DennisFetters
Gold Supporter
- Joined
- Jul 18, 2005
- Messages
- 3,235
- Location
- Dayton Ohio
- Aircraft
- 582 Commander Elite
- Total Flight Time
- Stopped counting years ago after 5,000
I got an email from my gyro-friend Craig Tompkins the other day (AKA ROTORHEAD), showing me a picture of what he found in a barn. It was my old 532 Commander Two-Place Side by Side gyroplane, N532CG.
N532CG was the first Air Command gyroplane we licensed as Experimental Homebuilt. It started life as a single-seat with the first 532 engine to ever fly, and made all the airshow rounds with me, introducing the new age of gyroplanes to the world, and soon taking over 97% of all gyroplanes being built in the world.
Later N532CG was converted into our first Two-Place Side by Side Commander, again launching a new area of training that would now be available, which was very limited by a few Parson trainers. Now training could be in mass and around the world.
I cannot count how many people were introduced to gyroplanes through their first ride in a gyroplane using old N532CG. Over a thousand or more, where I would go to all the gyroplane fly-ins around the USA and give rides from sunup to sometimes sundown. I have attached pictures where I was giving a ride to old Dr. Igor Bensen, as well as Wing Commander Ken Wallis from UK in N532CG.
N532CG was lost in 1990 when our factory was devastated from the flooding that occurred that year. After the waters went down, someone snuck in at night and took the engine off, leaving the airframe behind. We then moved our factory to the new location in Excelsior Springs Missouri, where I started my new company Revolution Helicopter and stored N532CG there for a few months. It became obvious that I was never going to have time to restore her, so I ended giving it all to someone, and now I can't remember who.
Now Craig comes along and digs up her bones. It was good to see her remnants. This gyroplane is a piece of gyroplane history, and I hope she is restored to her original old glory someday.
N532CG was the first Air Command gyroplane we licensed as Experimental Homebuilt. It started life as a single-seat with the first 532 engine to ever fly, and made all the airshow rounds with me, introducing the new age of gyroplanes to the world, and soon taking over 97% of all gyroplanes being built in the world.
Later N532CG was converted into our first Two-Place Side by Side Commander, again launching a new area of training that would now be available, which was very limited by a few Parson trainers. Now training could be in mass and around the world.
I cannot count how many people were introduced to gyroplanes through their first ride in a gyroplane using old N532CG. Over a thousand or more, where I would go to all the gyroplane fly-ins around the USA and give rides from sunup to sometimes sundown. I have attached pictures where I was giving a ride to old Dr. Igor Bensen, as well as Wing Commander Ken Wallis from UK in N532CG.
N532CG was lost in 1990 when our factory was devastated from the flooding that occurred that year. After the waters went down, someone snuck in at night and took the engine off, leaving the airframe behind. We then moved our factory to the new location in Excelsior Springs Missouri, where I started my new company Revolution Helicopter and stored N532CG there for a few months. It became obvious that I was never going to have time to restore her, so I ended giving it all to someone, and now I can't remember who.
Now Craig comes along and digs up her bones. It was good to see her remnants. This gyroplane is a piece of gyroplane history, and I hope she is restored to her original old glory someday.
