory wing tube location was in the wrong place and had to be moved.

I actually feel a bit sad for you, because you just don't get it. If you like having the kool toys that's one thing, but don't make the mistake of ACTUALLY believing they are better. They aren't. But they have you fooled, because they do offer some good advantages. The problem with a wood 2 meter kit is the wood needed. It's hard to get in any vast supply. But any problem can be overcome. I do not intend to offer a full kit anyway, but I may offer a short kit and a VERY detailed set of plans and instructions. Just for a few........hundred people........and that suits me just fine.

-M

Guys,

To this point I can tell you that Patrick at PL has met every request that I have asked him to, and in a e-mail that I recieved last week when I was checking on our current order of kits, he made no indication that there was a problem with the company or anything about closing the doors due to liquidation.

He did mention that they were moving to a different facility and would be a little hard to reach until they were back up and running.

I will check to see what Ben has refered to and hopefully report back soon.

Mike,

I'm just being honest. You are not that subtle yourself. I wish you luck in your pursuits.

David

What may be competitive in Masters or below will not be so competitive in F3A. And my so called garbage PL Partner now has 500 flights on it, with none of the problems Mike has described. I know Troy Newman has many hundreds of flights on both Pl and ZN models with none of those described problems.

I still say that you could not build one of the current style, large fuselage, F3A competitive models in wood at anywhere near the weights the PL and ZN kits do. The Typhoon 2000 or the modified version is just not that competive in the current F3A schedules. Is it good model for many, sure, but you won't see it in the finals at the World's.

You guys can all continue to shoot arrows at companies like PL or ZN if you want to, have a blast. But in the extremely small market called pattern they have provided top quality kits of modern design airplanes, flown to top places in the World's, designed by the pilots who flew them into those top placings. And they have done it for probably very little profit for their investment. I'm not trying to absolve them of the apparent problems with some business dealings. But I can also understand how those problems can occur, especially when dealing with relatively small overseas companies directly. That is why when I saw the opportunity to buy 2 Partner kits from Russ I jumped on it. Why when a Lazulite kit became available to me I snapped it up. I know quality when I see it and IMO the PL kits have it.

Mike. I have no problem with your zeal about doing your own thing. In fact, I applaud you for it. But I also fail to understand why you find it necessary to make attacks on others like you do. Oh, wait, I get it now. I just read your signature! VBG

Russ,

Go to the article and run it through a French-to-English translator - you'll get the gist of his problems. From his writings it seems that he is gone from the business - but that may have been "heat" in his head talking.

Tony if you find me attacking others , you may want to read furtehr back and understand why. Personally I don't see attacks. I see opinions, animated opinions, pointed problems with REAL examples, and then extremely condescending insults. I attract it like a magnet, because I do post with a bit of zeal and animation. I speak the same way in person.

In my opinion, they are garbage. As a package. I'm not faulting the quality of the glass work as a piece in itself, but there's much more to it. They have faults, and poor back up should you need it. That's not a good thing for competetive people. Yeah the quality of what you get is good, but $1600+ worth? No. Not hardly. If someone over here were making these things and the price was more reasonable, and you could GET parts when you needed them, that would be swell. But so far, it ain't happenin. IT IS A PROBLEM FOR US REGULAR PEOPLE.

As for "can't get a wood plane that light" that's hogwash. Use heavy wood, get a heavy plane. Use light wood, get a light plane. If you structure it correctly, it works. You're playing with electrics, that's a different ball game, you can afford to give up a lot of structure for weight. Shall I prove it can be done??

I'm glad your's and Troy's planes are holding out fine. Every one around here isn't. I have to make a new set of wings for a Hydeaway now, because the wing tube has wallowed out inside the wing and the support has broken through the skin. And that's with about 500 flights of masters. And this is the second in a row this has happened to. The sockets installed at the factory are too thin, and the supports are insufficient.

I'm fully aware of FAI being a different game. But not everybody plays it, it's not the be-all-end-all of pattern. How many people in the US ever actually fly F-05 in competition? Now apply that as a percentage to those that don't. Point.

As if 2 stroke vs YS wasn't bad enough, here we go with this stuff.

And yes, I am an evil bad monkey man. I disclose that up front. That's so you'll know I am a devil's advocate right off the bat.

-Mike

Edited cuz I misread something. Hey gimme a break, it's after 2 AM and I'm aligning the wings on a wood roach That people tell me is very similar to a PArtner BTW....but wood, and very light....and straight......but I'm fooling myself it's a roach!!!!! Why bother????? Teehee.

One last point, then I have to crash out.

In 2003, Don won the Nats with a Focus. He beat a lot of ZN and PL planes to do it. Last I checked, that Focus wasn't made by PL or ZN, and it was wood. And it was FAI.

As for the worlds, well there's a lot more going on there than just flying, and you of all people should know that Tony. The Nats too, for that matter.

-Mike

their website is down at the moment, claiming it's under contruction, hope they don't go under. My smaragd is magnificant.

I am not sure of the US situation, but while we are at it we should nail International freight costs -- adds 20 - 30% to the cost down here in Oz.

A positive thought -- in such a small market isn't it great to see a set of people abslolutely passionate and committed to what they do'. Sure they dont get it all right as this thread well explores', and they all have different philosophies, and depending on which way you go you commit to investing your time in fixing different things. So I have an old Fascination (scratch built, including belly pan); a ZN Line Hydeaway (great fuz that has survived extreme torture including a mid-air -- on third set of wings -- couldnt get response from facctory first time so have rib templates and good strong wing tube mountings!); and Oxai Impression (awesome initial finish but now beginning to show hanger rash, least work to build, perfectly aligned out the factory but if ever I damage it it is almost in the camp of 'no user serviceable parts' -- it is not a readily fixable structrure and I could never get even close to the paintwork); and an Impact (great in flight -- after wrestling with oval wing tubes, wing warps, and seams that annoy each time you look at them)

What gets me is tha JP is so passionate about the stuff they build (have a look at his swipes at C-ARF), the guys at Oxai will do anything to protect their reputation for finish, Andreas at C-ARF has got closest to low price and responsive parts service, and PL are passionate about their models too (F3A and female!). And then there are people like Mike and a couple down here who take the time to build awesome 10lb wood models that are world competitive -- I only wish I had that skill! The Arresti started that way as a scratch built down here.

We may not be there yet, but with this level of passion and investment in R&D there is at least some hope that we will continue to get a choice of models, make pattern increasingly accessible to budding pilots (and not purely Formula One style for zillionaires or building professionals), and can get the flying to building ratio more on the flying side!!

And until someone gets to the perfect model (which we assume is impossible and will never happen and won't be to everyone's taste) it is great we have a global forum like this where people openly share their views and we all understand and can work around the shortcomings of our purchase decisions.

Happy flying!

David, Is there any info down there on the Arresti, either plans for the scratch built or someone that builds a kit?
thanks

Short answer is I am not sure on availability of plans -- I am not aware of anything resembling a kit. Assuming we are talking about the same Arresti (the somewhat heavy, wooden built ARF) it is a Tom Bloodworth design that his son Bill flew very successfully down here (albeit in lighter, craftsman built mode) -- and Tom licencesd the plan to whoever the guys are building it in Asia. I am not sure what rights that came with etc., but I will track Tom down and ask him if the plan is available.

David

I've seen the ARF version and it is not what I meant. In my humble opinion that is a butt ugly plane. I also have seen photos from contests down there and seen some either kit built or scratch built really good looking ones. Those are the ones I was referring to.

I think there are three different 'generations' and all of Tom'/Bill's were scratch built and looked awesome -- nothing like the ARF.

That's interesting and sad. Can anyone translate the message from Patrick? Thanks, Mike