AR-1 - N688G - Pennsylvania

[MikeBoyette]

 

[Mayfield]

"The details of my life are quite inconsequential.... My father was a relentlessly self-improving boulangerie owner from Belgium with low-grade narcolepsy and a penchant for buggery. My mother was a 15-year-old French prostitute named Chloé with webbed feet. My father would womanize; he would drink; he would make outrageous claims like he invented the question mark. Sometimes, he would accuse chestnuts of being lazy, the sort of general malaise that only the genius possess and the insane lament." (Dr. Evil, 2002)

 

[Abid]

....

Following the success of both makes several other European manufacturers copied the Magni design, including MTO and ELA, and started marketing them in the USA.

...

This is like saying all high wing airplanes are copied from Cessna.
It simply isn't true.
ELA did not copy Magni. There are plenty of major differences between a Magni M16 or its predecessor which was basically designed by Juka (not Magni) and an ELA 07/08
MT03 (predecessor of MTO Sport) was a direct copy of ELA 07 I believe. The owner/designer of MTO says that himself in an interview in Australia right on Youtube somewhere that you can dig up. They wanted to become dealers for ELA but the German club required certain changes including the tail for compliance and ELA refused to do it and the Germans were stuck with a bought and paid gyroplane that they could not register in Germany. That was the chance start of AutoGyro. AutoGyro founder used to run a company called AirTrikes Gmbh (HTC) in Hildesheim in Germany with a partner and they used to use BMW engine conversions for that trike along with Bautek trike wings which were made by two brothers who were kind of friends of mine. If ELA had not given him attitude and actually made the changes demanded for German compliance, more than likely there would be no AutoGyro Gmbh. They initially just wanted to be a dealer. So saying they copied it ... well yes but because they had little choice or they would lose the money they had given to ELA for a gyroplane and have a nice lawn ornament. They were already trike manufacturers so they had a better idea than a lawn ornament.

 

[N962GT]

This is like saying all high wing airplanes are copied from Cessna.

Point well taken, but I don't know, Abid. To me it seems a stretch not to make the connection in such basically similar designs, disregarding the many minor differences not immediately apparent at a cursory glance while walking by at a convention (good gawd, y'all, i am sooo glad ELA got wise and redesigned that ugly nose!). Take a twin-boom Xenon (and whatever else they renamed it over the years), which is an obviously whole-hog original design that one cannot reasonably associate to any other predecessor. It's much like cars. They all started looking the same after the '60s and '70s, eh? Try to pick one out on the road today and tell your mate next you what every car is that is tooling down the road. When I was growing up, we could do that.

 

[Abid]

Point well taken, but I don't know, Abid. To me it seems a stretch not to make the connection in such basically similar designs, disregarding the many minor differences not immediately apparent at a cursory glance while walking by at a convention (good gawd, y'all, i am sooo glad ELA got wise and redesigned that ugly nose!). Take a twin-boom Xenon (and whatever else they renamed it over the years), which is an obviously whole-hog original design that one cannot reasonably associate to any other predecessor. It's much like cars. They all started looking the same after the '60s and '70s, eh? Try to pick one out on the road today and tell your mate next you what every car is that is tooling down the road. When I was growing up, we could do that.

Magni and ELA are as different as Cessna 172 is to Cherokee 140. If you don’t see the clear differences you are simply wearing sunglasses that are way too dark. They are tandem, open cockpit and have 2 blade teetering rotors with a pusher prop. That’s about all that is similar.

You are a gyro pilot. Not a housewife at Sun N Fun. You should easily recognize the real deep differences.

 

[N962GT]

Magni and ELA are as different as Cessna 172 is to Cherokee 140. If you don’t see the clear differences you are simply wearing sunglasses that are way too dark. They are tandem, open cockpit and have 2 blade teetering rotors with a pusher prop. That’s about all that is similar.

You are a gyro pilot. Not a housewife at Sun N Fun. You should easily recognize the real deep differences.

1. Abid F: I'm really glad I finally got to meet you at Wauchula this weekend, it makes it so much better to have a personality to attach to a web post. I would have taken this the wrong way two weeks ago, but now it just makes me smile. I sincerely hope you will make the trip up to Barnstormer's Spring Wing Ding!

2. Greg S: I also had the pleasure to have walked up behind Vance at the entrance booth, tap him on the shoulder, and when he turned around grab his meaty paw and shake it with a hearty, "CFI Vance, it's good to see you." I meant it. Vance hatchet buried. The 7 year statute of limitations applies in this case (coming up in May this year).

3. Mike B: 16 years ago at my first Wauchula event 2007 Jake told me a joke, "Wauchula is Indian for cross wind." This weekend I overheard you claim to have invented it 15 years ago in Steve M's tent. Things that make ya go, "Hmmm."

 

[MikeBoyette]

Well considering I came up with that joke back in the days when Bud O’Neil was President of Sunstate Rotor club around 1996-1998. I guess I was slightly wrong on the number of years it’s been. So 15 was wrong it’s been about 25 years. If he were still here Jake would tell you that he heard that joke from me. If you doubted my story why didn’t you question me in person? Why wait to do it on here Greg? I would have gladly discussed it with you and discovered my timeline was slightly off. After attending 41 or so years of Bensen Days fly-ins sometimes timelines get confusing.

Just like I don’t remember the exact year that you bought Adam’s hornet and decided to fly it at Bensen Days with little training and got slammed into the runway by a cross wind you were ill equipped to deal with. Your tore your machine up and Dad joked with you as you pushed it back to the hangar telling you the company motto of his rotorblades. “Crunch ‘em we will make more”. I guess you didn’t like that good hearted ribbing and got on here blaming my Dad’s blades for months. Then was sweet as pie to his face when you needed a new set of blades for your two place when we delivered them to ROC. You seem to air grievances loudly on here, but once in person are silent as a church mouse. Please next time you’re in my presence if you have an issue with me, come up to me shake my hand and discuss it with me don’t just do it on here.

 

[WaspAir]

Whatever it is, Mark Twain said it first, and later denied having ever said it.


E.g.
Truth is a journalist's most precious commodity, which he therefore uses sparingly.

 

[N962GT]

...I guess I was slightly wrong on the number of years it’s been. So 15 was wrong it’s been about 25 years. ... If you doubted my story why didn’t you question me in person? Why wait to do it on here Greg?

Just like I don’t remember the exact year that you bought Adam’s hornet and decided to fly it at Bensen Days with little training and got slammed into the runway by a cross wind you were ill equipped to deal with. Your tore your machine up and Dad joked with you as you pushed it back to the hangar telling you the company motto of his rotorblades. “Crunch ‘em we will make more”. I guess you didn’t like that good hearted ribbing and got on here blaming my Dad’s blades for months. Then was sweet as pie to his face when you needed a new set of blades for your two place when we delivered them to ROC. You seem to air grievances loudly on here, but once in person are silent as a church mouse. Please next time you’re in my presence if you have an issue with me, come up to me shake my hand and discuss it with me don’t just do it on here.

Well, good on you, back-peddling again.

Now let's answer your question, then untwist the rest of your rambling post covering even more, far-reaching, thread-jacking oddities.

When I was listening to you whine, complaining about someone telling "your" joke from 15 years earlier, your claim seemed reasonable, if not odd. Wasn't til later on, driving home, thinking about Jake, that it came to mind that he told me the same joke in '07 and I made the connection to you saying you started it 15 years ago (the gift of ASD memory). Although the math didn't add up I gave no thought to bringing it up here at all - then I saw your Dr. Evil air quotes pic above. Though it might not have anything to do with me at all, one has to consider the source.

When there's something to say in person, I'll say it. I am not two-faced, I am most certainly not a coward, and I am most definitely the same asshole in writing as you get face-to-face. The only real difference is in the reader's interpretation of my writings as viewed through the veil of social media. The thing is, in person you can see the wry smile, the twinkle in the eye, hear the vocal tones - all those cues to alert you I'm just f-g with you. Or not.

Matt Novotny (not Adam) dropped off his Honey Bee (not Hornet) at my house in Georgia in November 2007 after I had a blade strike with my Air Command tandem following a fuel pick up issue August 2007. Now, I'm writing slowly so you can follow this, and all of this has already been posted on RWF repeatedly, ad nauseum.

I bought a new set of 28' Dragon Wings from Ernie at Wrens October 2007 for the ACT.

When I showed up at Wauchula Spring '08 I had ~30 hours in Matt's Honey Bee with 23' DW's. While putting the rotor together there I found one of the hub bar AN4 screws was stripped. Since I had just spent a bunch of money on that new set of 28's from your dad I figured he would have a screw handy at fair value.

He charged me $15.00 for that one AN4-17 screw I asked for.

That's a 3,750% markup, Pentagon "gold hammer" rates.

That's what I didn't care for, Mike, and made crystal clear in 2008.

As to the bottom falling out while landing Dragon Wings in a changing crosswind, yes, they absolutely do. Hell, they do it even in a falling headwind, let alone a changing quartering wind. They dead-stick land in variable winds like a brick turd. Matt Novotney had the same thing happen to him at Mentone a few years later. He approached me and apologized profusely for ever having publicly doubted me on the matter, saying he just barely avoided balling up his new Ultra White when he got caught in an unexpected crosswind from his right that sent him down hard, though he was able to react and accelerate out of it in time - something I failed to do as a low-timer.

My agenda at the time, the sole purpose of posting my experience and observations on the poor float characteristics while landing DW's, was to alert other pilots - especially low timers like myself - to the very real dangers and possibility; and to advise them to KEEP SOME POWER ON while landing Dragon Wings in order to avoid a nasty surprise, and avoid dead-stick landings with them, most especially in tricky winds.

The PROBLEM with all of this was that the Wauchula gang circled the wagons, insisting there was nothing to be concerned with, and going so far as to claim that Dragon Wings float like just any other blade; and this was all just a load of Greg Mills crap as he looked for a scapegoat for his bad landing. The FLA hate and revenge never let up, and in fact grew worse as time passed and this weekend was par for the course.

Today it is accepted fact that all other blades "float" better on landing than Dragon Wings. It's my understanding that eventually Ernie tried adding tip weights in order to help maintain inertia and prevent loss of lift while landing on the ragged edge of flight/no flight variable wind conditions. So even your own father seems to have eventually admitted in a way that I was actually right all along, and not just some simp looking for a scapegoat for his bad landing, after all.

Your "...little training..." comment belies ignorance and venom. Chris Burgess, arguably one of the top masters of the "old school" CFI's, confidently signed me off to solo 1/2 year before I balled up the little Honey Bee at Wauchula in '08. Don't drag Chris into this, and make out like he signed me off before I was ready. I got in over my head that day, it's just that simple. The rotors were unforgiving and that's all that can be said. The winds were wicked, 35 kts, shifting at least 90° from the nose to the right beam, and I swear on my mother's grave there were horizontal rollers coming at me down RW 36. I know this because as I descended my ASI was going crazy, wildly swinging from 0-60 mph! I should have, could have, would have, but it's all Monday morning QB now and pointless. Truth is I wanted to get down on the ground, NOW, because it was scaring the crap out of me at the time to be flying in it and I didn't know what else to do.

Now, wouldn't it be nice if we could all just get over ourselves, drop this stupid s#!t, leave the past in the past, and look forward to some great flying in 2023 with our brothers and sisters in the damn gyro world, cuz I, for one, am running out of time and most certainly don't want my last memories of any of you to be bad ones. Christ, ya know it ain't easy.

And thayat's all I'm going to say about that.

 

[Doug Riley]

Greg, must be that you don't go back to the Gyro Stone Age like some of us do.

True, DW's aren't "floaters" the way, say McCutchens are -- but you have to fly Bensen's draggy, featherweight blades to experience the true thrill of dropping out of the air on landing. A brick outhouse would float better.

DW's hold energy like a lead flywheel compared with a set of Igor's best.

 

[MikeBoyette]

Doug
Dad ended up making what he called Cruziers they had the 12in tip weights in them. They did all the things I heard skywheels do except the uncommanded pitch up. I flew a set for about a month. I didn’t like them. Other people who have them love them.