Anablog

All the excitement about the new jetpack unveiled at Oshkosh (watch the video where it sucks in a tree branch) got me interested in airplanes again and last night I came across an interesting website about unusual aircraft. That website lead me to the Custer Channelwing, and true oddity and apparently a practical VSTOL aircraft. It also demonstrates how a bad engineer/geek/dork personality can hold you back, well at least if you are not Bill Gates. It seems that Custer, the inventor of the channelwing was offered a pile of money from a major aircraft company, but he insisted he be hired to work there along with some other onerous restrictions, so the deal fell through. Don’t overvalue you intellectual property folks, my mentor, Big John Massa tells me that the “idea man” can expect 1.5 to 3%. It is the perfection and development or the reduction to practice you might say where the real work and the real rewards are. It takes a lot more to make a successful business that a successful product and it takes a lot more to make a successful product than a good idea.

The Custer Channelwing was developed in the 1920’s and apparently works as a VSTOL aircraft. It is trying to be revived even today.