The quality of Guillow's kits

Ron

Actually, if the fuse were "plugged" as described seems the basla stringers would hold up fine. Alternating balsa stringers with basswood stringers would help too.

Won't attempt my Spit' until after the holiday season when guests and visitors have returned home. Then it's time to remove and store the decorations.

Meantime I'll continue to study the plans and instrustions for both the Spit' and my new air brush set-up.

SD,

I actually did do the plugging on the forward section. It helped the strength of the foward nose and fuselage quite a bit. Scroll through the pics in my log and you can see what I mean. BTW I have a new pic of my current progress and I would be interested in your opinion.

Hi guys,
I have built many guillows kits over the years.
I found that the wood is very brittle and hard to cut but hey I bought two today and at the price they are offered at I wont complain.

Yeah, I tried my best to use the parts for the tail section of my Wulf, but they were crushed out of their intended shapes, while the 1/16 square was simply petrified. I just decided to make them from 1/16 sheet, as any weight savings was gonna be negligible anyway.

The fuse formers were also rough with the stringer notches pretty much broken. I band-sawed the parts from the sheet, and glued them back together.

Still, I love all the Guillows kits, and they are still a good tool in learning to build frames the Old School way.

That's strange because my #403 Spit' is laser-cut and I have experienced none on the problems expressed here.

My kit came from: www.oakridgehobbies.com and cost $33 and change + postage. Received it as a Christmas present from our son and his family.

Dave when you get a laser cut kit is is usually better as you do not have to cut the wood out and in my experience that is when It is most likely to splinter.

SuperDave wrote:That's strange because my #403 Spit' is laser-cut and I have experienced none on the problems expressed here.

My kit came from: www.oakridgehobbies.com and cost $33 and change + postage. Received it as a Christmas present from our son and his family.

Laser cut? Hmm maybe my kit was on the shelf a long time. My 500 series was die cut. Maybe the 400 series are of better quality. I only paid something like $12. Sounds like you got a nice kit.

Most of the guillows kits still are die cut.

Not any longer ther're not. Look a the current Guillow's catalog (or Brits would say "catalogue"

SD,

You are correct however, looking at the Guillows website only the 200 and 400 series are laser cut. I went into the 500 series and the 300 series they still say die cut in the headers. Looks like they are headed in the right direction.

Guillows has a great selection of models and I will continue to buy them. I probably will only buy the larger ones unless I want to do some FF.

SuperDave wrote:Not any longer ther're not. Look a the current Guillow's catalog (or Brits would say "catalogue"

Dave a I checked some are laser but most are still die.
I bought some kits today and checked at the shop too.

I don't think I've ever built a Guillows kit, in my day they were far too expensive, but I built dozens of flying scale kits by Keilkraft, Skyleader and many others, which were the same structure and didn't have the luxury of even die cutting, just printed on the wood sheets. Cutting THOSE out was a nightmare, especially for young and inexperienced builders, usually armed only with a broken razorblade, you never got the fuselage former notches cut without most of them breaking off. Most kits' wood was decent quality, but some was either like cheese or like rock, I assume the same is true today, especially since kit manufacturers almost certainly don't have the choice of wood suppliers that were available to them 30 - 40 years ago, and anyway will reserve the best wood for their more expensive kits. In addition I imagine that a lot of this type of kit these days are "Old stock" and, as an ex-model shop proprietor, I can tell you from experience that balsa deteriorates alarmingly fast if not stored in optimum conditions, becoming seriously hard and brittle as it dries out.
So I think this explains the sort of variations in quality you are finding, small kit buying has, I'm afraid, always had an element of luck involved!

Wilf

Indra:

Depends if the kits are of recent production or have been sitting on the shelf for some time. I know my #403 Spit' was at one time die-cut but now they're laser-cut like the one that I just received for Christmas. If there is a solution it is to buy from a volume seller who "turns" and replaces their mechandise frequenty.

Oh it is new stock guy says it came in about a month ago.

Where was the kit prior to coming in? I would ask with a smile.