New Shop

[Allanon]

A friend of mine and I are tossing the idea around of opening a composite shop where we could build kit planes. We would design, build, and test them. I guess the question is this: is this a pipe dream or is there a real market for something like this?

 

~~Allanon

[Marc Zeitlin]

A friend of mine and I are tossing the idea around of opening a composite shop where we could build kit planes. We would design, build, and test them. I guess the question is this: is this a pipe dream or is there a real market for something like this?

Do you wake up at night with the desire to run into the bathroom and flush $100 bills down the toilet repeatedly?

 

Are you an aircraft designer?

 

Have you built aircraft before?

 

Are you a test pilot?

 

Do you want to do this to make $$$?

[Allanon]

No, but I do wake up in the middle of the night wanting to design and build my own aircraft.

 

Yes, I'm an aerospace engineer with a lot of design background.

 

I've not personally built an aircraft before, but the other guy who is in on this has previous experience building kit planes at Wicks (we live right down the road from them )

 

Money for me is not as much of an issue. Yes, I would like to make money... but as the old addage goes, a man making minimum wage that loves his job is happier than a man making six figures doing something he hates.

 

I'm not saying I hate my job... but I've always wanted to design and build my own aircraft and I feel like any potential I have is being wasted where I'm currently at.

[Marc Zeitlin]

I'm not saying I hate my job... but I've always wanted to design and build my own aircraft and I feel like any potential I have is being wasted where I'm currently at.

Well, then what I would suggest is that you and he design and build something that you think might sell, test the crap out of it, and when it's proven, then see if you can find a market for it. At that point, you can quit your day jobs and start selling kits.

[Allanon]

Good... because that's exactly what we're doing. We've got a design that we've pitched to Adam Wick and he likes it. We're finishing up the design phase now and are about to move into a prototype phase. From there, we'll see what happens.

 

Do keep in mind that the idea of having our own shop is probably 5 to 10+ years in the future...