Oooops. My bad Craven. Typo

The paintwork is looking great Bob!

To any and all that wonder about our (Aerotech's) relationship with Bob and our reasoning behind marketing this "new and unfamiliar" product, I can only give an NFL Draft type explanation.


When the owner and head coach of an NFL team decide to focus on a certain position with their up and coming first draft pick they then start looking at the "unproven in the NFL" players that they have to choose from. They take several measurable and even many immeasurable things to mind and pick from the available players relatively blindly. Granted, they have "College" experiences to look at and simple things like "40" times, but they are taking a complete risk on the player himself with respects to monetary investments, roster moves and fan appreciation/understanding. This is a necessary evil of the business.

Now, in our Aerotech world, we have been "drafting" a couple players here and there since we bought the company last spring. We went to the combine camps, well... We went to Bob's proven history of build technique, weight, mathematical airfoil understanding, the demo flights of his previous "like minded" prototypes and then we capped it all off with a measured "40" time of Bob's design relationship with George Hicks and we decided to call Bob's name with our first draft pick! Just as in the NFL, if we had waited until Bob's product had gotten a ProBowl Selection, we wouldn't have had the ability to market it to our customers anywhere near as affordably as we are now able to.

Now... To back up even further....And to address Aerotech's ablility to make the necessary alterations to any and all of our "new" designs.... All of you that know me, know that I am NOT a designer. I am an enthusiast, a salesman, and a true believer in our hobby. I knew full well that I would need to rely on several other relationships if I was going to be able to handle the futher advancement of this company. I invited Mr. Ken Perron, a facilities management expert as well as a life long flying buddy of mine to own the company with me. This allowed me to get a great handle on the "how" we were going to get the items produced that we needed to get to our customers in a much more timely and cost effective manner. Ken and I discussed the "now" and the "future" of Aerotech quite often back then and it was easy to see that we needed one more "draft pick" when it came to the "future" portion.

As I stated before, Ken and I are not desingers and believe me, we are never going to pretend to be. With the addition of Bob's project to our then up and coming 2010 stable, we needed to find one last partner to assist us in turning Bob's design into a mass producable, marketable product for our customers. We then were lucky enough to "trade up" for another #1 type draft position and we immediately signed Mr. Kevin Walker. Kevin's design and engineering background immediately allowed us to "relate" to Sensei on a necessary level and to be able to bring his wonderful project to the public. Even more importantly, Kevin has completely redesigned the construction of our existing airframes and is currently making the finishing touches on the most exciting and industry altering products to date.

We here at Aerotech realize that the success of our 55% project is more in the hands of Bob Sawyer than those of our own and we are thrilled with our decision. We have acquired the tools and the personnel to maximize Bob's talents and efforts for us and we remain confident in the outcome of our venture.

To any and all of the "Nay-Sayers", please don't worry.... As we have not yet found a way to "force" any of you to purchase one of these or any other of our products. We are simply offering up something that has yet to be offered here in the US market in builder's kit form. We certainly hope that the majority of the R/C Community will respect this project and it's designer even if only from the standpoint of understanding that the "Betterment" of our hobby was kept top of mind during this entire project. But, if for some reason, some folks are unable to come to grips with the "horrendousness" of this project and our "hair-brained" plans to market it, I would invite you to PM me here and discuss your concerns with myself or Mr Walker directly instead of hijacking a very popular and educational thread designed first and foremost for the enjoyment of the FG Community.

Thanks to all of Bob's supporters! I can assure you that the end result of this project will be one that will exceed all of our hopes and goals!

KEEP IT UP SENSEI! Your's is a relationship that we will cherrish for the duration of our existance in the modeling buisness!

Matt Mikesh

Originally Posted by walkerk122

Hey guys,
I picked up the cowl for my 55% yesterday. This is the first piece out of Bob’s mold and looks really great! Bob has provided Aerotech with some top notch tooling for the production kits!!!

To lighten the mood a little in this thread I’ve decided to post the most cliché photos in the hobby

I see it is not a composite layup like Bobs. Is this a test piece or commercial reality? Epoxy or polyester?

ATTA BOY MATT...TELL IT LIKE IT IS...NO-ONE IS TWISTING ARMS TO BUY..THE PRODUCT QUALITY WILL SELL ITSELF..SO TO ALL THE NEGATIVE PEEPS PUT THERE ..HAVE A NICE DAY...AND WATCH THE NEW AEROTECH SOAR TO THE TOP...POPS

Kevin, that's an awesome photo! Only problem is i will have to extend the stingers on the cans by about 500mm to get them poking out the bottom
Matt, I think you are a true poineer for having the forsight, brains and balls to do what you are doing, you will change the face of our hobby! I think you all ready have! I rekon ALL the other airplane companies are watching you closely to see how they can do thing type of thing too! I bet they are kicking themselves for not having gotten to sensei and his legendary designs first!
Sensei has had me thinking for a long time, that I need to do something like that, and when he started this thread and mentioned it may be kitted, I knew this would be my bird! You guys are getting so close now, and I've been waiting so long now, that it's intolerable! LOL!

Originally Posted by jarheadflyer

Wow! I leave for just a few days and then check back in on my favorite build thread only to see that things have gone a little daytime soap opera here. While reading the last few days posts all I could hear in the back of my mind was the crowd cheering Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!

To Sensei...
The build looks phenominal! and unlik some people I REALLY like the colors you picked. Looking forward to the video and the kits becoming available.

To Carven...
Always look forward to anything you post just to see your avatars and many of your post just make me chuckle, in a good way.

To Husker, Bobstevens, and any other arrogant, pompous assed European I may have missed...
After getting over the anger of reading your ill informed and at times, wordy posts I was overcome with a feeling of pride. The pride in knowing I was able to read your posts without interpreting them from German. Keep it up you knob jockeys, and soon all of your credibility here will be gone.

And now on with the build, let's see this big beautiful bird all mocked up!

Dude...I'm from nebraska...its in the u.s. right in the middle if you look at a map. Hence the name husker...I was mocking bobstevens....

Originally Posted by Rod

I see it is not a composite layup like Bobs. Is this a test piece or commercial reality? Epoxy or polyester?

It is epoxy and you are correct, no core like Bob's prototype; however, it is not your typical 2-lay of 6oz job like you would see in a 40% cowl either. We have not yet settled on exactly how the production version will be layed up but I can honestly say this one is a heck of a good starting point. Certianly meets my standards to go my own personal airframe

From day one we have had two very clear goals for this venture:

1) Maker sure that everything we do for the production kit meets Bob's approval.


2) Make sure you guys can afford one when we get done meeting goal number 1

So, here in a couple weeks when I head to TX Bob will critique the piece and we'll go from there.

Well, Bob keep up the good work. You are reaching the finish line soon

i see an iowa to texas road trip in our near future!!!

OK, here is the mockup, sorry the pics are so dark, by the time I got home from work and got it together, the sun was down.

Hey Matt, wouldn't this look good with a couple of Aerotech graphics on it in black and red placed some place on the yellow.

Bob

Bob,wondering what you decided on muffler's extending stockers or will that effect performance?The Jtec's look interesting.

Man,Bob that is sweet,great covering job!

Originally Posted by sensei

OK, here is the mockup, sorry the pics are so dark, by the time I got home from work and got it together, the sun was down.

Hey Matt, wouldn't this look good with a couple of Aerotech graphics on it in black and red placed some place on the yellow.

Bob

Speechless Bob, just speechless...

What a tiny little plane.

NICE!!!