It begins, the SAB clones have arrived.

[BladeScraperz]

Originally Posted by ian.newson

I want to cry

Hang in there man!

[Nelsonisms]

Certainly this thread will come to some kind of consensus within the next 100,000 posts or so.

[BladeScraperz]

Ya buddy, thread of the century!!

[BladeScraperz]

Yewwwww...wait till the kit hits the streets... Man o' man.. can't wait!

[notredan54]

Can someone post the shortened version of the last 500 posts, you guys are really going to town? I guess i need to check HF more often.

Any videos yet?

[ian.newson]

Originally Posted by BladeScraperz

Hang in there man!

Can I just cry? I cry tears of acceptance and agreement, which may benefit the process.

In the UK we have a saying which fits this situation, which translated into your language goes something like the following:

AAARRGHHH FFS AAARGH AAARGH

[wab223]

Ian, I think your over tired. Now do you have to get up for work in the morning?

[ian.newson]

Originally Posted by wab223

Ian, I think your over tired. Now do you have to get up for work in the morning?

Work gets up for ME in the morning!

Oh wait, is that the time?

:tiger: : :misinterpretingtheuseofthesesymbols:

[BladeScraperz]

[QUOTE=ian.newson;6682243]Can I just cry? I cry tears of acceptance and agreement, which may benefit the process.

Yeah we're definitely getting somewhere in this thread... almost there but not quite

[dl5973]

Originally Posted by peteski

Are you presuming the same quality of materials, manufacturing tolerances, and quality control in both cases? The likely reality is that the much cheaper clone parts will be of a generally lower and inconsistent quality. Plus of course there are considerable design and development costs incurred by SAB that the cloner completely sidesteps.

I use to own a trex 450 and bought spare parts from the clones just to compare to Align spare parts. Two clone companies that stood out for me were ALZRC and Tarot and the quality of the parts were very similar and on par with Align at half the price.

I doubt the ALZRC spare parts will be subpar compared to SAB parts.

I will give you two examples

The Carbon frames on the ALZRC 380 is 1.6mm thick while the SAB carbon frame is 1.2mm thick. That is s step up in quality in my books. I bet you SAB charges more for the carbon frames.

The tail boom on the ALZRC 380 is thicker carbon than the SAB goblin 380. The Goblin 380 carbon tail boom is very flimsy. How does that rate in terms of Quality of Material. I bet ALZRC tail boom will cost less to replace.

[peteski]

Originally Posted by dl5973

I use to own a trex 450 and bought spare parts from the clones just to compare to Align spare parts. Two clone companies that stood out for me were ALZRC and Tarot and the quality of the parts were very similar and on par with Align at half the price.

I doubt the ALZRC spare parts will be subpar compared to SAB parts.

I will give you two examples

The Carbon frames on the ALZRC 380 is 1.6mm thick while the SAB carbon frame is 1.2mm thick. That is s step up in quality in my books. I bet you SAB charges more for the carbon frames.

The tail boom on the ALZRC 380 is thicker carbon than the SAB goblin 380. The Goblin 380 carbon tail boom is very flimsy. How does that rate in terms of Quality of Material. I bet ALZRC tail boom will cost less to replace.

All very subjective. You seriously cannot judge the quality of CF by its thickness alone! It's not like all grades of CF are remotely similar in quality. The ALZRC frames could easily be E-glass with a token gesture amount of low grade CF thrown in. So could the SAB frames, but less likely given their reputation.

If SAB really were skimping on their manufacturing quality while charging premium prices I doubt they would be where they are today. Time will show whether ALZRC can provide the same quality at a lower price point. It's certainly possible if you avoid the R&D costs, marketing and support, but you rarely see it in the real world unless the original is not quite up to scratch. I think it's fair to say that Align has a mixed reputation for quality, so they are perhaps more vulnerable to reasonable quality cloning. But even then in most cases the cloners struggle to match Align.

Given the choice of a genuine SAB kit and one of these clones, I'd be happy to bet good money that the SAB kit will be significantly better. Anything else is probably just wishful thinking.

[dl5973]

Originally Posted by peteski

All very subjective. You seriously cannot judge the quality of CF by its thickness alone! It's not like all grades of CF are remotely similar in quality. The ALZRC frames could easily be E-glass with a token gesture amount of low grade CF thrown in. So could the SAB frames, but less likely given their reputation.

If SAB really were skimping on their manufacturing quality while charging premium prices I doubt they would be where they are today. Time will show whether ALZRC can provide the same quality at a lower price point. It's certainly possible if you avoid the R&D costs, marketing and support, but you rarely see it in the real world unless the original is not quite up to scratch. I think it's fair to say that Align has a mixed reputation for quality, so they are perhaps more vulnerable to reasonable quality cloning. But even then in most cases the cloners struggle to match Align.

Given the choice of a genuine SAB kit and one of these clones, I'd be happy to bet good money that the SAB kit will be significantly better. Anything else is probably just wishful thinking.

SAB are where they are today because of the innovative design of their helis and the way they look. They also did a great job at marketing their helis. The quality of the parts is not any better than Align.

I will leave it at that as I do not wish to upset all the SAB fanboys.

[peteski]

Originally Posted by dl5973

SAB are where they are today because of the innovative design of their helis and the way they look. They also did a great job at marketing their helis. The quality of the parts is not any better than Align.

I will leave it at that as I do not wish to upset all the SAB fanboys.

Is that some sort of factual information or just your personal opinion? If the latter, what sort of engineering qualifications or experience do you have to back that up? I'm serious, I've never seen a Goblin up close. You could be right.

[oliver1071]

Originally Posted by peteski

Is that some sort of factual information or just your personal opinion? If the latter, what sort of engineering qualifications or experience do you have to back that up? I'm serious, I've never seen a Goblin up close. You could be right.

You don't think it's innovative? You don't need an engineering degree to see that it's something different. Just getting away from the pod boom design and have the same or better performance is innovative. Everyone else is just happily following the same old design.
Also the insane head speeds these things are capable of without blowing apart.

It's also one of the easiest heli's I've worked on which is great not only a great flying machine but something that you don't want to stomp to little bits when you're repairing it.

[peteski]

Originally Posted by oliver1071

You don't think it's innovative? You don't need an engineering degree to see that it's something different.

Yes, I can see that they are different. It was more the quality aspect I was questioning. Is the quality of SAB components really the same as Align? Maybe it is, I don't know, but I always got the impression that SAB was making higher quality parts with better QC, not just innovative design. Just because some clone parts are "thicker" than SAB equivalents doesn't automatically make them better quality. It just isn't that simple. Same when you look at pictures of machined parts. It tells you nothing about tolerances or material properties. Aluminium alloys and steels are hugely variable in quality and price.

If someone is claiming that this 380 clone is better than the SAB original I want to see some hard evidence.

[oliver1071]

Originally Posted by peteski

Yes, I can see that they are different. It was more the quality aspect I was questioning. Is the quality of SAB components really the same as Align? Maybe it is, I don't know, but I always got the impression that SAB was making higher quality parts with better QC, not just innovative design. Just because some clone parts are "thicker" than SAB equivalents doesn't automatically make them better quality. It just isn't that simple. Same when you look at pictures of machined parts. It tells you nothing about tolerances or material properties. Aluminium alloys and steels are hugely variable in quality and price.

If someone is claiming that this 380 clone is better than the SAB original I want to see some hard evidence.

I think the quality is actually lower then align to be honest. I've never had to modify plastic or metal parts to get them to fit on align. But with the 380 it has parts that are definitely out of spec. I couldn't even fit the tail slider over the shaft on one of my 380's without modification. And my 500's plastic frame was so warped that it would teeter on opposite ends like a bad bar table. That has never happened to me with Align.

The design flies better but the QC on the parts is another story.

[dl5973]

I can give some example too

The paint on the goblin canopies and tail boom fades over time. The paint has no UV protection.

The goblin tails are designed to break away in a crash to save on crash costs.(the plastic bolts that hold the tail should shear away) The Goblin 380 carbon fibre tail is flimsy and breaks in half if you crash . It does not break where it is designed to break (the bolt that holds the tail should shear away) This happened to me in a crash. I was baffled as to why the bolt did not shear away to save the tail. A thicker carbon fibre tail boom would have helped. All the other Goblin helis have much thicker carbon fibre tails. (I'm guessing the carbon fibre tail on the g380 is thin to save weight). You can literally squeeze the carbon fibre tail and it will bend inwaards. .


Overall the design of the Goblin and how they fly is much better than Align

[oliver1071]

The fading is crazy fast I put some gpro stickers on one and then took them off maybe 20 flights later when I put a vbar on the heli. The heli was only flown out back so it was never left sitting in the sun at the field or in a car and you could clearly see where the sticker was when I removed it after such a short time.

[dl5973]

Originally Posted by oliver1071

The fading is crazy fast I put some gpro stickers on one and then took them off maybe 20 flights later when I put a vbar on the heli. The heli was only flown out back so it was never left sitting in the sun at the field or in a car and you could clearly see where the sticker was when I removed it after such a short time.

+1

[svensson_bo_l]

Originally Posted by notredan54

Can someone post the shortened version of the last 500 posts, you guys are really going to town? I guess i need to check HF more often.

Any videos yet?

ALZRC is coming out with a Goblin 380 clone in a week or two, for some $238.
First will be a bare kit, without documentation.
Later there will combo kits.

Here are a couple of videos with ALZRC Devil Fast 380:





Regards,
Bo

PM. Found the right video...