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  1. #1

    Join Date
    Jun 2018
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    Boeing Go-Fly Prize

    I am an old man, I have been in an out of aviation most of my life. When Boeing came up with this Go-Fly prize for VTOL personal aircraft, how could i refuse? Using all my engineering and homebuilt aviation expertise i came up with a vehicle that was safe, inexpensive and guaranteed to fly, with 1 hour range. Not bad looking either.You can build it in your garage.
    10 Winners were announced on the 14th, most of them were cherry picked colleges. The rest were who knows where they come from, science fiction looking devices that no way can fly for 20 minutes , with 10 minute reserve. More glitz then function. When selecting these submissions, Go-Fly didnt follow their own rules.
    What ticks me off is there were no or next to no older aviation people considered to win. On a point system, I think i had more points then all of the selected winners. Does the established airccaft community know about this injustice. Shouldnt winning depend on the merit rather then the galmour of a design. I am not against young people participating, but winning should be decided on by how credable the design is. The old guys working in their garage making something magical are excluded from this competition.
    EAA is one of the sponsors of the competition. I doubt if any one of us will be allowed to win anything.
    Some one please tell me that i am wrong.
    Jeff
    Attached Images Attached Images  

  2. #2
    I like. What was the power source?

  3. #3

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    Jun 2018
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    Quote Originally Posted by waltermitty View Post
    I like. What was the power source?
    hi Walter,
    this thing is easy to make, big motors in the middle are gas paramotors,500 pounds of lift. i upraded to 4 of them instead of the 2 shown,
    it is surrounded by outrunner drone motors, 600 pounds of lift. total lift 1100 pounds for a 600pound craft with passenger . Gas engines
    provide the heavy lifting, Drone motors supply control and safety if something fails. Estamted speed 50 MPH, range 1 hour. I want to land on the roof of walmart, avoid the traffic, joking,
    Jeff

  4. #4

    Join Date
    Aug 2014
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    4
    Hello all.

    Hello Birdmann.

    Comment for GoFly / BOEING contest:


    On August 1, 2018,
    GoFly / Herox deleted the Forum wherein the contestants of the GoFly / BOEING contest presented their opinions and their complaints.

    In the deleted Forum, several contestants were complaining for lack of transparency and were threatening to sue BOEING for it.


    Quote from the deleted Forum:

    (July 9, 2018)

    To put it simply, what I purchased with my 250 USD (paid to GoFly / Herox) is the following info:
    “You are not in the ten winners of the Phase I. Period.”

    Neither scoring, nor ranking, nor justification of the decision, nor a clue for the weak points the judges find in my solution, nothing at all.

    Just that I am not in the ten winners of phase I. . .

    And now they try to trap again the contestants with cheap “tricks” of the kind:

    "Dear contestant, in order to get a REVIEW of your Phase I submission, you have first to register to phase II; and in order to register to phase II, you have, among others, to create a company, to pay insurance fee, to pay “team” fee and to give equity rights to GoFly.”

    . . .


    (22 June 2018)

    BOEING, what is wrong with you?

    Secrecy,

    delays,

    hiding of essential information (like analytical scoring and ranking),

    publishing of highly misleading information (the “600+ innovators from 6 continents” turned it out to be 164 submissions),

    breaking of basic rules (the 20 miles became 20 minutes),

    selection of winners that beyond reasonable doubt do not comply with basic requirements (like the maximum size, the “vision cone”), etc.

    Come on BOEING. You can better.

    End of quote.


    For more : http://www.pattakon.com/GoFly/index.html

    Thanks
    Manolis Pattakos

  5. #5

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    A lot of this is typical big company culture..... the fix is in to fit specific narratives.
    But I'm sorry to hear about the way you treated.

  6. #6
    rwanttaja's Avatar
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    Don't know if you could sue Boeing over this. Boeing is the *sponsor* of the program, and control is vested in Gofly The competition agreement is between the entrant and Gofly, Boeing's only mentioned as a sponsor and not as a controller of the competition.

    Ford sponsors Airventure, but that doesn't mean you should be phoning-in your portapotty complains to Alan Mulally.

    Ron Wanttaja

  7. #7

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    Jun 2018
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    thanks for the support,
    Looks like we are out of the competition 100%, I dont have the capital to go on, I hope something good come of this
    but aviation is progressing rapidly towards VTOL technology. It is happening with or with out the Go-fly challenge.

  8. #8

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    Hello Ron Wanttaja.

    You write:
    “Don't know if you could sue Boeing over this. Boeing is the *sponsor* of the program, and control is vested in Gofly The competition agreement is between the entrant and Gofly, Boeing's only mentioned as a sponsor and not as a controller of the competition.”



    Quote from http://www.pattakon.com/GoFly/Posts_to_GoFly_Forum.htm (it is my last message to the GoFly / Herox / BOEING Forum, then the Forum was deleted):


    Hello all (August 1, 2018).

    As it seems,
    the “transparency” of the “Phase I Awards Issue” and the “clearly defined rules”,
    continue in the phase II of the GoFly contest.

    From the so far posts about the “equity”, it seems that nobody really knows what equity means here.

    To be in the safe side, when you sign a paper / a contract, you have to consider the “worst case scenario”.

    Flapping Flight’s scenario is an interesting one:
    When you sign the agreement doesn't matter if you are the winner in the competition or winner out of it
    GoFly will be your "partner" ”

    At first, the GoFly contest, with the BOEING involved as the big sponsor (remove the name “BOEING” from this contest and think if you would ever think to participate), was presented as a contest among thinkers and tinkers, with goal to make people fly.
    Now it appears as a contest for lawyers.

    Compare the GoFly / BOEING contest with Sikorsky’s contest for a human powered helicopter (more at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igor_I...er_Competition ) wherein the first who achieved “a flight duration of 60 seconds, reaching an altitude of 3 meters, with the center point of the aircraft hovering over a 10-by-10-metre square, was immediately declared the winner and took the big prize.

    A clear / honest / transparent contest against the GoFly / BOEING contest.

    I wonder, nobody in BOEING reads this forum?

    Thanks
    Manolis Pattakos

    End of Quote



    As GoFly used the BOEING as their bait / teaser to attract and trap the 164 contestants of the Phase I,
    the same way I use the same name BOEING to attract the interest of those who what to know the truth.

    And to warn new potential contestants (they can immediately go to phase II without participating in Phase I) about the transparency / quality / credibility etc of the GoFly contest . . .

    Thanks
    Manolis Pattakos
    Last edited by manolis; 08-11-2018 at 10:22 PM.

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