Hi,
obviously Autogyro company has been placed under a sort of chapter 11 protection .
goods news for small local makers !

Good news for people who don't want their mast to crack after a few hundred hours....

I know I am the minority here but I always thought the weight reduction race always has its victims!
Design the damn thing like a freaking tank!
Just look at the Hughes 269s. You can't kill them.
After millions of hours tens of thousands of botched landings by students the damn thing still flies!!!!
Don't skimp out of the freaking material where it's crucial.
Sorry but that's just me. Lightweight is usually fragile!

Gab,

IHMO in their case it is not only weight ( the magni M16 is ligther with a 4130 frame) and it never get cracks
it is their damned stainless steel ... square tubes ... of stainless steel ... for an aviation frame ...
ok for a cheap gyro, or an amateur gyro ... but not for they dear peices of crap !

it is not for nothing that they get a TBO on the frame !

as for the weight my gyro is light made from the same aluminium tubes that the Deluc and the averso gyros ... and not one has never get cracked ...

I have defended a couple of people having hat cracks on their autogyros .. belive me they had them repaired (frame change) and they have sold them and bought real gyro with real rotors ... averso, magni ... not this crap ...

lastly I have striped a MTO3 with my friend at the hangar ... for an overhaul ... you could not believe your eyes seeing the number of fully threaded screws working in shear !!!

and I could write 3 more pages .... never buy it ..

Interesting that I posted the same comment on the other forum with many many AG buyers/lovers sort of sarcastically in a thread about them "having troubles"....
Not one comment on the cracks or frame or longevity. All comments were about finances....not one!
Odd says I.....

'cause it's a fucking cult!

.

I am paraphrasing from memory so this may not be exactly correct.

They (Autogyro) wanted to become a significant manufacturer of gyros so they took advantage of EU subsidies which enabled them to do so

This (socialist) underpinning covered about 1/3 of their costs .... however they were still losing a bit of money on each machine

Then they accessed even more EU funds in order to expand and create a worldwide market ..... plus the fancy new models .... but still were not profitable on paper

The owners realized that when the subsidies ran out they would incur significant losses .... so they sold the company to investors.

At this moment the investors have realized they cannot continue into complete insolvency thus the chapter 11 type of restructuring.

This proves socialist government funding of private business seldom works.

Belt tightening and downsizing may keep them in business for a while but if their worldwide dealerships suffer too much they will abandon ship.

A strong worldwide dealership is the only real advantage they had over all the other gyro manufactures .... if the American dealers quit or their profits are slashed , it is over for the parent company.

Oh and.......their masts crack!

Autogyro founders came to toulouse, at the bois de la pierre pierre festival (our mentone)

then they met a local gyro maker , jean pierre doléac ... they took his rotor head and his rotor and he taught them how to make a gyro .. they have copied an ela .. a fuck ing other flying bath tub

their rotor is a big piece of crap, notably the double blade hub bar ... when the rotor gets conicity the holes on the upper blade and the holes of the botom blade are no longer one in front of each other ... theire are nasty constraints in the metal ...

the extruded blades are too thin .. there was nothing in the blade roots preventing the metal to be crushed when the hub bars screws are thightened !

I remember hearing a sort of band afer landing (this is the first gyro I have piloted in dual)

the rotor head had a mono-seater 3206 ball bearing ... have a look on the datasheet ... no radial résistance ...I don't know of they have modified this but they kept it long ... a scandal ... I remeber that they wanted to mount a thermometer on the head to detect bearing over heating ...

as I said I have completely stripped one, a nightmare ... I decided never to fly with a crap lilke this ... never

one day I saw a man and his mistress with a cavalon in montelimar .. they spent the night on the hangar .. the day after it was hot when the took of from a 1000 m runway .. the 3 wheels unsticked at mid runway and they bearly passed the fence at the end of the runway ... flying an American big familly hudge Fridge with a 912ULS ... is pure madness ...

I flew the enclosed tandem ... a nightmare ... the wheels are so behind the rotor head that the front wheel take ages to lift and it is violent ... and with the drop keel when the gyro noses violently the rotor hits the ground ... not a gyro for beginners ..;

they never desinged any good gyro ...

generally all the european gyros are big peices of crap except the magni .. which I don't like because the cg in 25 cm under the center of thrust .. but at least it is a good reliable stable machine, Italian mechanical quality is there , it is a familly which owns the business, they are honest, and their gyro can fly thousands of hours without any problem, no rotor or frame tbo.. a bit heavy but as Gabor says it guarantees reliability ...

but the worst are the fucking CFI selling those gyros ... they all say those machines are perfect .. only because they could get machines fastly for their clients ... where at magni and dta the client has to wait for the gyro to be built ...

The Eurotubs had one big rise when the Euro dropped against the good ole greenback and everyone thought they were getting a deal from Autogyro.
Then the reports were coming in about pre-rotator cracks, tail cracks, mast cracks, rotor head problems, and scrapes of the keel in the absence of the tail wheel. The ground strikes and coupled nose wheels were another issue. The main bolt in the stick assembly unwinding had created some soiled underwear too!
Autogyro sold their untested machines and kept finding explanations for the shortcomings by blaming them on the misuse of whatever broke.
BY the way. I have never had a flight in the TAGNA but I know for example the R1 from Greg Spicola had completely re-designed their machine learning from the mistakes of Autogyro.

Giro, if you get a chance youve got to see Jims new M2.
Its got to be the toughest two seater ever made. The things a tank.
Wish I could have flown it when I was there.

I'd love to see it , do you have a link ?

Sportcopter.com

I have videos and pics of it, but as usual no idea how to get them to display here.

ok benry, I did not know who was Jim in fact , thanks I am going to their site


as a matter of fact Jim has optimizer his enclosure so that it is smaller the the previous big Egg ( that I loved)

it is clear that Americans don't need to copy the fuckin European bath tubs ... they have averything at Home !

it is not like the AR-1 that only the name is American , and that is a simple Autogyro copy with an horrible canopy making it look like a beluga

Interesting pic!
Look close at the tail feathers! I bought them off Jim and they are on my rig now.
That was a while ago because the M2 now has a fully carbon fiber triple tail that is stronger then steel and weigs next to nothing!
That also geve it a gorgeous paint job.
But what really gets me is the engine and the suspension....
Man I want to fly one!
Ive flown the red egg plenty and its an awesome rig, but just not my style. But that M2??? Oh yeah.

Hmmmmmm. Well over 600 hours on my Cavalon and no mast cracking.....no problem flying anyone....my heaviest passenger was 280 pounds. Machine has been good but I wouldn’t recommend one as a first gyro.

Barry, I have never flown one. I know it's not as forgiving as the Calidus.
I do like the closed cockpit feature of any aircraft.
By the way, all your gyros and airplanes are in tip-top shape, Barry!!!!!
You are one of the few out there who takes care of their machines absolutely unmatched.
You are not skipping out on anything. You also do not cheap out on things.
SO you truly are the exception, not the norm!
I would also add that you do not abuse nor bang the damn machines.
Somehow you have mastered how to fly and land the damn thing.
So I do believe your way of approaching aviation has a lot to do why you are not having the typical problems that others do!
OK I have praised you enough. I am better looking! So there is that! Bo yah!

Hey Gabor......what’s with all the sappy stuff?........I didn’t even recognize you!!
...( oh...and I have the award that says I’m better looking)

Awards are just like presidential elections Barry.....you can't really believe them!
But if you are sticking to it I have the longest joystick award sooooooo
Just sayin'!


Merry Christmas my friend.

Well.........