so anyway this has been bugging me for a few days now. was flying a pretty aggressive line through some trees and clipped something and came down hard, not terrible crash but when i got home and inspected the frame one of the arms has a crack running about halfway through it. its my old ImpulseRC Apex which i love but replacement arms arent super cheap and by the time i buy two (always buy spares) im spending like 35-40 bucks.

for that money im almost thinking about just grabbing a different frame entirely. been kind of eyeing the TBS Source One v5 or maybe just going with another Apex arm set and calling it a day. the Apex has been really good to me but idk if im just being sentimental about it. the Source One is way cheaper but i hear mixed things about the arm durability on those.

has anyone switched from an Apex to something else and actually been happy with it or do you end up missing the feel

Source One arms crack even easier than most frames if im being honest. its a fine frame for the price but if you're coming from an Apex you're probably going to notice the flex. the Apex is genuinely one of the stiffer 5inch frames out there and that translates to how it flies, video looks cleaner and it just handles differently. id just buy the Apex arms, its not really a fair comparison for 35 bucks.

i went through something similar last year, was flying a different frame (not Apex) and kept telling myself i'd just replace it with whatever was cheapest. ended up going through two budget frames before i just bought back into a quality one and i kinda wish i had done that from the start. sentiment aside the Apex is genuinely a good frame and if you already have all your components fit and mounted the way you like them, swapping frames is way more work than it sounds. you'll be re-routing all your wires and probably re-doing your camera mount and vtx position and by the end of it a few hours have gone by. just get the arms imo