Building powerchutes for working Americans
With all the powerchute companies out there to choose from, why should you buy your new powerchute from us ?
1.We are committed to building the safest, highest quality, best performing powerchutes available at the most affordable prices.
Those of us at Airframes Unlimited are constantly looking for more efficient construction methods and more efficient powerchute designs. This constant quest for more efficiency allows us to offer a line of powerchutes that is unsurpassed in safety, quality, performance and value.
2. We build powerchutes that working Americans can afford to buy and fly. Working Americans cannot even consider buying the average powerchute being marketed today. We believe that is unacceptable.
Airframes Unlimited does offer some very high priced powerchutes, but we will never forget working Americans like ourselves.
3. We are here to stay. We've been here for many years, and to the chagrin of a few of our competitors, we simply won't go away. We are a lean, highly aggressive company and we are getting leaner and even more aggressive every day.
Over the years we have watched several powerchute manufacturing companies come and go. We've watched other companies file bankruptcy and then re-form under a different name only to go "belly-up" again a few years later.
We know that lowering the prices and raising the performance standards for powerchutes has not made us popular with some of our competitors but our goal is, and has always been, to offer more safety, more quality, more performance and more value to our customers. Customers pay our bills, competitors do not.
We know that our pricing structure, innovation and business model has made the powerchute industry a much harder place to survive, but our customers and for that matter, all powerchute buyers reap the benefits of stiff competition in the marketplace.
4. We are easy to reach.
If you email us, you'll get an answer in a timely manner.
If you call us, your will call be returned. We believe that if you do us the honor of considering our product the least that we can do is to return your call or email in a timely manner.
5. We do not have a dealer network and will never have one.
Dealers must be paid a commission and guess whose pocketbook that commission comes out of ?
We sell our powerchutes directly to the customer, cutting out the "middleman".
6. We don't bolt together our airframes.
We weld our airframes together. The finest aircraft ever built were/are welded together because welded aircraft are safer aircraft and welded aircraft require the least amount of maintenance.
Here are just a few of the finest, safest aircraft ever built, whether it be general aviation, aerobatic, experimental or ultralight. All of them have welded airframes. Piper Cub and it's variants, Sonerai, Stinson 108, Kitfox, Cessna Airmaster, Cessna Bobcat, Aeronca Champ, Chief, etc, Christian Eagle, Pitts Specials, Super Decathlon, Citabria, Titan Tornado, most Rans aircraft. I could go on and on but by now you should be getting the message.
7. We will not install a small prop on a powerchute. Why?
Small props produce small amounts of thrust. Large props produce large amounts of thrust. On the same engine. This is proven scientific fact, not opinion. The rest of the aviation world has known this for about 100 years. Only the powerchute world disputes this. Go figure ?
Thrust, not horsepower, is what gets you into the air. More thrust means lower cruise rpm, lower fuel consumption, longer engine life, higher payload and higher climb rate. If the powerchute that you are considering does not use a large (72" or larger) prop then you are "giving away" about 20% of the thrust that your engine is capable of producing. There is no downside to using a large, efficient prop.
8. We will not install a 550' canopy on a powerchute. Why?
Every 550' canopy currently manufactured has what we consider to be bad traits. They are noticeably harder to inflate and kite. This results in more "flip-overs" during the most critical part of the flight (getting the canopy up and over you). Once in the air the ride quality suffers badly due to insufficient wing loading. If the air gets rough, the 550' canopy tends to roll side to side much more than a 500' canopy making the powerchute significantly harder to control. And last but not least, our extensive canopy tests show no measurable increase in lift over the 500' canopy when installed on our aircraft.
None of the bad traits listed above are present when utilizing the 400' and 500' canopys on our powerchutes.
9. We don't waste financial resources hosting expensive fly-ins, buying large print ads or putting on publicity stunts. Why?
Because every dollar spent on such things must come out of the customer's pocketbook. We respect and value our customers more than that.
Our sales have always been and continue to be so good that we have no need for expensive promotions.
Our only problem is meeting the demand for our products, not trying to generate sales. A great product sold at a great price will always sell itself.
10. If you want to buy your powerchute from a corporate CEO wearing Ray Bans, Lacost and Gucci I totally understand and can provide you with a couple of phone numbers.
But if you want to buy your powerchute from a guy that talks straight, who actually knows what he's talking about, wears Wranglers and work boots, sharpens his knife every day, reloads his own ammo, changes his own oil in his Harley, still sweeps the shop floor himself and conducts all his business from a phone and computer located in his gun/guitar room (with his dog named Blue sleeping at his feet) you've come to the right place :)
We are located in Athens Texas (that's 65 miles southeast of Dallas)