Sun n Fun Dissapointment.

[bugdevheli]

Having travelled from the UK to visit the helicopter section at
Sun N Fun. What a complete waste of time and money. In total
three homebuilds and a Robinson. Never again! Weston Super Mare
puts them to shame, plus the foods better.

[rotornut]

three homebuilds
Rotorways?

[outofwhack]

I am not sure how anyone interested in aviation could be disappointed with a trip to Sun 'n' Fun.
I havent been to that one but I hear its 50% - 70% the size of the EAA event at Oshkosh which is an enormous 7 day event. Been to OSH 4 times and never fails to impress me. But neither event is big on helicopters. E.G. last OSH had 2 Safaris, 2 Rotorways, 2 Enstrom, 1 Kiowa, 1 Blackhawk, a few gyros and 10,000+ fixed wings (many of which homebuilt).

What is prevalent is the level of enthusiasm and get up and go of our American neighbours and the flow of knowledge presented in the Oshkosh forum tents. It is truly inspiring. You have to give them massive credit for keeping the dream alive and making homebuilding possible and affordable in their country. Oshkosh and I suspect Sun 'n' Fun are about the future of aviation. They keep it alive.

I would love to get to the Weston Super Mare helicopter museum one day and trust it might be impressive but suspect it is only a record of the past - of great ideas killed off by governments and over regulation. The best British inventions were given away after all - e.g. the jet engine (the inventor gets so little credit) - and now the Brits cant even build their own Harrier because the licence is now in the hands of the U.S. At least it will survive over there.

I, as a Brit, think it might be a little sad to visit the museum at Weston to see what were such advanced designs for their era but came to nothing.

[MarcK]

I like our local helicopter show: Vertical Challenge (http://www.hiller.org/vertical-challenge.shtml) at the Hiller Museum, San Carlos, CA.

Here's a picture from the 2002 show:
http://www.hiller.org/files/i/Picturebook_2002/aaa-four-piasecki.jpg

[AB139engineer]

budieheli

where did you get the notion sun fun was a helicopter show?

One month earlier HAI was held in Orlando and its the best commercial
show in N.America

[slowrotor]

I don't think there is any good "sport helicopter" display anywhere, mostly because there is not many sport helos.

The Homer Bell sport copter fly-in might be an idea, mostly Rotorway.

[Dave_Jackson]

Sun n' Fun was an excellent show for homebuilt helicopters in 2000 (or was it 2001?).

Ultrasport had flying and static, 1-seat 254s and 2-seat 496s, plus a booth with cut-outs of various components.

Dennis Fetters had a static Mini 500, plus a booth with information and components used in the 1-seat Mini-500 and the developing 2-seat Talon.

In addition, there were other helicopters on display and flying.


Here is some of the 'reverse engineering' (http://www.unicopter.com/0162.html) done on the transmission when Dennis left the booth for lunch. :uhoh:

[smarthawke]

There was a privately owned N-reg Huey Cobra near the warbird parking area - what a toy that must be....