Bearhawk community opinion please

[beanman]

I hope asking this question here is OK.

I have my long stored Bearhawk plans # 209 for sale. I will never be able to finish and need to finally sell it. Age, medical and other commitments.
I posted it on the forum classified last month. I have had some inquiries. What I would like from anyone is input on my price. Am I being fair and realistic??

When I was involved with the original bearhawk forum back in the 90's and 2000's I found the input from the folks out there to be pretty straightforward and honest. From what I.ve followed on this site it seems to the same open and honest type of input.
I am asking $11,000.00 (negotiable to a point) for everything I have including tools. I have been out of the loop for a while. Lost my medical 16 years ago. Project listed below:
Any input would be appreciated.

I have about 1500 total hours in it. Located in Waynesburg Pennsylvania (50 miles south of Pittsburgh) a partial list of what is included is listed below:

Fuselage; This is the fuselage used by Bearhawk kits as a template for the original kits. Built by Carl Adams and inspected by Bob Barrows when Carl was building it. I travelled to Carl's place and bought it from him back in late 90's. Absolutely beautiful work.

Wings: Ready for skinning. All primed and have been stored in my garage. One is currently in skinning jig with two panels cut and drilled.
Aileron: Ready for skinning. Primed and stored in my garage.
Flaps; Ready for skinning. Primed and stored in my garage.
Fuel tanks: Complete. Done by Spencer aviation back in late 90's. Stored and kept covered in my garage..
Landing Gear Shock Struts:
Wing strut blanks. Gotten from Bob Barrows.
Plans fittings: All packaged and cut by the Bearhawk company as payment for using my fuselage. Dozens of all necessary fittings for remaining work.
heated Pitot Tubes-New;
Air vents from C-180
MANY tools to include but not limited to, rivet gun, rivet squeezer, riveter, clecos enough for entire project. Some 0.032, .026 aluminum rolls (not enough to finish wings).

ALL of above have been kept in heated garage. Other than some dust all items are fine.

I am asking $11, 000.00 for everything I have. I can deliver for costs within a reasonable distance from my home.

[whee]

I think you are pretty close on price.

I paid $11K for my project which was at a similar stage as yours. Jig built fuselage, wings basically at QB stage (skinned with just the trailing edge needing rivets), flaps and ailerons basically ready for skinning. But no tools.

[Bentmettle]

To some extent, it's a marketing exercise as well. Price is only part of getting yourself a buyer. Photos with the listings are a big deal to me personally. Close ups are appreciated.

If you can upload a pile of photos to something like Google Drive or Dropbox and share a link, maybe that will help tip the shoppers into a buyer.

[nichzimmerman]

If I were starting over, I would definitely consider yours at the asking price over scratch building, but only if I couldn't afford a full kit.

[beanman]

Thanks to everyone for the input. I do have photos and will try and add a link. Did not think of that. just figured I'd send them if anyone was interested..

[Pbruce]

I think Bentmettle is giving you very good advice. When somebody sees parts which look like a plane, their imagination can easily take them to them to the finish line (completed airplane) while sitting in an armchair. And only 11 grand, which is fair and affordable. Almost makes it seem easy, which scratch building is not. The very reason it’s so low is that it’s no where near a completed airplane in terms of work or cost. I’d say price is fine and lowering may not help much in finding a buyer anyway, whereas better marketing almost certainly would. I’d list it on the Vans RV classified site. It’s amazing how much interest there is on that site for Bush planes, and you’d be talking to a whole giant community of people, many of whom already have the skill set. Lots of nice quality pictures organized by component.

[way_up_north]

Just wanted to toss in an item of interest here...

When I sold my sonex partial built kit to another builder.. the factory had a transfer fee of $100...to re-assign the serial number...

but from my understanding the transfer fee...it was kinda like you're selling the kit back to the factory for a fee and the factory is selling it to the buyer...

the factory is assuming (some/all) liability for the plans and the kit...

I wanted to mention this as a way for Jared..Bob or the factory to have another income stream and everyone gets something out of it....

its been awhile and there may have been restrictions ....like only plans or factory build kits...etc..

[Mark Goldberg]

Way up north - no way the factory would be interested in assuming any responsibility for what a particular builder has done to a kit. As far as when selling the kit to another person. We have seen a wide range of things done to kits over the years by the builder that were not good. From damage to poor workmanship - on and on. Even kits that have "never been touched". No reason to mention particulars.

In no way am I saying every kit out in builder's workshops are not OK. Almost all builders are very good and contentious. But there are LOTS of accounts of issues with second hand kits. Often the new owners call asking for help/advice. So what you suggest is not really practical from my point of view. Mark

[way_up_north]

my memory of what I was signing 15 years ago might be a little rusty ...

Mark i appreciate you commenting as I’m probably mistaken about the factory liability(sonex factory item listed above)

I`m just making suggestions...and not all ideas are good ideas....Il clarify here what I’m trying to get at...



as it stands Bob gets nothing from the trading, selling or swapping of his intellectual property from one builder to another..(I’m talking about plans/kits)

and one day if Bob retires there won’t be someone to call to ask questions ...he offers free tech support ..out of the goodness of his heart...

If you had to pay to have someone answer questions like Bob does

Transfer fees would be one of the ways to offset such costs

By charging a transfer fee it makes used plans less valuable..and encourages potential buyers to buy a new set vs used...especially if phone support is only offered to original plans owners or those who have paid a transfer fee....

if a buyer knows they have to pay a transfer fee on top of the cost of the used plans... then buying a new set for slightly more is more appealing ...

since Bob or the factory make zero off used sales as it is... I just wanted to plant the seed here of a way to help offset the cost of having support in the future

[predragvasic]

I'm just an observer here (no Bearhawk kits yet), but this idea made me respond.

I can see that, on the one hand, any one set of plans (or a kit) essentially eventually is meant to arrive to a point of completion of one aircraft. In many cases, this will be done by one single builder, who got the kit (plans) from the company, went ahead, built the plane and then flew it. Then there are those who had great ideas, but life interfered, and they sell the plans, plus whatever work they had already done, and another person picks this up. From the perspective of the company, this is still one single aircraft, along its path from plans (kit) to completion. So, whether the ownership changes hands or not, it is essentially still just one same set of plans (or parts), from the support perspective.

On the other hand, as Mark had implied, the chances are probably higher that the abandoned project may have problematic workmanship (original post here notwithstanding, of course). And each time the project changes hands, there is an increased likelihood that the new builder will ask questions that had already been asked by the previous builder (and answered), increasing the burden on the company regarding the support for that particular set of plans (or parts).

It seems to me that, so far, the Bearhawk team has been able to offer answers whenever builders had questions, and I'm guessing, for the most part, the questions were short enough that the answers could be simple, and don't require extensive research. My point is, this seems to be working well for both the builders and the company.

Adding the transfer fee may well only be of a symbolic value. Ultimately, it would simply reduce the value of the set of plans on the used market by the amount of that fee (since it would be impossible to sell a used set of plans if the combined price of the used set and the 'transfer fee' is greater than the new set from the company), and that additional revenue that comes from the existing set of plans would come with a set of expectations that may well be unrealistic.

Plans that are at various stages of completion are probably the biggest potential headache for the company. The whole philosophy of the E/AB category is founded on the experimentation, and for many ambitious builders, the plans are simply just a starting point. Quite many builders deviate from plans (and even kits) to some extent, and nobody but the builder can be expected to take responsibility for the results.

[jaredyates]

I appreciate where you are coming from, and have proposed some similar thoughts about transfer fees in the past. Speaking from the Beartracks perspective, I think of the newsletters as extensions of the plans. If a project changes hands, the new owner asks, and the old owner doesn't object, I'll transfer ownership to the new builder. This is really rare, but it does happen occasionally. In the end, I want to make sure that folks have what they need. A transfer fee is one more thing to have to keep track of, which has its own administrative costs. I realize that sometimes the revenue doesn't correlate to the effort, and that's ok. Hopefully in the end, there is enough in the bank to keep the lights on, and so far that has always been the case, whether it is with the store merchandise, the cookouts back when we used to do those, or the various internet resources. Some forums have an optional paid tier, but I'm concerned that trying to do something like that in a group of this size will require more inputs than the outputs will justify.

We've been having a lot of rain where I live, seemingly more than usual. Yesterday I managed to get my 4x4 pickup hopelessly stuck in a neighbor's yard. I'm existing on two properties while we are in the process of moving, and our little tractor is at the other property. Usually, this would be my standby recovery tool. The tractor and truck have always been able to pull one another out of their various predicaments. I tried a winch, but was running out of daylight and good options. So I called a different neighbor to ask for help. He had just changed out of his work clothes for the day and was getting ready to eat, but he brought over his big tractor to help. Less than a minute after he arrived, I was back on the pavement and we were both on the way home.

That's a long digression, but the point is that I didn't offer him any money for his help. It's not likely a job he would have done for money. He came and helped because he's a fantastic neighbor and realized that I was literally and figuratively stuck without him. If we had to assign a dollar value to his help, there is a good chance I wouldn't have been able to afford it.

Similarly, the plans and kits cost a lot of money, but when we observe the support that comes from Bob and Mark, it's my opinion that they are both providing far more value than the dollars justify.

Folks who study this type of thing categorize two distinct realms for transactional interactions and relational interactions. When we're over at the distant family's house for thanksgiving dinner, we don't slide back from our chair at the end and say "that was great, how much do I owe?", because we're in the relational mode.

Both Mark and Bob are running businesses, and it is a transactional realm at times. But I've noticed that the support often falls more into relational realm, thankfully. The same happens here on the forum between builders. We help each other out because we are neighbors and because we can. Whether this is sustainable in the long term for someone in Mark's position is up to Mark. Whether it is or isn't, I don't think any transfer fee is going to tip the scales... we're talking about far more dollars than that. I'm just really glad that we have so many helpful folks, and I try and be especially thankful and return the favor in ways that I can whenever I'm aware and able. If we all do a little, a lot gets done to build the community and promote the success of the designs.

[Sir Newton]

After owning ​​​​​​my PA-140-28 for 20+ yrs. Flying it all over God's great earth. Flying little tiny airplanes is a hobby. Weather you want to admit it or not. We are all aircraft enthusiasts. The more people involved
the better. IMHO

​​​​And thus everyone should be committed to keeping our hobbies as cost effective as safety will permit.

[way_up_north]

......deleted

[jaredyates]

I can't produce a materials list, because I haven't built one and kept track of the materials. Bob doesn't produce a materials list because he knows that how you lay out the parts is going to determine how much material you need. If 2 builders recorded their lists, we'd have something slightly better than zero. If 25 builders did, we'd have something very useful. We have an excellent Patrol hardware list because a builder took the time to make one. It takes a lot of time to compose such things, but anyone who is willing to do so is more than welcome. I think a spreadsheet is a great tool to record this type of thing, with each row dedicated to a builder, each column dedicated to a material, and a line at the top that averages all of the lines below. Make it spam-robot proof and get folks to use it, and let me know what url to link to. It can have a tab right next to the builder map. My experience has been that it's hard to get folks to contribute to this sort of thing.

If you'd like to have the information presented in a particular way, I'm open to suggestions. Should there be a sticky post? My concern is that too many sticky posts will make it harder to find the information, not easier. Unless we only make sticky the topic that applies to your current stage of the project.

What we have is the best compromise for all of the needs that we juggle, and no doubt it comes up short at times. But there is no conspiracy to intentionally underserve scratch builders. Within the limits of the software package that we use, I'm all for making the forum more usable as long as those changes are positive for enough users. The first step is to make actionable suggestions. Think of it this way, if you had the magic pen and could make reality match your ideal experience, what would it be?

[Frank]

Possibly too many variables to make a generic materials list. A parts list, on the other hand, seems like something which could be included with plans.

[way_up_north]

Hi Jared

took a few days to frame what I wanted to say correctly

manny plans holders don’t actually build anything... faced with the realization of the size of the project they don’t see a path to completion...

for some builders the path to completion includes relying on factory parts ... by building a hybrid kit partially built by myself and the factory I see my own path to completion

this industry is flying on hopes and dreams...and my efforts on here are to keep scratch builders motivated ... to build what they can and buy the rest for the factory...

the hybrid build I believe is a win win for everyone..

Asking someone to create their own materials list... is nearly impossible for a inexperienced builder...size parts, place parts on a layout sheet to minimize waste...ect... it’s a big job and you still have not built anything to show off

Even with a materials list the In-experienced builder may still be lost in that they are overwhelmed...

I propose that a new scratch builders build just one thing... a rib ...with one sheet of aluminum... one layout... a mallet and power tools everyone has around the house... set a very small goal...

the Bearhawk challenge

because I believe there is a fortune to be made if you can convert the plans holders that fail to launch... into factory parts customers

what we get out of this is larger community

i do appreciate the thankless work you do and all the scratch builders should appreciate we live here rent free with the factory/management paying to keep the lights on

[Sir Newton]

I am a profession tradesman project manager kinda person. I am building out a complete material lists as I go. Once complete, I will offer the information for free to the community. Cooperation is the only path forward. IMHO Bob started something here that is really great for the aviation community. By simply selling plans, basically for free, he is just covering his printing costs.