Harry's STILL at the factory

[DanBrown]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

OK.. I downloaded the latest registry file from the FAA website and now have it in a MS Access database. There are 3764 aircraft of various Taylor* and Auster (9 of them) models. A few may not be Taylorcrafts. There are only 13 with no addresses and 2 foreign addresses (NZ and CA). I have a zip code sort of the rest (should be able to use bulk postage rate), and will make a label report this weekend. Any of the writers like to take a stab at drafting a petition?

[Buell Powell]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

I think that information to all owners is very good idea, and Dan's offer to set up the data base and labels very good also. How would we help to get the postage and other stuff paid for? dunno? I would sure chip in though.
"EVERYONE NEEDS TO BE INFORMED ABOUT HARRY AND D&E"

JS

James is right -sending information to all owners is a very good idea-prehaps that would encourage other owners to join the foundation to stay informed also.According to the "factory" web-site" they have sold 5 sets of struts--lets see if we can help them keep that number until we can figure out how to see that the ones that have been paid for are sent to the rightful owners. How can I help? I can send in some to help with postage and some ideas ---some may be good and some prehaps not so good to consider.
Buell

[CraigH]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

If someone wants to set up a PayPal account for contributions towards printing/postage I'd be happy to make a donation.

[M Towsley]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

Dan,

Even thought the 'D' models, (L-2's, DCO-65's), are not part of the AD's, at least yet, you may want to include them as Taylorcraft owners. I just threw away the entire list of 'D' model owners. Remember, some are listed as L-2A, L-2B, L-2M and DCO-65's. Mine was listed as a Taylorcraft/Johnson due to the builder rebuilding her. There are very few of those, though. Great idea on using the database!

[Aircraftman1]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

If there is ANYTHING I can do to wipe that smug, arrogent grin off Harry's face, and facilitate giving him what he's deserved for a LONG TIME, count me in! How about the petition, and let Patrick know that unless he kicks Harry to the curb, WE WILL BOYCOTT THE FACTORY, aka Harry's Ripp Off central! (My personal opionion, of course!) Bob

[Aircraftman1]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

I think writing all the current owners and warning them about whats going on would put us in a position to show the owners we are looking out for them, also, I think it would go a LONG WAY on boosting membership!. whom do i send money to help with the postage?.. Bob

[jstall]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

I'm kinda surprised that we haven't seen something in the Club Newsletter on this, the Cessna 190/195 club letter comes out quarterly, and they have a very effective club, lots of support, and enthusiasm.

JS

[VictorBravo]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

Here is my suggestion for the mass mailing, if it is approved by the group. Because there has been no official stance on this matter from the Foundation, and the Foundation may or may not choose to support this mailing, we can position this as official or unofficial as the case justifies.

[Arnold Wallace]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

Bill,
That is an excellent letter and I for one will support you on this cause. Very well put. N96175

[VictorBravo]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

At the private suggestion of a forum member, I have amended the document Paragraph 7 to include this change:

"... improperly influenced by Taylorcraft, and that the “evidence” presented to this inspector was questionable, making it so that others in the FAA process had bad information. We suspect that this was set up by Taylorcraft so that their money-making wing strut scheme was soon "backed up" by the full authority of the FAA"

Since I was not personally victimized, I think it is imperative that the people who were victimized put any corrections or more accurate facts up on this forum, so that if/when this document goes out it is mentioning the truest facts. Truth and verifiable factual data is the first and best defense against anyone accusing someone else of lying about them.

[VictorBravo]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

Bill,
That is an excellent letter and I for one will support you on this cause. Very well put. N96175

Thanks for the compliment, but this is not ME you are supporting. It's YOU and all of us as a group.

I was not defrauded by Taylorcraft. I never sent any money. I actually volunteered to help Harry way back in the very beginning, by offering to be the West Coast salesperson for their thousands of impending production airplanes that would be filling the skies.

I am not even the one "leading the charge" here, other than my willingness to write what I understand others are thinking. There should be at least one guy in particular leading the charge, but so far we have not heard from him.

What I'm doing is to simply offer whatever time and effort I can to support a potential group decision. One member is willing to print out mailing labels. One member is willing to bang on the keyboard and give the idea some shape and sound. Another one or two said they'd throw in some money towards stamps (me too).

However, this has to be a group effort. The version of this flame-fest that I posted this morning was positioned to represent the views of a large number of people. That means there have to be 50 or 100 or 300 people who are willing to put their names on the list of supporters of the letter. If there are four people who list themselves as supporters then it makes the whole thing look weak and unjustified.

The guys who had their airplanes taken apart and scavenged by the factory have to identify themselves and support it. The guys who paid money for struts and never got them need to identify themselves. The guys who worked at the factory for a while and saw some of this take place need to identify themselves. The people who paid for parts and never got them... the people who got the months and years of BS excuses... the people who were offered the "new" struts for sale which were paid for by the original victims... the people who wend down there and had to take their incomplete piles of parts back... the woman who took her husband's plane in for restoration and got nothing... the people who put down a deposit on a new airplane... all THOSE people are the ones who have to get behind this and put their names on the dotted line.

I also attempted to position this letter in such a way to represent a large group of people's sincere opinions, as opposed to hard legal facts.

So it is me who is being supportive of all of YOUR efforts, not the other way around. I'll stand behind anything I write, but this project involves one written document expressing the views of a large number of people rather than just the original author of the document.

Everyone should also be VERY open to hearing or reading someone else's story, someone else's suggested petition, someone else's opinion on how to approach this problem, not just what one particular blabbermouth thinks everyone else wants to say!

[jdoran]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

Before we go off and do something, how about considering this?

The people that will suffer in my opinion is not Harry, but the folks who are trying to put the company back together again. That's right, I think the ones to catch all the flak we're getting ready to send will be the very people we might want to help instead.

Many of us probably have owned a business at one time. Imagine taking over a company that someone else was running, and stepping in to "take over" the company without knowing anything where anything is, who does what, what bills are owed, who the vendors are, etc. To make matters worse, the fact that Harry left the company as a smoking hole makes the job even tougher. I'll bet the last thing the Patrick group needs is a "lynch mob"

I don't know any of this for a fact, I'm just guessing that Harry is only needed for a short time to fill in some blanks, then the Patrick group will usher him out. That's what I'd do if it were me.

I haven't lost any money, time or parts as many of you have, and I don't blame you for being pissed, but I think maybe we should wait and give them a chance.

[Aircraftman1]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

Excellent letter!.. count me in to sign it as I am one of the many. many people that have been ripped off and cheated by Harry.
When I was there, there were SO MANY pissed off people streaming in looking for Harry, while he hid in the bathroom right next to the front desk, with the door locked, with his ear to the door listening like the little B--CH he is!..
I personally would LOVE IT if Harry was beat to withen an inch of his life!. If HE doesnt deserve it, who does??? Everyone is being TOO NICE!, Call me callus, But I am sick to death of everyone pussy footing around! After this is all over, Harry is going to be JUST FINE, with NO repercussions!. I cant stand it!... If everybody had listened to me back in May of 2005, when I brought all this to your attention, instead of many of you sticking up for him , (Are you listening Mike Rice?) , we wouldnt even be having this discussion now!... Bob the interior man.

[DanBrown]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

Before we go off and do something, how about considering this?

The people that will suffer in my opinion is not Harry, but the folks who are trying to put the company back together again. That's right, I think the ones to catch all the flak we're getting ready to send will be the very people we might want to help instead.

Many of us probably have owned a business at one time. Imagine taking over a company that someone else was running, and stepping in to "take over" the company without knowing anything where anything is, who does what, what bills are owed, who the vendors are, etc. To make matters worse, the fact that Harry left the company as a smoking hole makes the job even tougher. I'll bet the last thing the Patrick group needs is a "lynch mob"

I don't know any of this for a fact, I'm just guessing that Harry is only needed for a short time to fill in some blanks, then the Patrick group will usher him out. That's what I'd do if it were me.

I haven't lost any money, time or parts as many of you have, and I don't blame you for being pissed, but I think maybe we should wait and give them a chance.

John,

My only loss was two months of not being able to fly while Harry reneged time and time again on promises to deliver struts. Luckily, I believed what I saw on this forum and did not send money in advance. I finally canceled my order with him and got my struts from Airframes -- delivered just when they promised for considerably less than Harry's.

IMHO, if the new management group was serious about restoring Taylorcraft and establishing good will among us, they would have taken at least four actions:

Honor the previous orders.

Explain their position and business plans on this forum.

Respond to customer questions and complaints.

Remove Harry as an active participant in the business. If his expertize is useful, retaining him as a consultant for a brief transition period could be an option -- although not good for customer relations. There is much better technical and business help available, as evidenced by many of the contributers to this forum.

I don't see where any of this has happened, or is likely to without a strong jolt from the aircraft owners. So I, for one, am happy to assist with the others who want to alert all Taylorcraft owners, the AOPA and EAA, and investigative agencies about the factory's actions. Bill's letter is an excellent start, so count me in to contribute time and some dollars to the effort.

[jstall]

Re: Harry's STILL at the factory

John: Dan is absolutely right on this, as far as I'm concerned Patricks, D&E
and the rest of thier management staff are from the same snake den as Harry.

They simply were not honest with anyone on this deal, they painted a different picture than they advertised to folks thru media sources.

D&E didn't even contact me as many of the articles said they were "DOING" I contacted them when I didn't hear from them, if they had been sincere in establishing a reputable bench mark for them or the next Taylorcraft Factory owner, they would have stood behind what happened, cause in my sincere opinion, they sure knew, this wasn't any surprise, heck they were it it with Harry from the beginning, and they sure wouldn't have been stupid enough to sit iddley by and let it spin in as it did, without knowning what was going on. They knew and finally took action, but only to shed the past obligations and bail out of those financial obligations, thence to try to find another sucker to take it. No one in their right mind would touch that factory now. Way behind the power curve now, reputation shot, and even major damage done to the other outfit "D&E AIRCRAFT" WORD IS OUT ON THEM ALSO UP AND DOWN THE EAST COAST,

They had the opportunity to have smoothed this out, and things could have worked, but nope, they didn't and won't so 'I CUT THEM NO SLACK"

Now what we crafters are faced with is how to salvage what might be left, and protect our A/C from furthur maintenance prostitution by money mongers feeding like a bunch of sharks on a partially alive victum. What has happened can happen again, and could literly put our little craft out of the future in light sport. Don't get me wrong, I'm for safe airplanes, but not in the way this last deal came down, and then to add insult to injury, not produce parts, lie, get the FAA to lie, get the receivers to lie. bad deal guys and gals

JS

JS