A MISSED OPPORTUNITY

[Lee Smalley]

I think its fair to say that traditionally built kits have been making a bit of a comeback of late and as a massive fan of these type kits, its great to see...but (and here is the rant) why are we still blighted by kits with instructions that you wouldn't wipe your ehhhmmm with, its utterly frustrating that we have great designs and models and yet hardly anyone will ever build one because they either don't know they exist or the if they did the instructions are so bad there chance of success is fairly limited... and why ...lets face it every man and his dog has a computer and a digital camera (although the dog may struggle to take the piccys) and so it can't be hard to actually create a decent and picture laden manual can it??  indeed some have actually done it !!!    but far too few have made the leap into the 20th century, i cant help but think this is a missed opportunity to get a toe hold in the kit sales and for what a day or 2 of typing !! seems daft to me !!

 

let me know what you think and what kits you have tried and what you thought of the instructions etc....come on lets tell em what we think!!  good and bad  

[Peter 'Ivanna Crashalot' Savage]

It can be great fun reading Chinese -> English manuals, stuffed full of engrish! Thats what you use to entertain yourself, after you have built it from common sense and are waiting for the maiden!

[Myron Beaumont]

Lee

I like your "rant" as you put it .I think that you /we have to take into consideration the different sorts of modellers that there are out there.I think we all know on this (& other forae ) there are the old'uns like me that get as much out of building as flying (engineering /creative types ?) & then you have the AIGARTF peeps (Almost Instant Gratification ARTF 'ers ). I for one was like a kid with a new toy recently when for the first time in my life I bought all the wood I'll ever need for ever with which to build models, , Regarding instructions etc . I too (as the owner of just one Vietnamese ARTF ) would have had a few problems had I been a beginner. I think that if I was after instant success / gratification ,it would never have happened & I would maybe have bought another computer game /mobile phone etc or whatever it is they can or cannot aafford to spend their money on ! 

Sorry but I 'm getting Grumpy again . Three people never turned up today to see the house for sale (could have been flying )

[kiwi g]

Lee I do agree with what you are saying .some kits and arfs have shocking instructions.

I enjoy a kit with no instructions. if theres a good plan and the woods in there then thats all you really need.     I find with the abc sort of building eg greatplanes and sig kits that I end up building in a  b a c d way and rarely follow the order unless needed.

Its more like scratch building without the scratch.

[BB]

Nice rant Lee, well put  .  Personally I don't mind a kit without photos or instructions providing the plan set is up to standard.  Too often though what is missing in photos &/or instruction is also missing on the plan.  This does then make things difficult.  Then again, some might argue that this forces one to think for him/her self.  Which isn't a bad thing.

 

Plan building aside there are some truly terrible ARTF instructions about aswell.  The Wot Trainer instructions contains reversed photos.  If, one copies the photo instructions, a mistake is made.  The instructions don't tell you that Ripmax have pre-drilled (cnc'd) holes for dowl rods.  So that the wings can be held on with bands !  Just one example.

 

BB

 

 

[Biggles' Elder Brother - Moderator]

In general I agree with Lee. I'd love to see more people having a go at "real" kits and I often try to encourage it on here and down the club, waxing lyrical about the satisfaction of flying a model you've really built yourself. But what lets it down are the terrrible instructions in too many kits. As you say Lee - a real chance missed given that British manufacturers have so many potentially great kits they could re-launch. Note I'm talking about British kits with rubbish instructions - not overseas! And I think that is what Lee meant as well.

 

If, as might be the case, the owners of the rights to these British kits are not computer literate enough to put a decent set of illustrated instructions together then maybe there's a great business opportunity for a younger builder to do it for them - and so do us all, and the British modelling industry, a great service!

 

BEB

[Richard Wood]

Good point Lee.

Many of the builder's kits still available were designed decades ago

when a manufacturer could call a kit 'ARTF' if it had a glassfibre fuselage

& veneered foam wings. Remember the Waterhouse & Ely Superfly?

MIne took 6 weeks to finish!

The contents of some kits have improved over the years with cnc cutting

etc. but the plans & instructions remain as they were originally - when to

be a flyer you also had to be a builder by necessity, or get it done by proxy.

Most flyers today have not done a 'Keil Kraft apprenticeship' & do not know

the smell of dope!

A few years ago a pal tried to build a glider kit, got so far & gave up - it was

 too hard.

He couldn't get to grips with the way it went together.Formers,longerons,spars

etc were all alien terms.It was his first & last model & his initial enthusiasm

turned to bitter disappointment.

What he needed were a few photos or even just some decent construction

drawings & he could have made a better fist of it.

Kit manufacturers would do well to take heed & revamp & revise their

approach to instructions.

 

 

[kc]

For me the worst example of lack of instructions is the plan articles in magazines.  The lack of information is terrible.  And to make matters worse the articles about ARTF models are longer and more comprehensive than the plan articles in the same magazine!  Ridiculous!  ARTF reviews should occupy far less space and merely state whether the plan is good or bad and why.

This lack of instructions and the exorbitant cost of plans will kill  plan building. Then who will buy magazines?

[Biggles' Elder Brother - Moderator]

KC, surely there is a big difference between a plan and a kit.

 

In a kit, no matter how complex, the buyer reasonably expects some good quality guidance and instructions. In the case of a plan this is not so. It is assumed that anyone building from a plan will have had a good number of complex kits under his/her belt already and would be fully familar with most standard biuld techniques. So a plan shows all the constructional detail on the plan itself, it will only go into instructional detail where what is being proposed is very original, non-standard or can't be shown through the medium of a drawing. Plan articles are the same  - the article only really deals with a brief summary of the build highlighting only any very critical or unusual steps.

 

But this is all the more reason why kits need good instructions. Kits are the apprectiship that leads to plan building. Once you can build a complex kit well - and even feel confident about put in the odd modification here and there - then you ready to try a plan. And plans open up a huge range of possibilities - tens of 1000's of models - choice and variety well beyond anything the ARTF industry can even dream of!

 

BEB

[Lee Smalley]

Richard make a very good point and gives an excellent example, most kits still around do have the original plan and instructions that they had when first released and its just not up to the job anymore, and seriously how hard and how much cost would it be to assemble a manual on your PC with digital photos and print them of on your printer, its not even if you have to get a printer to do it, you can leave the plan as it is just upgrade your instructions, in our great mag we have read the encouragement "why not try a traditional build over the winter months"  and to be honest that’s a good tactic when you can't fly ....build!!

but how many ARTFers are going to pik up that trad kit open it up take one look at the instructions typed(badly) on a few sheets of A4 and put it quietly back on the shelf

 even the new releases (jamara) have reportedly got instructions you would not wipe your ehhm on

 lets face it in the 80s American kits were the best out there, and we are still some way off that standard and its 2010!!

 many years ago i built a Chris Foss wot4, has that been updated ????  has anyone built one recently

 KC i think because plans are aimed at those who can already build maybe that’s why there is less description, not only that remember that a mag only has so much space available on each issue and if the plan builder described each move in detail 1. the reader would prob have nodded off and 2. we would have no room for other great stuff .

maybe if a plan is to be a feature then there could be expanded instructions on the web for download after the plan has featured in the mag!! subscribers only even !!

maybe the mighty G might consider it

 all hail the mighty G

Edited By Lee Smalley on 18/06/2010 11:30:43

[David perry 1]

I suspect it all comes down to Britishness!  " Ee by gum, chuck t'balsa in a box wi a few notes and let 'em sort it owt at 'ome".  Versus the Americaness ..." Glossy pics? Check  pretty words? Check.  nice box,? check! big photo? Check! Decent balsa?, erm..."

 

But I agree with you, our presentation and manuals leave us sadly placed.  

 

D 

[A.A. Barry]

KC, i agree......" For me the worst example of lack of instructions is the plan articles in magazines.  The lack of information is terrible.  And to make matters worse the articles about ARTF models are longer and more comprehensive than the plan articles in the same magazine!  Ridiculous!"

I have long been a Balsa basher, and then a nice plan comes along in a mag. most of the space is taken up by pics of it flying , landing , and so on, not much in the way of "how and where to start", and what REALLY, ummm CHEESES, me of is those iternal words " for the exprinced builder only" , how do you get ......that word, ex...... if you don't try, already, the mind says.....ummm "nice but there is not much info here, so you down below" , "look for an easier one", we the turn the page and forget about that "nice "plan

A.A.Barry 

[A.A. Barry]

wrong site

Edited By A.A. Barry on 18/06/2010 12:43:10

[David perry 1]

AAB I think youre being a tad over reactive here.  Firstly, one gets the experience by doing, but if the plan you want to build is simply unbuildable by you then try something different! The same is true of that first plane isn';t it? All the new guys want a spitfire, but we still tell them to try a simple 2 channel jobby...and for good reason!

 

So, if you cant make head nor tail of a particular plan, dare I say it is beyond you? Try something easier and come back to the "for experienced builders only" later. 

 

As for lack of instructions with a plan...well, it IS a plan!  A builder is supposed to interpret the drawing and build off that, with some advice perhaps about areas the designer thinks are novel or particularly taxing (probably because that same area taxed him in the design stage!).  Personally I HATE being told how to build from a plan and I always have! I like to read the drawing and do it in my own manner, which is why I loath American style "glue A to b" style instructions.  

 

I think what you are really talking about is summed up in one word:   kit. 

 

You say you have long been a balsa basher...but you can't build from a plan? Methinks you doth play Devil's advocate Sir! 

[A.A. Barry]

David P , I suggest you look elsewhere on the  site for my creditials, I was mearly agreeing with Kc, about the lack of information in mags when it comes to a "plan" in which other not so other talented builders find

Thanks for your comments

Barry

Edited By A.A. Barry on 18/06/2010 12:36:50

[Lee Smalley]

in the olddays though the traditional process was build few kits and then progress onto a plan, and in them days of hovis and marmite you could take your pick from hundreds of kits, that sadly is no longer the case so if you want somthing particular then you have little alternative but to buy a plan!! but how can we get more kits on the market when the ones we have are so woefully presented to the ARTF masses that might ....just might try a trad kit,

 

i am building a DB spitfire at the moment and the kit quality is absolutely excellent but even here a few piccys of the most complicated areas would be extreamly helpful, instead i have to resort to build blogs and learning from other peoples mistakes.

 

not the best really

[A.A. Barry]

Lee, I agree, Ithink it is all to do what is popular, and let's face it, how many kits are around for the......Stuka, raider tyhoon tempest , beufighter, do 335, untold amount ,but they do not sell, it is a sorry world when production only caters for the majority

e.g .... local butcher, the corner store, hand made colthes, enen the paper boy on the corner "read all about".. yep it's now of to the that big impersonal complex, that takes hrs to find what you need, and genaraly you have to search the web to get it.

"boomers where blest with the best"

 B

[Lee Smalley]

true but if you offer somthing that people might want IE a 40 sized (or electri**) equiv sportster and present it well and very throughly then you could tempt a few more to have a dabble and then if sucessful have a go at somthing not so mainstream, its all about presentation and good design get these right and you may have somthing , sadly it seems we are only good at one of those things

 

[Grahamd]

No matter how good the kit, (or plan) builders (US) are a very small minority in this day and age. No matter how good the kits are (Skyshark in the USA is an excellent example of great cad drawn plans, excellent laser cut parts, and top quality parts, with impressive written (and downloadable) manuals with pictures) that the number of people purchasing them is dwindling. Skyshark have stopped making kits, why ? the numbers were just not there, plus the cost of quality parts in the box (laser cut, manuals etc) made the price higher than a chinese ARFs.....

Sad as it is, this is now the future

[Biggles' Elder Brother - Moderator]

Graham the problem is that because they've never built one a lot of folks don't appreciate that the sort of kit you are refering to may be more expensive than a cheap ARTF - but it will also, in many cases, build up into a much higher quality model - particularly in terms of longeivity.

 

Lee opened this thread by saying that there does seem to be a glimmering of a growing interest in Trad Kits. I agree with him. I think som people are getting bored with the same 25 prototypes being presented in ARTF form over and over again. So I don't think exclusively ARTF is necessarily the "the future". But I do think that unless the trad kit manufacturers get their house in order and sort out instructions then they will snuff out this fragile resurgence as quickly as it started - and that is the missed opportunity Lee is refering to. As he says - it doesn't take much. The kit is already there and its a great design, the part cutting already done. How much effort is a couple of pages of decent instructions and perhaps an email address for any remaining questions.

 

If you want to see this aspect done well by a UK company take a look at BritFlight - smashing instructions, good on-line support. OK, they are not manufactuerers of traditional built up kits -  but those that are could learn a thing or two from the BritFlights of this world about customer care. It proves the "Brits" can do it.

 

BEB

[kc]

My point still is its crazy when more space is given to ARTF reviews than plan articles!  The sparse instructions will mean less and less people building from plans. 

I have to say Peter Miller's articles give quite good instructions. 

 

I started RC when David Boddington was editor of Radio Modeller and his RM Trainer article (in 1984 ) gave enough info to build from the plan. In addition the Plans Handbook also had articles about building from scratch.  RM then RCME, RCSQ, AMI, MF & FSM were all at their peak for content when Boddo was editor.  He knew what modellers needed and wanted.  Current editors take note!

 

[Biggles' Elder Brother - Moderator]

Well KC you wont find a dyed in the wool balsa basher like me arguing with a proposal that says the mag should give more space to plan building and less to ARTF's - I'll vote for that

 

BEB

[Lee Smalley]

well to be fair to RCM+E they have listened and they do seem to be putting more trad building articles in the mag totally traditional column is one example the more exposure that the mag gives to this type of kit then the more chance that people will give it a go, but still we come back to the quality, exposure is great but if the quality is lacking then exposure is pointless even detrimental

 

granted there are a few British company's that seem to have got there finger out  and brought kits into the 21st century but to be honest i have yet to see one that i would actually buy they are either ugly made from foam or both !! 

[David perry 1]

Posted by kc on 18/06/2010 15:23:22:

My point still is its crazy when more space is given to ARTF reviews than plan articles!  

 

 

 

Probably accurately representative of market share / customer spend though.

 

D