http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=419&item=2154130368

Does anyone know why the bids are back to zero? Just yesterday afternoon, I checked the bids from work to see how high it had gone, and it was listed at just over 6 million. That excited me greatly, especially after reading about the accident to the second airframe and the financial implications that the accident presents to the company.

That 6 million bucks could really help put them back on the bandwagon.

Like Michael Moshier said, the press about the sale has brought much more attention to the project. The accident was not due to failure intrinsic to the construction or design of the airframe, it just plainly (no pun intended there) got FODded out. The accident, IMHO, was a case of getting ahead of yourself and cutting some corners, or a lack of safety procedures regarding a certain hazard - They should have never ascended so fast, even in clear weather, that they weren't able to ensure that the umbilical retraction device was working properly when it posed such a clearly visible hazard. Of course, that's easy for me to criticize here from my armchair with hindsight. But my point is that FODding out can happen to ANY aircraft, and this was not a failure in the design or production of the aircraft.

There's always been a lot of excitement surrounding rocket packs (like Lee posted about below), but the impractibility of short flight times and expensive fuel meant the cost basis for each flight would always stay high, on top of the initial cost of the product. With SoloTrek, the overhead of the product, plus insurance, would be high, but the cost of fuel for each flight, combined with long flight times, would mean each time you flew it, it would, over time, make it a relatively affordable aircraft. Not that this will become a layman's toy any time soon, but it would be more available and practicle to people who can already afford a decent conventional fixed wing.

I'm just suprised that there isn't more excitement about this thing already.

My n number will be N1PEX... ;-)

Pex