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<DIV>I always loved the offerings from Hanson (Dick and his son Gy) and probably have more flights and success with Hanson stuff than anything else. The EMC (now available, I think, from Rich Lee) was way ahead of its time, and with a few simple mods will still fly with the current day stuff.</DIV>
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<DIV>In almost 20 years of pattern flying, 2004 was the first time my planes were not of US origin. I am currently flying a pair of Vivats - full composite (FG / balsa / FG) with substantial amounts of prefab. I closely inspected 2 before shelling out the dough for mine, and have closely inspected several others since. The entire structure is extremely rigid and the flying weight is 9.75 lbs. The flight performance and craftsmanship are the best I've seen. It is obviously a very well refined design and has proven to be very durable (500 flights and counting). It isn't cheap, but for the level of quality, I wouldn't expect it to be cheap. Independant of cost, I think the value of the plane is good.</DIV>
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<DIV>Regards,</DIV>
<DIV><BR>Dave Lockhart</DIV>
<DIV><A href="mailto:DaveL322@comcast.net">DaveL322@comcast.net</A></DIV>
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<DIV>Mark there are several threads that have quite a following on RCU about another pitfall of the IMPACT. The egg shell fuselage, unsupported, is prone to compression buckles and broken tails. I have written quite a bit on this subject, allerting all who will listen.</DIV>
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<DIV>The fix is fairly simple at the factory but much more difficult in the finished part that you get in the kit. </DIV>
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<DIV>Yes, CARF did a reat job reducing the price of a nice looking airplane, but the quality has suffered, in my opinion</DIV>
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<DIV>MattK</DIV>
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<DIV>In a message dated 2/2/2005 8:51:26 AM Eastern Standard Time, edbon85@charter.net writes:</DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: blue 2px solid"><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000 size=2>The American kit manufacturers haven't learned the secret. The more one pays <BR>for an item, the harder one will defend it and overlook it's deficiencies. <BR>We had an abundance of American cottage industry kits manufacturers AND <BR>designers, we drove them out of business with the plane of the week <BR>mentality.<BR>Ed M.<BR>----- Original Message ----- <BR>From: "Mark Hunt" <flyintexan@houston.rr.com><BR>To: <discussion@nsrca.org><BR>Sent: Wednesday, February 02, 2005 8:05 AM<BR>Subject: Re: Composite-ARF Impact question<BR><BR><BR>> I'm gonna say it.....just can't hold back.....if an Aires fuse was like <BR>> this we'd be hearing all about how hard it is to find a quality pattern <BR>> kit in the US. Drives me nuts that so many people have been fixing this <BR>> without so much as one bad word about this company.....<BR>><BR>><BR>> there...I feel better.</FONT></BLOCKQUOTE></DIV>
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