Need a recommendation

[piolenc]

A shocking thing happened to me yesterday. While I was idly watching some video of gyroplanes on YouTube, I heard Sharon's voice behind me saying "get me one of those." Now my wife is a woman who is afraid of going out on a boat, so having her manifest an interest in flying just floored me.

But I'm no fool, and I am now looking for a two-place enclosed or enclosable design to build for us. My old copy of the AeroCrafter Homebuilt Aircraft Sourcebook has little to offer. The only seemingly suitable design in it that I can still find plans for online is Hollman's two-place, and he's raised the price of his plans from the $250 listed in the Sourcebook to over five hundred dollars, so I doubt I'm going to be using those unless somebody has a used (or unused, for that matter) set that I can buy for less than a king's ransom.

Having established what I'm not going to use, I now need to determine what I will use. Any ideas?

[Arnie Madsen]

A shocking thing happened to me yesterday. While I was idly watching some video of gyroplanes on YouTube, I heard Sharon's voice behind me saying "get me one of those." Now my wife is a woman who is afraid of going out on a boat, so having her manifest an interest in flying just floored me.

But I'm no fool, and I am now looking for a two-place enclosed or enclosable design to build for us. My old copy of the AeroCrafter Homebuilt Aircraft Sourcebook has little to offer. The only seemingly suitable design in it that I can still find plans for online is Hollman's two-place, and he's raised the price of his plans from the $250 listed in the Sourcebook to over five hundred dollars, so I doubt I'm going to be using those unless somebody has a used (or unused, for that matter) set that I can buy for less than a king's ransom.

Having established what I'm not going to use, I now need to determine what I will use. Any ideas?

Marc .... I will buy you the gyro of your dreams .... all you have to do is find me a wife like yours. Tell your wife I love her .... but to forget about it .... she is already married. :):)

Arnie

[choppergabor]

Hey Marc! Have you looked at the Dominator? You can buy plans and parts right here. Well built, proven design, and very popular. http://www.rotorflightdynamicsinc.com/ See if you like what you (both) see :)
Cheers

[GyroDoug]

The only seemingly suitable design in it that I can still find plans for online is Hollman's two-place, and he's raised the price of his plans from the $250 listed in the Sourcebook to over five hundred dollars, so I doubt I'm going to be using those unless somebody has a used (or unused, for that matter) set that I can buy for less than a king's ransom.

Having established what I'm not going to use, I now need to determine what I will use. Any ideas?

Marc,

When you are looking for Gyroplane Plans, there isn't a large selection to begin with. Then you further stipulate that it needs to be for a two place machine that is fully enclosed, and you narrow it down to a very short list, and then you top it off by stating that you feel $500 is way too much to pay and you insinuate that coming up with that much money will be a problem for you. When I read that I can' thelp but feel that you have some expectations that are going to be hard to meet and will probably furstrate you until you either change your expectations or get discouraged and quit trying to meet them.

It' kind of like buying a car and saying I really like quality and the engineering of the Mercedes line of automobiles and I like the newer models as they seem to have less maintenece costs than buying an older model and I really like some of the new features they are putting on the new ones today, and oh by the way, I don't want to pay more than a couple thousand dollars for the car.

While it is possible to get into flying Gyroplanes relatively cheaply (it still costs money to fly), the smaller and lighet and simpler the machine, the less expensive it will be to build, maintain, and fly. When you start talking about two place machines you are moving away from the innexpensive end of Gyroplane flying, then when you start talking about going with an enclosed machine you get even farther away from the innexpensive end. I understand that you are willing to build the machine yourself and that can save you some money (but not necessarily will save you money) you are still talking about more structure, heavier weight, requiring a bigger engine, which costs more to buy and more to operate. The bottom line is a two place, enclosed machine is going to cost you a lot more money to have. It sounds to me like you need to do more research into what you can expect to pay to get into the kind of machine you are dreaming about. If $500 seems like a lot to pay for plans, I am afraid you are going to have some major challenges to overcome when you understand the other costs involved.

I wish you luck in finding the machine of your dreams and getting into the air. Finding someone else in your area that is currently flying a Gyroplane and learning all you can from them may be your next logical step. Best of luck!!!

[ironcowboy]

I don’t want to be the only contrarian here, but something seems amiss… Are you certain your baby is not setting you up for some sort of quid pro quo here? Proceeded with caution friend, you may end up doing yoga, or worse, cross stitching for two years.

I can report the Hollman HA2M is a tight squeeze to get into and out of.