If you’ve been around aviation for a while, you know that there are a few famous cases of airplanes so profoundly hyped that even if there had been any substance to their manufacturers’ overinflated claims, nobody would have believed it.
The case of the Eclipse 500 stands out in recent years, though it’s hardly alone. In this case, the details are so well known it hardly bears repeating, but here goes: The airplane was going to cost less than a million dollars (less than $900,000, in fact), it was going to be built in batches of a couple of thousand a year, and it was going to spawn a new worldwide on-demand charter network that would revolutionize aviation as we know it. It was all nonsense, of course, but the airplane, despite some grueling development issues, really was what the company said it would be, that is, a much more expensive version of what it said it would be. The sad part was, the airplane got lost in the hype.
There are other examples that might predate you. The homebuilt “supersonic” Bede 10 jet which luckily never went anywhere, though it and a close derivative, suffered tragic fatal crashes. Jim Bede showed up at Oshkosh in the mid-1990s with another project, the BD-12, a single engine pusher constructed using modern automotive techniques, including extensive injection molding, except that it never happened, not even close. But listening to the hype, you’d have believed that this new model was going to revolutionize the industry. Maybe Bede believed the hype. My guess is that he did. The project is still ongoing, sort of.
The thing about hype is that it doesn’t have to be associated with a fake product, a bad product or one that won’t come to pass. It’s just that all of those products need the hype, so when a new airplane shows up that’s surrounded by hyperbole, my spidey sense immediately starts to tingle, and it’s then up to the hype-creators to prove that they’re not scam artists.
It’s not just me, either. Pilots in general and Flying readers specifically are among the best-educated consumers in any industry that I know. When marketers overpromise, we know they’re overpromising. That’s why the likes of Cessna, Hawker Beechcraft, Embraer, Cirrus, Diamond and others all strive to underpromise and over-deliver. And they all consistently do just that. The result of that kind of marketing — which is the opposite of hype — is that the consumer believes the message, and not just this time but the next time and the time after that too. It’s the difference between a company that's in it for the long run and one that’s in it for short-term gain.
In the final accounting, flying is all about the cold hard truth. The difference between how much range an airplane has in real life and how much it has in the brochure can be the difference between landing at an airport and near one.
That’s why there’s such a thing as a POH: because the facts matter. In aviation, they matter ultimately. That's why hype is the enemy.
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I agree.. As I recall from the days of WW-2, the folks at Grumman underplayed their machinery too, but they built aircraft that could take all the abuse the Navy could throw at them in carrier ops and came away smiling every time.
Far better to under-promise and amaze than to disappoint.
The eclipse 500 was technically possible and financially possible given the Ecconomic conditions of pre dot com bomb, pre 911, pre Realestate crash, pre y 2 k scare pre wall street crash. Due to sales commitments the Williams 700 sh hp engine did not have
Time to be improved for Hot High and blade containment. Eclipse had to make the executive decision to go to another engine. A heavier engine. So more fuel was needed therefore the airframe was changed to have tip tanks. Due to unforeseen Ecconomic growth in the world aluminum went up in price. The hit per plane was$150,000.
We have a deflationary period and commodities should be cheaper. We at the time were sending concrete to China and concrete went from 75 a yard to 110 yard.
Also mfg techniques from the auto industry were to be implemented. These were firsts.
Please separate out technical possibility from the crazy Ecconomic role roster the
Ecconomy was put into.
I remember the lines 100ft long to go into and see the Eclipse. This was possibility.
If it is technically feasible it is not hype. Do not confuse Ecconomy with
Technical Feasability.
MHz
I wish that the public in general wasn't so easily gulled...then, maybe, marketers would start to underpromise, overdeliver, and crow about that. I work in the auto industry and am stunned by the number of "40 miles per gallon" claims in manufacturers' adds. A quick read in Consumer Reports knocks about 40% off the claim to reach reality. Likewise Ford, with its high mileage, high tech EcoBoost truck that CU says gets the same 15 MPG in the real world as its 5 liter V-8. In spite of that, F-Series is the largest selling vehicle in the U. S. "Lie to me...I won't mind." No wonder sales types overpromise.
Although, when you run out of fuel on I-35 you can just pull over.
You "work in the auto industry" yet you don't understand that mpg numbers are not manufacturer claims but numbers registered by Government-mandated test cycles? It's not the manufacturers' fault, it's that the test cycles don't reflect reality. The numbers they produce are only useful for comparison of different models vis-a-vis each other, not for indications of what you will actually achieve in real life, which is where the acronym "YMMV" (Your Mileage May Vary) comes from. Also, in many states gas stations are required to sell 10-percent ethanol gasoline, which immediately reduces mpg by about 10 percent versus the Government test cycles that use 100-percent gasoline.
I'm guessing you're a used-car salesman.
I wish that Peter Garrison would "chime in" on the recent claims of Synergy Aircraft's claims regarding their box wing's ability to reduce friction to such an extent that their aircraft is 4 or 5 times more fuel efficient than comparable weight and size aircraft.
As PT Barnum put it, there's a sucker born every minute. We all know that sizzle sells. That's why car company A can sell its 2012 model which, apart from new exterior trim or a glitzier interior, is pretty much the same as last year's model. But eventually the subliminal effect of watching those car commercials for years convinces people they need a new car. Ditto for FLYING readers, coveting that latest Cirrus or Cessna or whatever.
Wasn't it honest Abe Lincoln who said you can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all of the time? All those BD-5s, turned planters, certainly attest to the gullible nature of otherwise intelligent people. Some Americans tend to gravitate towards bigger/faster/newer like moths to a flame, desirous of remaining ahead of the curve, or keeping ahead of the Jones's. If you have the dough I say "go nuts", but be prepared to lose a large fraction of the resale value of that plane in the first five to seven years. That's a sensible strategy for a business that needs a flight department and can purchase the plane on a lease they can deduct from their taxes; its a poor idea for the average Joe who flies around his/her local area every other weekend, chasing that $100 hamburger.
Most people would be better served by a 3-5 year-old low mileage vehicle for about half the sticker price. The aviation analogy being the 8-12 year-old aircraft with the smaller monthly payment and sufficient performance/utility to match their needs, NOT THEIR DESIRES.
Here's a classic example. Today (June 6th, 2012) trade-a-plane.com offers us a gleaming new 172, loaded, with that new-plane smell for a staggering $307,000. That plane will depreciate a lot faster in the first five years that the loan value will. A few spots down on the same page is a 2001 Skyhawk, loaded with avionics, a low-time engine and an air freshener for $107,000, depreciated close to its wholesale value. Given the recent sweeping AD for all 100-series Cessna and the 210 series, I would avoid anything older than 1986 like the proverbial plague.
The successful light plane owner doesn't fall for the latest thing and refuses to sign his name to a note he'll never be able to afford. The ones who overreached or bought based on desires are the owners who became bankrupted and had to sell their magic carpets for less than blue book value.
Beware the sly, smiling salesman, offering you an easy way to own an overpriced toy.
Douglas M
Surrey, BC
I never advocate a legal remedy in our over litigious society but a woman in California is suing Honda in small claims court over their mileage claims being false advertisement and fraud. If she wins, she can be entitled up to $5,000 restitution. In california lawyers are not permitted in small claims and they have to appoint an legal representative. Interesting tactic to squeeze the hype a little bit.
+1 on the wants vs needs :)
A few comments.
1.I agree with the stupidity of hype but I think the article is little too harsh, overall. My sympathies are with those affected personally and financially but I agree to a fair extent with the first poster Michael Zucco.
2. Eclipse created a lot of hype and some of that it was always going to be foolish but sensible, smart people put money into Mr Rayburn's venture as well. In hindsight it is clear that they were trying to do too much too quickly and were, as you guys say, drinking the cool-aid. They should started with several fewer variables and built up from there - maybe an existing VLJ design, of which I can think of at least one, maybe a turboprop like the Epic. The principle however remains sound - using mass-production techniques and economies of scale to reduce the unit cost to levels proportionate with what old-timers would remember paying for aircraft. It's been that way before and I don't accept that it can not be that way again. They had some bad luck, which they partially created themselves, and they also went a bit silly.
3. The BD-10 came close to being a massive success. As with the eclipse, the concept was actually sound, even if was yet to be shown that home-building was viable. They failed to fully test the airframe before wringing its neck and that led to the well-known catastrophic flutter-induced breakups. A slightly more engineered structure in the tail area and we might all be aspiring to own a share in one of them now. I would give a fair hearing to someone wanting crowd-sourced investment to redo the BD-10 with the kinks ironed out.
A revolutionary, awesome idea will sell itself, non dubium est. When you're onto a winner, the trick is to limit the hype generated by others. Over-promising and under-delivering is kiddy stuff. As you correctly point out, aviation types are better informed than the general population. We're always going to be somewhat susceptible to hype however. Why? Because every pilot is also a bit of a dreamer and every good thing starts with a dreamer who thinks, "this is not as good as it gets and I'm going to prove it." Ever may it be thus :-)
I fly one of the originally most-hyped planes of the postwar era, a Johnson Rocket. It is one of the nicest-flying planes I have ever flown.
That said, it is rumored that R.S. "Pop" Johnson originally built 7 planes and had them flown to airshows, promoting this hot new plane, which looked like a scaled-down P-39, with a B-17-shaped vertical fin.
He is rumored to have sold more than 500 planes, plus company stock and dealerships and distributorships -- all before he had obtained type certification. He and J.C. Pirtle (his successor) built only 17 planes.
It was a tribute to the concept of undertaking vast projects with half-vast ideas.
Excellent read, I simply passed this onto a colleague who was simply performing a little research about this topic. And the man actually bought me lunch because I found it for him. So I should appreciate the free lunch I acquired.
REGARDS
Magazine Subscription
Editor:
I object to the gratituous insertion of street drug vernacular, " my spidey sense immediately starts to tingle," in this article in FLYING, the iconic general aviation publication. As a faithful subscriber for 45 years, and as a general aviation pilot for these same years, I am appalled by this careless association of law-abiding pilots with illicit illegal substance abuse, no matter how cute the locution might have seemed as it's preparation was condisdered.
This editorial style recklessly damages the aviation community. You can do better.
I guess Robert Goyer, an otherwise good and factual writer should read this editorial. He has the right to his own opinions but when writing for a mazagine personal and exagerated favoritisms, in this case towards the Eclipse, should be put aside.
Flying is doing the right thing in enlightening readers about these con artists as potential buyers might fall prey to overkill advertising and plunk wads of dollars into something that is not worth anything. Another example of this kind of daydreaming is the resuscitation for the Nth time of the car-airplane contraption recently displayed that really turns heads as an idea but, does it have any merit. If one looks back towards the Bedes, the Eclipses, the car-airplane hybrids and so on it is evident that those exotic ideas were pushed by people who had never been in the airplane manufacturing business. Yeah, go first and only to the pros who have been around for decades.
Just a note to trcole3: Spiderman, the iconic Marvel comic from which I borrowed this common phrase, has been around for 50 years now. I googled the phrase and the first several hundred hits were for Spiderman. Before I made a reckless allegation, I'd have at least googled the reference first.
I agree with the basic premise of the article--if it is too good to be true, it is probably today's equivalent of snake oil.
Btw, that is also not a drug oriented comment anymore than "spidey sense" was. For gosh sakes, lighten up Cole!
Cary
I don't know if I would fly with a pilot who has never heard of Spider-Man... makes me wonder what else he/she has missed. FYI, an iPad isn't street vernacular for one's house. You handled that better than I would have Robert. I hope the guy is trolling, cause it is scary to think we share the same airspace.
i know this is an old-ish post already but i just happened upon it now. I'm w/ the other commenters who find the tone too harsh. Both the Eclipse and the BD were near-misses in my book.
What's success ? getting a type certification or actually delivering what you said you would ? Because if it's a matter of a successful program meeting its stated parameters then the Space Shuttle, the Concorde, the Beechcraft Starship and probably half the planes ever made were hyped up failures because they lost money. Often tons and tons of money (or, in the case of the shuttle cost WAY more money than it was supposed to to operate. And it had a demonstrated failure rate 4 orders of magnitude less than claimed.)
Also a broader point is that there is hype all over the place in the industry. There's hype that makes commercial pilots spend tens of thousands of dollars and spend years to become qualified to make Starbucks wages for a few years. There's hype pointed at air travelers, there's huge hype about GA (which is quite an expensive hobby) etc.
My impression is that whatever lack of hype there is at core is not so much because of the wisdom and level headedness of pilots who demand better but because of the draconian policies and enforcement of the FAA.
