Again I'm not actually trying to spoil any one's ideas or pursuit of something new. I have
plenty of weird things I'd like to do, just like everyone else.
My main point was that we can all easily work way too hard to solve a set of problems with some strange configuration... and victoriously make something fly... and then realize later the resulting airplane was not worthwhile.
I wound up almost completely re-designing the Cessna landing gear structure a few years ago. I had taken over an STC approval for converting the Cessna 172 back to the tailwheel configuration. The OEM parts were prohibitively expensive, and I figured I could create an approved parts kit for this conversion. With a lot of help from a structural engineer, I came up with something that would have worked perfectly well, and improved several things to make a more robust system for bush pilots. It would have been less expensive and easier to convert than using Cessna parts. In the end, the cost of completing the FAA testing and certification was too high for my budget. So I set it aside until I could afford it.
Then one day after I had taken a step back from it, I realized I had lost a fair chunk of my sanity, three years of no flying, about fifty grand, my wife almost left, and all I had to show for it was that I had come up with something clever that woulda-shoulda-coulda worked.
They say failure is the best teacher, and I'm offering the cap, gown, diploma, and degree to you all... but you get to use the tuition I already paid
