Laser vs router kits

[rcsoar4fun]

I have noticed European kits tend towards being CNC router cut while American and Chinese cuts lean on laser cutting. Is there a compelling reason for this difference?

Interestingly, European machine cut kits go back quite some time. I have a few old Kyosho kits that are incredibly well made.

 

[Wayne]

Each method has their advantage.

At Aloft we prefer laser for a few reasons. The key advantages for our current setup is how clean an operation it is. No saw dust and a lot less noise to deal with. Parts are very accurate, and less wood grain issues or fuzzies to deal with. Other advantage is less waste, and quicker operations. Really the only downside would be the color of the cut edge. A good laser setup can greatly reduce this, and some materials are less prone to the darker coloring. The downside is the laser is a bit more picky on what sorts of materials you run through it for production work.

There are somethings that are really suited to one process or the other, but for the production we are doing, I think laser is the better option.

We also have a large full sheet CNC router that we only use for making shipping boxes for our larger aircraft. If you bought a plane from us recently you will get to see how nice these cardboard boxes are!

In the old days most all kits would have been die cut. A very manual process to make the tooling and maintain it. Before that they just printed the the design onto sheets of balsa and you had to cut them all out by hand. Before that, you only got the paper plans.