Blade Heli spares - UK price rip off

[Rick Rotorhead]

Just had a look at RCHover.com. Can't belive how cheap the spare parts are in the US. I reckon that even allowing for the currency conversion our spares for the small Blade/HB2/Twister machine are about 3 times the cost. Why? Example: tail motor heatsink - US $1.99 UK £4.50 (almost seven Dollars!!!). The whole retail trade in UK has too many 'middle men' taking too much profit. Gaaaaaa I get so angry, I mean the whole heli is really just a few bits of moulded plastic - how can it cost 200 quid? I wonder if I could just order parts direct from Uncle Sam' and save a mint?
(Unless UK port authority/customs get excited over the import and slap a huge duty on the parts - which would never surprise me) Gaaaaa :arggg:

[Rogan]

Shipping costs are very high too. I paid $20 on a $25 servo. :/

And that's reasonable...

[Rick Rotorhead]

Yeah, bottom line is they got us by the short n'curlies - if you want it you just gotta pay up. Thing is, if you order a DVD or something like that from the US the shipping cost is usually pretty reasonable, like about 4 quid. I think its a case of 'R/C hobbies are known or supposed to be expensive' so all vendors and distributor middle men just hike the prices accordingly to whatever they think the public will pay or what they can get away with. I bet if you could buy a heli direct from the mfr at cost price it would be ridiculously cheap - but, of course most mfrs simply won't supply to private individuals, those that do add a big mark up to prevent you wanting to short circuit the normal retail 'system'. Its a kind of price fixing. Its not just R/C hobbies that suffer either - its all consumer goods actually. I digress, but you know like car headlamp bulbs sell for around £6 or so, but the mfr (eg:Ring/Osram) sells them in bulk into the trade system for like 50p a throw. Sickening. So when you go and buy that new OS engine for £80 how much do you think the OS company actually got for it? not much! I'd guess £25, if that..... So, for cheap R/C Heli flying just register yourself as a Ltd company and become a one man hobby shop, then enjoy all your purchases at 30% off what you'd normally pay (Ok, so you then gotta do tax returns etc). Seriously, I suppose a flying club could become a 'retailer' to its own members and sell stuff at no loss cost prices - Hmmmmm. The LHS owner would then have to sell his Merc and second Villa. Any down sides, well ok, if the LHS went under there would be no ready supply of those small hard to get items and you'd have to order all your rotor blade spares in boxes of 100 at a time - gulp! Ok, Ok rant over - I just resent paying hugely over the odds just to make someone else wealthy. Grrrrrrrrrr

[zooland1]

Can you guys use PayPal? I'd be happy to pick up an order and see if the duty outweighs the price over there. I have a young guy working with me who'll be returning to Prague next week. He' taking a fully assembled Trex back with him in his luggage. We ship stuff over there all the time. I know we pay some surcharges, but I don't think they're too high. The only things that I can think of that wouldn't be worth it are Tx and Rx (no 35mhz here). Let me know if you think it would be worth a shot.

[Rick Rotorhead]

Thanks Zooland1, might even take you up on that. Trouble is of course we normally maintain our hobby piecemeal, you know a blade here a batt pack there, but if we're talking a bulk purchase or whole heli it may well be worth all the hassle. There are also some US branded items that we can't normally get here.
I'll have to find out how 'Paypal' works.

[zooland1]

To use PayPal, goto paypal.com and open an account. You assign a bank account which allows direct deposit and withdrawal. It's free to make payments and transfer funds. It only costs the seller if a purchase is made. Like E-bay. For instance, if you want me to send you something, all you do is make a deposit to my paypal account and it will automatically be deposited to my bank account. I use it mostly as a secure way to make on-line payments. I have sent money to friends in other staes, but never did one to the UK. It should work the same though.

[davidnyuspri]

You can search around for good price. Use Google.com (http://www.google.com)or other search engines (http://www.do-ok.com)