FHC pulls Me262 from Gosshawk

[Dora9a]

Legend Flyers (Old Stormbirds) is putting together a A6M for Evergreen, but not with a R-1830, the plan is for an original Sakae 21.

[jneaircraft]

To bad the truth will come out someday im sure. gosshawk is a good shop. as are the other ones that have been used in this endever. problem is sometimes the ones paying the bills dont have a clue who is really doing the work.

[Jeff Nelson]

To bad the truth will come out someday im sure. gosshawk is a good shop. as are the other ones that have been used in this endever. problem is sometimes the ones paying the bills dont have a clue who is really doing the work.

I have a non-disclosure with FHC and so am not at liberty to tell the whole story. What I will say (because it is not part of the disclosure.. my attorney said so...) is that Dave Goss indeed runs a good shop. His is one of the most honest shops around and he always lives up to his part of any contract with any customer. The least a customer has ever gotten from GossHawk has always been more than asked for, and certainly more than the customer paid for. That's just his way of treating people. I've been contracted to do his wiring for about 20 years now, so I'm speaking from first-hand experience.

By the way, so no one puts 2 and 2 together and comes up with 5, the person who submitted that video is not a GossHawk or Custom Connections employee. I don't know who he is or why he was taking the video.

Last edited by Jeff Nelson on Wed Jul 18, 2012 11:22 am, edited 1 time in total.

[Forgotten Field]

I'm not an expert. But I've been around this stuff for a while. When it comes down to it, any restoration of a complex WWII aircraft is going to take multiple years and multiple thousands of dollars. I'm not saying anything about any restorer, but I have personally seen an owner get a slowly developing case of sticker shock, an acute case of difference in restoration philosophy, and a sudden change of restoration team. The margins for doing a restoration for anybody are very small. By margins, I mean profit for the contracted restoration facility. Before you turn wrench one, you are anywhere from $2000 to $4000 just for the facility. When you add in labor, parts, incidentals and maybe a smattering of profit, you are apt to make a case against the fiduciary sense of doing a restoration. Add a fickle owner to that mix, and this is what you get.

As an owner of 18 WWII vehicles, aircraft and turrets, most of which are un-restored, I can say with great sincerity that there have been some hard days as an owner. The last four years have been some good progress in maintaining what I have, but they have also been frustrating times as family issues intruded, business has suffered due to the economy, and my restoration facility construction has been delayed for the nth reason. Do I take that out on anybody else? Well, I'm human so I probably do at some point.

I have experienced some bad times dealing with licensed maintenance personnel as regards ownership of my aircraft. I don't blame them because basically, there aren't a bunch of people out there that can comfortably move between spam-can GA aircraft and warbird/antique/classic aircraft. That said, it is up to the restorer/facility/restoration team to be the spirit guide for an owner in a restoration. If a restoration shop doesn't have a plan while they are in the process for dealing with an owner's emotional needs, that falls on the restoration shop. In my experience, it is both sides that make a restoration not work. But I will also say that there are a fair number of owners who have no sense of what it takes to make an aircraft fly.

All that said, my hat is off to the guys and shops like Tom Reilly, John Lane, Mark Dinest, Vulture's Row, and all the other ones I don't know who spend so much time of their lives working on this stuff. It is a hard road and making money at it is difficult at best in these economic times.

[Jeff Nelson]

Forgotten Field, I will agree with you in many respects. I can't speak for other shops. However, Dave Goss always gives owners very regular reports of work done, including photos and financials. Therefore, his customers always know exactly where they stand on a project. He doesn't believe in surprises. Again, it's nothing new or different, it's just the way he treats all his customers.

[Moosehunter]

As a owner I know what Forgotten is saying, but perhaps I'm just a little bit harder-nosed then he is. I am very familiar with Gosshawk and their history, I have worked with them a little bit and been around them a great deal over the years, I have friends who have had projects with Gosshawk, and In fact I almost handed over a Model D to them years past but went with a different shop in the end.

For owners, or custodians as I like to call myself, I offer some thoughts. You should always look into a shop first, see how they are actually making the bills, chances are that they have one really large client, find out who that is, investigate whether your timelines will interfere or help each other first, speak to that client. Volunteer to help on a project that is in their shop, or barring that Talk to their employees, watch how they treat their employees, listen to how they speak to the employees, ASK how much they pay their employees. The fact is that no matter how much of a apparently helpful yes-man the operator is, it will be the hands of the floor that will make your experience one you treasure or regret. Best practice, give them your puddle-jumper to work on first, ideally don't let them know you have a bigger project available, see how they treat deadlines and you when only a little money is at stake. Why when a 172 is so different from your P-40 project you say? Simple, You want a shop that works on FLYING aircraft, that flys aircraft. You want people working on your project that see it in the air in the near future, not for some kind of hokey "keep em' flying" sentimentality, but because if they know its going to fly, high and fast, they will do the work right, not just, "accurate and attractive". The fact is, airworthy projects progress faster then "as original" restorations because the former is such a subjective bit of nonsense, whereas "airworthy" is dead set. You want a group of mechanics that know the plane will fly soon and that people will get hurt if it is not done right. When shops have projects "underway" doing work here and there, now and then, for years and years and years, it leads to a problem with attitude and results for a client.

Shops, all shops are cannibals plan and simple, and how they gossip! They will always bag the hell out of the last shop to have your project, they will always sneer at others, they will always try to earn your confidence by doing so. Learn to read between the lines.

Be wary of any shop that survives mostly on poached projects, always has at least one or two hanger queens ticking along year after year, filling their dance card other half-started projects poached from other shops. By all means go out for coffee with the owner of that kind of shop, no doubt he is pleasant company and has many funny stories, and he will never tell you no, but... he is more interested in working on you, not your project.

Pick a shop that works it floor clear, that is hungry because its projects are done and gone. Not because you can get a better rate, but because it shows you that they start and finish work rapidly. Better yet look for a shop that has had down times, and see how they behaved, if they came back, Bill Moz, at ATW had a rough couple of years with every shop in Cali and Az circling over him trying to pick him dry, but he came back on his own. Don't have coffee with this shop owner, coffee with Bill Moz is not fun, this shop owner is not "pleasant company", he has stories but is a horrible story teller, he is not interested in working on you or your project, he is interested in working on the project about to leave his hangar that will be flying the next week. Get your project into his hangar.

So what happened to the 262? even with the Non-disclosures? well you can only look at what can be seen that happened. Gosshawk had several projects from FHC for many years and earned quite a bit of industry cache in spite of the "secret nature" of having the work, Goss regularly spent time in Wash with the always changing heads of FHC, Gosshawk took 4 years to assembling and painting the FW190 which had been previously totally restored at a very reputable shop in the UK. Now the FHC has "surprisingly" pulled the ME262 a much more complicated and involved project, perhaps they didn't want to wait 4 years, perhaps they felt Gosshawk was over its head, perhaps they didn't have faith in Gosshawk's staff. Whatever the reasons FHC and Gosshawk were in business for years and each company knew what the other was capable of.

FHC is schizophrenic as a rule, new heads are constantly being brought in to oversee what is largely a irrational activity for a very rational man. Now calm down, warbirds are fantastic, but it is irrational to spend so much on them when it is really examined. This does not mean that we shouldn't restore warbirds, just that we accept that it is a "enthusiasm" and not actually a logical thing to do with a hundred million dollars of Mr. Paul Allen's money. The FHC seesaws between heads that love the dream and don't understand real business (IE outside warbirds), and heads that run real businesses for a living and don't understand the dream, added to this is Mr. Allen's family's occasional influence who, one could say understandably feel that 5 or 10 old planes really should be enough for Paul's hobby shouldn't it? All this makes working with the FHC a tricky proposition, any shop working with them must know this going in, in fact Gosshawk had one of the longest runs of work with FHC of any thus far when you look at the timeline. The best a shop can do is to get the work from FHC and complete it before the changing of the guard see them out the door. Even Wespac one of, if not the very best restoration shops in the USA had a limited shelf life with FHC, wisely they got the work done and out the door in time.


Now as to Gosshawk, which up until 2005 was based out of the champlin museum, has steadily poached projects for the past years since Champlin sold off his collection and thus their gravy-train pulled out of town. But even before that happened they threw several other shops under the bus to get their projects, Sometimes deserved, sometimes not. Since Champlin closed and moving the shop south of Phoenix Gosshawk has lost all it original mechanics that helped to complete all but one of their most famous restorations. Within two years after the move the original employees who had been supplemented by volunteers in Phoenix were gone. By and large they couldn't handle the 120 mile round-trip drive from north phoenix, especially buying the gas required for that 600 miles and the extra 8 hours driving for the same pay as before, these workers ended up back in shops in phoenix or retired. Now the only original working hand at Gosshawk is Goss himself, and he is busy running the shop, not working the projects hands on and frankly getting on in years for floor work. Instead the shop uses a staff who seem eager but have very limited experience in warbirds or any heavy restoration, all being paid at one of the lowest rates in industry. To fill the gap Gosshawk use many subcontractors to do work that other shops do in house, when found out this does't always fill a client with confidence. As a rule, stick with a shop that pays its mechanics higher then industry standard and is thereby able to keep the majority of its work in house. That said, I like Goss, I have enjoyed having coffee with Goss, but in the end I was satisfied with my decision to send my project to Dakota instead of keeping it instate.


Add to all of this the fact that Gosshawk was one of the shops to work on Jimmy Leeward's ill fated Galloping Ghost in the years leading up to Reno '11 and the FHC might have become concerned that they could become entangled with the massive legal cases that surround the GG and the shops that worked on it. These cases will be around for years to come. So perhaps they just played it safe and pulled it because they didn't want risk the chance that their property would be on the floor of Gosshawk if its stock is locked down in court action, or seized as assets.

Gosshawk had a good run with FHC, better then most, the long and short of it is that both organizations will move one from this.

Finally for all of you that are worried that this will send the 262 project "backwards" who knows? I for one think that it shows the FHC, right or wrong is concerned with the project, and concern means attention to it, and that attention makes it much more likely that it will move forward. So chins up.

[51fixer]

Huh!

[StangStung]

Interesting necro-bump Moosehunter.

Sounds like you have had some experience in this regard, but I have to ask: There are plenty of threads here on similar topics so what made you want to comment on this one in particular - especially as a first post?

[Moosehunter]

First, I ran across the short breakdown video on youtube entirely by chance, and was curious enough to after watching to google for any longer vids of the breakdown and move, while doing that I came across the thread here. After quietly reading and not posting WIX for the past few years I felt compelled this time to add my two cents worth. I suppose Forgotten's comments, moved me to do so, while I don't entirely agree with his view I found it to be very interesting and to becoming from a place not heard often on any forums, and I thought my views and experience might be of interest as his was to me.

Granted its not the most "current" thread, but it is one I have personal experiences, and views relevant to.


Cheers

[JimH]

This is between Gosshawk and FHC...period, none of our business.

JH

[Mark Allen M]

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Last edited by Mark Allen M on Fri Sep 21, 2012 12:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[StangStung]

First, I ran across the short breakdown video on youtube entirely by chance, and was curious enough to after watching to google for any longer vids of the breakdown and move, while doing that I came across the thread here. After quietly reading and not posting WIX for the past few years I felt compelled this time to add my two cents worth. I suppose Forgotten's comments, moved me to do so, while I don't entirely agree with his view I found it to be very interesting and to becoming from a place not heard often on any forums, and I thought my views and experience might be of interest as his was to me.

Granted its not the most "current" thread, but it is one I have personal experiences, and views relevant to.


Cheers

Thanks for the thoughtful response.

[StangStung]

This is between Gosshawk and FHC...period, none of our business.

JH

True in some respect. They "whys" and "whatfors" are known to the parties involved, and aren't really necessary for the public at large to know.

Still, if "none of our business" was the threshold for having a conversation around here, there'd be a lot less conversatin' going on. There have been honest questions and considerate answers on this thread, so I don't see a real issue with this conversation.

[PinecastleAAF]

Very educational thread especially for anyone who has ever considered buying a project and having one of the many shops around restore it.

[Pooner]

This is between Gosshawk and FHC...period, none of our business.

JH

Spot on, sir. That was exactly my thought when I read this post.

Now the only original working hand at Gosshawk is Goss himself, and he is busy running the shop, not working the projects hands on and frankly getting on in years for floor work. Instead the shop uses a staff who seem eager but have very limited experience in warbirds or any heavy restoration, all being paid at one of the lowest rates in industry.

I'll take umbrage with this, as being directly involved with a flying project that this particular shop bantied about in discussion has been working on for the past two years, I'm not sure where you get this sort of data to spout. I've personally never met a shop owner that is more involved in the project from the ground floor level on up. He's spent as much time as staff getting in there and getting dirty, and I've been along side him on multiple test flights as well to make sure the issues are addressed promptly and properly. I don't know of too many business owners that you can find on the shop floor working product with staff and flying with customer to see that the work is done correctly - each and every time. I personally find this to be pretty unique to the industry.

I'm not sure what pedigree you expect staff to bring to the table or how you rate this, but each and every employee in this shop has shown an extreme amount of skill, knowledge, expertise and courtesy - and enthusiasm with the customer's airplane. And as a businessman keenly focused upon employee relations between staff and management, I've never heard a discussion one way or another about compensation from the Gosshawk staff. I'm not sure how you've arrived at that conclusion.

Seems to me your decision to take your project to another shop was indeed a prudent and wise one. I've noted that not every business is suited for a "particular" customer, and conversely, not every customer is suited for a "particular" business.