WOW - the WORLD HAS GONE FUBAR!!! - when even HERE -the famous FREE-SPEECH - ANYTHING GOES FORUM! ---- Admin gets lily-livered about the TRUTH!


SINCE WHEN - Can a forum owner/mod/admin - get sued for libel/slander????

Did some crazy new LIBTARD law get passed in the last few years to endanger our FREE SPEECH - HERE?????







PS - about the time Montana Eric was resolving his lawsuit & Kevin was telling me all about the Aeronews Network/ Jim Campbell investigation into SC $ woes and TROS's embezzlement Ponzi scheme ...JV - made several calls to me (finally I answered one - to hear him out) appealing to me - as PRA President to put a STOP to all the LIES - he felt were flying around him & SC - in fact apart from a couple on Kevin's posts on RWF about the ANN / Jim Campbell investigation ... the OLD RWF thread - with negative posts about him - he wanted deleted ...I had to tell him - as PRA has nothing to do with RWF ( OR Skywolverines) - I have NO authority over such forums ...I can only influence PRA website and social media accounts - where there was NO SC /JV bad press! ........ after Farmer Jim's & my bad experience with Larry Neal - I am squarely on Kolibri's side - these jokers NEED to BE EXPOSED!

For one thing I like being informed and it was a SC single that was on my short list prior to my decision to build since I trust myself and I take great exception to being bamboozled.

PPL like this disappear were I come from. No fuss , no muss, just done taking ppl for a ride.

EDIT: I looked into this Neal guy mentioned. Reports say he offed himself......interesting.

I read the 9 pages about Larry Neal on RWF.
The posts comprise the bookends of opinions from:
"Larry was a good-hearted man! " to "Larry was a sociopath and seller of a failed gyro! "
In between were frequent "None of us is sinless, don't speak ill of the dead, learn to forgive."

True, none of us is perfect, and we've all done wrong.
But, where's the line between that and somebody worse on another level?
A line from Shakespeare illustrates it nicely:


Thy sin's not accidental, but a trade.
— Measure for Measure, Act 3, Scene 1, Isabella to Claudio

accidental = happening by chance, fortuitous
a trade = regular line of work, recognized business

https://www.shakespeareswords.com/Publi ... _1-3_1_135

To me, this is very similar to the Bible in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 describing who would not gain entrance to Heaven:

Does that mean somebody who has occasionally though rarely stolen or been drunk is banned from Heaven?
No, for the Scripture refers to unrepentant practitioners of such sins, not merely the imperfect.

Is one's sin "accidental"...or is it a proven pattern of many years, i.e., a "trade"?
Is one's sin a regular line of work — one's recognized business?

To me, that is the yardstick to measure people of disputed reputation.

Yes Larry (deadbeat dad & sociopath, conman) Neal - DID INDEED "off himself"- ate a shotgun blast - just one week prior to his & Jim's law-suit being settled in front of a judge.

He was also facing a lawsuit from the purchaser of his Super sky-cycle - roadable tricycleMC/ flying cycle. He had just sold it a year prior at Oshkosh. He had also just lost his "bread & butter job " as test-pilot for CarterCopter (Olney TX) ...when DOD funding did not come through to continue funding the project!

He was found by the neighbor's( Larry's rental house) son - after 4 days in the hot TX sun - on his back patio! ...the son noticed - the gate open & in the house - all the doors & secret room were opened up! (Larry was obsessively security minded - so this was unusual & noticed by the neighbor!)

Confirmed by local police.
Jim & I met his daughter Lori a couple of weeks later - trying to "find the truth" ...we all thought he had faked his death and made a run! We spent a week-end in the area talking to Larry's friends & neighbors & Lori as kin was able to get confidential info from the police - which she shared!

It was very surreal & eye-opening !

Who is JOHN GALT? ................Don't answer this...I already know.....just quoting quotes! My girl Ayn!

And confirmation info from sources concerned on Larry Neal relayed in this post Kolibri.

The practiced art of removal is available to anyone with means........ who says I left! I am a perpetual visitor where ever that may be. Home Sweet Home is in the heart.

I got some information on the ONE - almost completed M2 ....the owner on the way back from a trip to Scapoose from OH - having personally cracked the whip in the S-C hangar to get it FINISHED!

ONE YEAR ago - all it needed was the final paint. (Although - it did have some canabalized parts from the prototype - to finish assembly.)

It missed coming to Bensen Days 2024 - still had only dusty primer, prior to Mentone 2024 - HOOLEY DOOLEY - HOW SLOW can "TROS" - AKA The Rat Of Scapoose go in finishing the first customer's completed M2?????

WILL IT DEBUT @ Mentone 2025????


Place your bets folks!!!


TROS

As a counter to all this negativity that YOU feel is deserved. I would like to point out that Eric as far as I know has not bought, built and flown his own Sportcopter.
Drop Bear who seems to have a TDS levels of misplaced aggression is still furious over the Larry Neal situation and is transferring that onto Jim Vanek, has also to my knowledge NOT purchased, built and flown a Sportcopter.

I have flown a
Bensen
Brock
Dominator
Xenon
MTO
Cavalon
as well as the Sport copter Lightning, a Vortex 582, Vortex 912 the Sportcopter 2 and the Sportcopter M2. I have many many hours in the Lightning and Vortex rigs, plenty in the SC2 and a good bunch in the M2.
I can unequivocally say that I owe my life to the safety features Jim designs into his rigs, and walked away from a crash no one else would have! Ask Timchick and the guys in Florida, they saw it.

I have PURCHASED TWO kits from Jim and am currently flying the second one still. I have never been "ripped off" or Ponzi Schemed as you have said.
I fly Sportcopter because they over build capabilities no other company can, hell the landings I have pulled off in the SC2 as well as the M2 would have cracked the Cavalon and rendered it a worthless lump of Carbon fiber!
Jim designs and sells the best gyros on the planet in my opinion.
People listening to Eric bad mouth the shit out of his company and products need to remember he was an employee that was let go, chances are if YOU got fired from a job your not going on the internet to tell people how great the company is. All your getting is one persons opinion who has a bone to pick, that has not ever bought/built a kit!

If you want a gyro kit, and you have the money to invest it in a gyro kit THAT WAS STILL UNDER DEVELOPMENT, not an already flying kit, and it takes change after change to get it up to his safety specs, then the waiting is part of it! No one who bought an M2 was told you'll have it next week!
If you want to buy a rig that flys right now? Get a SR22.....you want a gyro that can carry two people SXS and work in rough fields all day? You gotta wait.
Thats not even taking into account that a LOT of the customers in queue waiting for an M2 ask for custom changes or find out that they need a design change for say A DIFFERENT FUCKING MOTOR.....then they HAVE TO KEEP WAITING! The rig was designed with a 915....

Now you guys can say what you want about "free speech" and the mods here, but the gyro community is very small, we know the people here irl. You are not anonymous. We know your "back stories" and it's painfully obvious WHY you are shitting on Sportcopter, a company that has been building the very best rigs for DECADES.

You know what I DON'T see here? the people who have a dog in this fight complaining here, I see a bunch of virtue signaling "white knights" voicing their OPINIONS for all the world to see no matter what the facts may be.

Kind of like progressive liberal leftists do....
feel free to argue back and forth what I am saying here, but in the end you all come off looking like losers.

Anyways thats how I sees it.

Your loyalty to SC's past quality is understandable, and I empathize with it. I had such a high regard for their machines that I uprooted my very happy life to help SC get to the next level.

However, none of that is relevant to the M2 debacle.



>>Jim designs and sells the best gyros on the planet in my opinion.
Regarding single-seat gyros, I'd agree, even now. But he's been proven incapable of offering a knock-out winner of a 2-place. The SC2 (<10 made) is an overweight orphan with no more useful load than an RAF2000. The M2's flaws I've already described, and it's still not even in production.



>>Eric as far as I know has not bought, built and flown his own Sportcopter
Why would I buy one as an engine-less M2 was included in my 2018 compensation agreement?


>> I have PURCHASED TWO kits from Jim
Maybe you purchased the first kit, but I know what you traded to JV personally for your 582 Vortex, and TMK not a penny of that trade went on the SC company books to pay back depositors or my friends. JV "backdoored" your gyro, and you know it.


>>he was an employee that was let go, chances are if YOU got fired from a job your not going on the internet to tell people how great the company is
You've been lied to. I was neither "let go" nor "fired". I gave notice in Sept 2021, and the 15th was my last day. When I gave notice (the 1.5 page letter I have, and you're welcome to a copy), JV went on such a morning tantrum outside behind his truck that he apologized for it that afternoon. (The next morning was a similar tantrum, though not as long or intense.)

I quit because:

1) to gain orders JV and his secretary were claiming imminent production of 10 M2s/month, which I knew was fantasy if not fraud

2) new deposit customers were being "Just between us!" promised earlier positions than the long-suffering Aussie ranchers who had $$$$$ down as early as 2017

3) the M2 was chronically late and overweight

4) I learned that JV was not the brilliant gyro designer of reputation, after wasting months of fruitless tail testing to null out a perplexing flutter. Finally, JV's 10-minute phone with an actual engineer pinpointed the issue as not aerodynamic at all, and easily fixed. When the M2 at MGW proved to be an overweight nose-tucking 80mph pig, JV embarked on the hideous "Wing Step" canard palliative. By then, I'd seen enough and my blind faith in his designing skills was shattered.

5) My friends who invested $2,986,000 were getting shafted, and full repayment was looking impossible

6) I (a Finance grad and "numbers guy") was never allowed to inspect the SC books and make cost analyis or budget projections. I suspect the numbers were so bad that it would have been embarrassing for me to see them. I also came to understand that customer deposits were not being spent on their machines' parts stock, and that M2 costs were higher than the lowball Aussie deal of 2017-2019--i.e., SC was upside-down on those orders, losing thousands per machine if ever delivered.

7) I despaired of ever getting my engine-less M2 or the $90k in value, and knew that I'd be dissatisfied with the M2's weight


>>If you want a gyro kit, and you have the money to invest it in a gyro kit THAT WAS STILL UNDER DEVELOPMENT
Customers in 2017-2020 understood that, but SC falsely announced production in their December 2021 Update. (Not a single kit has been delivered since "production".) So, what about the past 3 years of M2 customer deposits after 12/2021?


>>Thats not even taking into account that a LOT of the customers in queue waiting for an M2 ask for custom changes or find out that they need a design change for say A DIFFERENT FUCKING MOTOR.....then they HAVE TO KEEP WAITING! The rig was designed with a 915....
This is only partially true and relevant, regarding the Aussies who requested a less expensive 140hp engine (the AM15-HP). What you conveniently ignore are all the customers who wanted a Rotax. Where are their machines by now?

Also, JV was not satisfied with the Rotax 915 thrust (esp. in relation to the M2's 875 lb true-not-website empty weight), and JV himself embarked on a hunt for a 160+hp alternative. I was there, and graphed out the torque/hp curves of several promising car engine choices. More thrust was needed due to the M2's excessive weight, not because of customer demand.


>>We know your "back stories" and it's painfully obvious WHY you are shitting on Sportcopter
This is absurd. I have no "back stories" and certainly none relevant to my ire with JV and lack of faith in the M2. But, do you need a hint who really has "back stories" and lives in a huge "glass house"? JV knows that I have kept my mouth shut on several matters.


>>You know what I DON'T see here? the people who have a dog in this fight complaining here
I've been cheated out of an engine-less M2, a $90k value. Also, I consider my 3 full years at SC a general waste of time since I only relocated 1300 miles to help SC grow into "the Vans RV of gyros". This was a completely futile mission given JV's dearth of business abilities and ethics. If that's not a "dog in this fight" then I don't know what is. Many people have lost five-/six-figures, but I also lost 3 years.

Certainly, JV and SC have their qualities, but such are woefully lacking to save the M2 or the company.

To give M2 demo rides in the hope of gaining a new deposit is in my view FRAUD, given there is no reasonable expectation of actual production.

This sort of thing goes back long before my time. I know the names of people who years ago never got their new model 582 or M912. When I joined, SC had not refunded the $500,000 (ten $50k deposits for the SC2) owed to a company in Utah...and TMK still has not. SC has been "monkey-vining" for many years from debt to debt, but this time it's caught up with him.

I recommend that you stop parroting a single-source already discredited. I have the "receipts" (email, paper, audio, video) to back up everything I've posted (and more). You do not. I asked him to at least give me the shop M912 in lieu of the $90k value he owes me, and he wouldn't even do that. Am I disgruntled? Of course. I've been ripped off, and his "friendship" was farce. But that doesn't mean I've lied about anything. I don't have to, as the truth is sufficient.

I was wrong, Jim didn't fire you. you quit.

I am not a "flying monkey" I am a happy customer.

I am not going to get into a protracted battle with a professional writer on this or any forum.

I find it sad that your professed desire is to help your friends get their money back, but by helping to harm one of the few remaining American gyro companies you will in fact be accomplishing the exact opposite.

I seem to recall a time when Chevy was having some financial problems and they were able to turn it around. Any company that has been in business for 50 plus years will have ups and downs. A micro company whose leader almost dies in a hospital followed closely by his wife's deteriorating medical condition (heartbreaking to say the least) is going to affect business, but from what I could see when I was there a few months ago they are doing everything in their power to make things right.

Again, I am not going to get in a protracted battle with you over this. And the reason Jim isn't on any forums anymore is that he just doesn't need the distractions throughout the day dealing with customers in a tit for tat instead of ordering materials and running a biz.

It's not worth fighting with you here simply because I am not your enemy and there is no "upside" to engaging with you. You are hell bent on damaging Sportcopter. Nothing I post will change that.