ARTF costs more in the long run

[Keith Flower]

I've flown and crashed numerous models over the the last years and although saddened or maddened by the crash have found pleaseure in getting them back into the air agian. This has not always been true of the ARTF models I've owned. The skills needed to build from scratch were learened from an early age, many of you will recall Keil Kraft kits consisting mainly of eigth inch square section balsa, sheets of uncut ribs and formers, plans and balsa cement. There have been vast improvements in glues, coverings and die cut kits over the years, which make kit building, scratch building and repairs easier. For me half the joy of model flying is building the models first.

So, I'd like to propose more articles and events aimed at giving newcommers to our sport some building skills.

[David Ashby - Moderator]

Very true Keith - The good old Wot 4 is still a benchmark in strength and durability compared to many modern ARTF models. The popularity of the plans we include in the magazine at RCM&E still testify to the strength and popularity of traditional building here in the UK.

Interestingly when we spoke to the Horizon guys who came over from the US last month they had just visited a UK flying club for a Sunday fly and commented as to how there were more trad built models on the flightline - something they never see back home apparently.....many of the ARTF models we see over here are aimed at the US market of course.    

When you say more articles - do you mean here or in the magazine. It's always a case of getting the balance right of course as we still need to cater for those who prefer building ARTF models - they often try trad building after a while.   

[Steven Houston]

Sounds great, i'm in the process of putting an ARTF together but have purchased a couple of plans to have a go at,ever since i was a kid i always took everything apart to understand how to fix it if i needed i only wish i had known about this sport i only found out about it 3 or so years ago but i'm pretty interested in building my own airframe in fact ive been trying to find as many articles as possible and have found some pretty good ones, now i'm thinking of making solidfoam wings before ive even started 1  lol   maybe i should buy a keilcraft just for the experience and their inexpensive so that is a very good possibility.

Yes,please post as many scratch build articles as you can find,i for one find them fascinating and inspiring.

S.H.

[260 Flyer]

How times have changed! When the WOT 4 first appeared all those many years ago a box of pre-cut balsa and a pair of veneered foam wings was marketed as ARTF! Nowadays for less money than you will pay for one of the few remaining “traditional” kits you can buy a truly finished airframe complete with its shiny and sometimes lurid covering

If you have built the plane from parts, either from a kit or cut from a plan, by the time the plane is in the air you will know the airframe intimately, and will know how to repair all but a total write off. If you have gone into a shop and walked out with a finished model even minor repairs will be a challenge and for many the easier option will be to move on to the next box of Far Eastern promise.

Seeing some of the intricate laser cut ply structures on the current ARTF’s even the most experienced builder would be hard pressed to put one of these back together after a bump.

[Keith Flower]

Message to Steve Ashby at RCM&E

Thanks for your comments, perhaps the mag could have an article or two on how to go about repairing some types of crash damage to ARTF's. Recently I repaired a friens model that had a completly lost it's nose section. I built a simple box section including and engine mount and glued that to the intact fire wall. Then a couple of sections of balso to make something of a nose profile and the model was ready for flight. Not a pretty I must admit, but as ever, once a model is 10 feet away mush of the detail is lost in it's silhouet.

[David Ashby - Moderator]

Steve Ashby....have we got a new recruit?

[Steve Murray]

I've been building models since I was very young, the early 50's in fact. After a break of ten years, I come back to find the magazines, and shops, full of all these ARTF things, with their servos hanging out. (surely not in front of the kids, I hope!) For a quick fix they're ideal, but for real satisfaction you can't beat slaving over a hot workbench with a balsa plane, sneezing from the balsa dust up your nose, to teach you to be very careful with your creation. I don't think you can beat the screams of a 60 diesel in torment either. These fancy battery things just don't make the right kind of noise for me. I suppose I'll have to join the electric brigade though, if only to hide the fact that I build model airoplanes from the neighbours! Sad to think that after 60 years of trying to beat them, I may now have to join them!

[Former Member]

[This posting has been removed]

[Steve Murray]

I spent many happy hours scraping the congealed castor oil from the insides of my glow engines, but isn't setting fire to lipo's an expensive way to heat your workshop?

[Stephen Jones]

Hi all

I remember having crashed a flair meteor 40 which had veneered foam wings and a fibre glassed fuselage . The front end ended up like a broken egg shell and the remainder of the fuselage was split in two a fellow club member turned to me and said well i guess its a bin job now. LOL i glued all those tiny egg shell pieces back together with supper glue then glassed over and inside it . I had it flying the next week good as new and boy was that a fast plane wouldn`t mind another as i sold that one.  

[Pete Rieden]

Keith Flower wrote (see)

The skills needed to build from scratch were learened from an early age, many of you will recall Keil Kraft kits consisting mainly of eigth inch square section balsa, sheets of uncut ribs and formers, plans and balsa cement.

With the "flying scale" series (inaccurately described in both senses, but never mind) the main ingredient was 1/16"sq strip, and yes as a schoolboy I had built all of the KK and Veron ones by the age of 11, moving on to CL when I saved up for my first engine at 12 and RC when I was 14. I have to say that for me the state of modern modelling is summed up in two respects in the mags - this isn't a dig at RCM&E because it must serve its readership, but it shows how things have "changed":

1. Back in the mid 70s a magazine would do a kit review of a fully-built-up RC scale kit in a four page article. This would cover construction, finishing and flying in some detail, with comments on the quality of the kit and the flying characteristics of the model. Today's magazine will cover the assembly of an ARTF kit in two (and sometimes even three) theree to four page articles split over several issues. I almost see it as "this week's masterclass - how to screw in the left hand wing bolt. Next week - moving to the right-hand one!" I'm continually amazed at how much detail the readership seem to need on basic stuff like installing a servo, or bolting an engine mount to a firewall.

2. When the all-sheet small electric jobs (like those of Hawes and Nijhuis) are published as plans it is felt necessary to cover the schoolboy-simple task of carving/planing a section onto a solid wing with between 10 and 20 column inches of instructions. None of these are beginner's models - they would be in what we used to call the "2nd low-winger" category, and the idea that RC pilots can get to this stage without the basic model-building skills is frankly depressing.

[continued in part 2]

[Pete Rieden]

[part 2]

A few weeks ago I was travelling up to a business appointment, driving up on the sunday for an early monday meeting. At one point I saw models flying in the distance, so I headed off to look for them and found a local club field (I won't mention the area because I don't want to embarrass anyone). I parked up and walked out to watch for a while, and saw that this club flew nothing but ARTF/RTF models. While I watched a club member arrived and got a 90-4stroke powered Extra out of his car. He was immediately surrounded by a "posse" and a huge argument ensued. Listening from the sidelines I gathered that this model had been crashed the week before, and the fuselage had essentially broken in two just behind the wing. The argument  was over the fact that the owner had actually *repaired* the fuselage rather than ordering a new one as a spare part. The vocal committee members were heard to say (several times) that it really didn't matter how *well* it was repaired; no repair could be to the original design standard and so repairs were (by definition) a "bodge". They then went on to claim that "repaired" aircraft would obviously be uninsured for this reason.

I couldn't keep out of it, so I approached one of the committee members and asked how this prinicple was applied to kit-built, or even own-design aircraft. He replied that they didn't allow home-brewed aircraft in this club for "safety reasons" as they could never be as strong as "proper professionally designed models", and that in any event as far as he knew all kit built aircraft were subject to the "inspection scheme". After a while it dawned on me that he was talking about the LMA scheme for over-20kg models. This chap had a BMFA examiner's badge on his cap, and I could feel my hackles rising, so I left before getting drawn into someone else's argument!

But are there REALLY places that are this stupid? Are there any real modellers left out there? Am I just a crusty old carmudgeon whose 47 years places me on a different planet?

Mutter, mutter - nostalgia just ain't a patch on the proper nostalgia we had in MY day, I can tell you...

PDR

[Simon Chaddock]

Peter

You have touched on a very thorny subject re insurance and home design and build. I can understand the chaps position but I fear the trend for ever bigger models will eventually lead to the situation where home build = uninsurable!

Nostalgia pah! - when I were a lad you needed special permission to fly any model that weighed over 10lbs.

[Andy Harris]

In our leisure time there are three parameters:

   time --- cost --- quality

Chose any two.  If you're not retired you're left with cost and quality, if you have a family whatever time you have is precious.

In defence of ARTFs, they increase the fly:build ratio.  I prefer to spend more time at the patch than at the bench.  The better a model flies, the less likely it is to be broken.  Technologies like laser cutting and computer stress analysis have given us models that perform better than ever.

However, there are many low value ARTFs out there, mostly likely copies that have never seen more than an accountants calculator.   I have a £40 airframe that may never see the patch.  Why? - Because there is more cost in the batteries/servos/ESC/RX/Motor.

I believe we actually need better manufactured ARTFs, if the cost goes up then hopefully we are repaid by value.  Perhaps that new chappy Steve Ashby can be tasked with seeking out the very pinacle of posh ARTFs?

Regards  Andy

P.S. - Builders are a brilliant and entertaining bunch, I'm definitely in the gratitude department having had a couple of ARTFs repaired for me.

P.P.S - I'd trade a little weight for undercarriage strength. 

[Andy Harris]

Some specifics:

I watched my son go throught the 'solo landing' phase of his training this weekend.  His Graupner Saphira had more than 20 landings/TnGs and at least 5 were rough.  Result - two 5mm nuts and threadlock needed.  (The Saphira was previously repaired by a ninja builder after a 2.4 radio failure).

I've stopped counting (after 100) the flights I had on my PA Addiction.

My son's Mini Pulse also saw the brunt of some landing practice this weekend, no maintenance required.  This Mini Pulse has very high hours in the circuit.

I'd prefer not to name the less sucessful ARTFs.

The common thread in the three above is price.  They are all mid to upper mid-range cost per size.

Cheers Andy 

[David Ashby - Moderator]

Seems like you looked in on a very strange club there Peter, I've never heard of such silliness anywhere else. Point taken about the two-part ARTF reviews, I agree and in truth it's very rare when we now do this.

Andy - who's Steve Ashby?  

[Andy Harris]

David

  Steve gets mentioned earlier in this thread, I believe you may not have noticed him amongst your large staff ..... Andy

[Bob Cotsford]

Quote from Peter:-

"I couldn't keep out of it, so I approached one of the committee members and asked how this prinicple was applied to kit-built, or even own-design aircraft. He replied that they didn't allow home-brewed aircraft in this club for "safety reasons" as they could never be as strong as "proper professionally designed models", and that in any event as far as he knew all kit built aircraft were subject to the "inspection scheme". After a while it dawned on me that he was talking about the LMA scheme for over-20kg models. This chap had a BMFA examiner's badge on his cap, and I could feel my hackles rising, so I left before getting drawn into someone else's argument!

But are there REALLY places that are this stupid? Are there any real modellers left out there? Am I just a crusty old carmudgeon whose 47 years places me on a different planet?"

47?  Old? are you having a laugh Peter?

I currently belong to two clubs, at one almost everything is ARTF, at the other club almost everything is kit plan or scratch built.

Guess which one I prefer to fly at?

I have recently dipped a toe into the ARTF scene, starting with the CMP Cessna I won on this forum.  As this worked out well, after writing off my Acrowot I wanted something I could get in the air quickly so I bought a Katana from a reputable company.    There were a few little niggles, wrong size or missing bolts, poorly applied trim, inadequate instructions (no CofG or initial movement settings, different version of the model illustrated) but it went together and flew quite well.  Ok the u/c ripped off on the second takeoff but it was an easy repair.   At least my repair outlived the rest of the fuselage after an awkward landing (inverted 30 degree descent - whoops).

The damage didn't look bad at first, a clean break behind the canopy.   If it had been a trad bals model, a couple of hours would have seen it back in the air.  Unfortunately on close examination I found the longerons weren't straight grain, meaning that they had shattered over a considerable length.  The liteply skeleton used for the underside and doublers had also shattered, I've never seen such brittle ply.  the fuselage is a total write off.  I wish I'd rebuilt the Acrowot now.

"as they could never be as strong as "proper professionally designed models" - what world was that guy living in?

Bob, a crabby 55 yo

[Former Member]

[This posting has been removed]

[Tony Nijhuis]

Peter....I think those comments would raise my hackles too....this is a classic case of clubs make it up rules on gossip, missinformation and ignorance.......I think the word that discribes these people and clubs......... 'alarmist'......

We need to remind ourselves that RTF/ARFT's have only been truly arround for 15 years. Prior to that the only way to enter the hobbly was to either buy an build a kit, build from a plans or design your own model.....and people did with great sucess.... The early ARTF's were appauling (and some still are). It was one of the reasons why I don't do ARTF kit reviewes any more .........they made my blood boil at the design incompetence.

As for 'proffessionally designed and built model'.....well that implies these designers are qualifieid  Chartered engineers in structure and aeronautics....oh please that just doesn't happen in China, Vietnam nor probably anywhere else ... .....(well apart form yours truly )......

Most notable designer of model aeroplanes are first and formally, modellers who have the 'nack'...its not something you can do a university course in is it! (mores the pity)

Having had over thirty years of design experience and had a kiting business for 20-years, I owe most of my knowledge to the keil kraft kits of the 1960's and 70''s...they are an invaluable part of modelling history

     

[Tony Nijhuis]

peter rieden wrote (see

show so little appreciation of structural and materials engineering that I seriously doubt there has been any stress analyses of any kind - what would you say Tony?

Extremely unlikely...the sort of returns a far east manufacture would get from a run of ARFT kits would not warrent that level of design you could expect from say a car manufacturer. The cost of designing and manufaturing an ARTF is usally recovered in the first 2000 kits or so. Now the manufacture is selling at a 1/4 of retail so a £60 retail kit is being imported for around £15!!! so £3,000 could be the only turnover for that model (if no more are ordered by an importer) which is laughable.....manufactures are not silly so they need to design, manufacture and complete and then move on to the next project quickly....I would think the only stress anlysis carried out is by the test pilot to see if can break the thing!!! .......just my view

Tony

[Stephen Jones]

Wow this is a hot debate

just to put you in the picture i am 43 and i have also been modeling since i was a lad . I started with plastic kits then rubber powered kits , co2 , .049 glow control line moving up to 60rc planes .Building from kits ,plans then my own designs . I remember when veneered foam wings where becoming the norm i hated them at the time as they where heavy any way that`s not really building . well being a dad for some years now means i do not have the time nor the money to spend .well my pride has also taken a back seat for a while now,and i soon got use to foam wings and the like i have had a few ARTF`s as they are the only way i can make sure i have time on the flite line . One ARTF the super air i have just crashed due to engine fail and i had that for over 6 years " ARTF costs more in the long run " how long should they last, i think i paid about £60 i think thats money well spent. Currently i am building an old favorite of mine which i built some years ago from a plan , the fantrainer so all things said , no matter how you arrive at this sport its the taking part that enriches us all . And given time modelers /flyer`s will at some point try there hand at one or the other .

[Andy Harris]

Hot debate indeed.

Tony with previous work experience will know more than most here.  However I feel that the thread is comparing the worst of Chinese designed ARTFs with 150hour builds of ninja Tony designs.

AFAIK the better ARTFs are designed and test flown by companies in the UK, Australia, US etc and then the manufacture is outsourced to China.

A better comparison would be something like the Extreme Flight Extra 58" for £159.95 details

If you cost your build time at nominal £5 per hour (or whatever you feel your worth not to be at the flightline) you'll quickly get to a £500+ versus £180 (allowing for the ARTF complete time).  Thats just the airframe.  Add the running gear and its more like £800 versus £480.

Stephen had his Super Air for 6 years.

Therefore I humbly submit to the thread that the assertion is unjust.  A good ARTF is a strong buy and in fact cheaper in the long run. 

[Ian Holme]

"ARTF costs more in the long run"

 couldnt agree less....

Having just entered my 40th yr and subsequently still qualifying as a Junior at my local club(!) I have been flying rc for 34 yrs, starting out with a Keil Kraft Student (which i "helped" my father build) complete with Horizon radio gear and a Ueda 29 engine....

Over the yrs I seen aeromodelling costs drop to levels unimaginable 20 yrs ago..... i recall the cheapst Acoms 2 channel radio costing £30 back in the early 80s' ................ a basic radio is still the same price now.

I have enjoyed flying all this time but have never much savoured the building side of things, a 3/4 finished Mick Reeves Spitfire i got for my 14th birthday testifying to that! However my father loves building, probabaly much more than actually flying, and his efforts kept me in the air for many yrs.

With the on-set of wife and kids, time and money has been more of the essence than ever for the last 15 yrs and the arrival of economical artfs has been a godsend to me. I have able to fly 109's, P40's Spits all bought for approx £100 and built to standard I could/would never achieve. I have never had an issue with quality on these models, (mainly kyosho) and even a cheapo Giles 202 has given yrs of reliable service.(the only major failure being a recently purchased edf rtf Rafale, which was lost due to poor quality electronics )

Having seen the huge time and effort my father puts into his modelling to this day i truly appreciate the "art" of the aeromodeller and hats off to all those who prefer this route. My father  builds everything from tiny free-flighters, to a vintage Southerner to a home design scratch built turbine powered Supermarine Swift. Given the effort involved in building some of these, I personally would be gutted at the possibility of a total loss! so scratch building is not for me!

(having said that, i have just started to appreciate building those little Guillows free-flighters, first a Chipmunk and now Bird Dog, so maybe all is not yet lost!)

In the end model flying is a broad church and more accessible than ever. For right or wrong the days of 12 yr kids spending their pocket money on a balsa kit and more weeks building are long gone. But if they can access simple aeromodelling via a half decent rtf or artf model they will at least be drawn into the hobby which is essential in the lonf term.

[Bob Cotsford]

also allow for the difference between 'work' and 'hobby' - perhaps we should factor in an additional cost for the ARTF to account for loss of enjoyment/satisfaction in the construction?  If you regard the hobby as one of constructing and flying models, then an ARTF has a lot less intrinsic value than a model you've crafted yourself.  note - not cost, but value.