Jon says:

The truth is Mike from paratoys supplied an engine with a known crack in the cylinder wall on day 1 of the trip. Because he could not sell the motor to anyone else, he “graciously” donated it to be flown across the country. Hence, it only made it half way, which is still pretty impressive considering the increasing level of damage as it was flown; however, a lack of proper ethics nearly caused an unnecessary death/injury on 2 occasions.

1. When the motor finally lost all compression due the crack turning into a hole, I was nearly electrocuted by powerlines when forced to make an emergency landing right after takeoff.

2. After the team rebuilt the bottom end, the 3rd and final redrive siezed on the motor (they kept seizing after aprox. 30hrs of flight), the prop sheered off and came through the cage nearly slicing my neck open at its base and paralyzing me. Mike never could give proper instructions on how much oil to put into the case (it was always “about a shotglass”) and it is clear that he has the clutch plates manually grinded down to fit the redrives. This is why there is such an inconsistency with the redrives from motor to motor. These clutches appear to be originally designed for low RPM machines such as a 4 stroke ATV, not paramotors.

Throughout the entire trip, it was clear that when communicating with Mike, he had a minimal understanding of small motors. One of the team members happened to be a small engine mechanic and completed an entire rebuild after the team discovered the first problem to be with the manufacturing of the cylinder. This was why Mike had put an extra bottom and top end in my spare parts tub before leaving, he expected this problem because he had pulled the head and top end by himself in the parking lot shortly before I took off the next morning. He made Brian buy some Red sealant (low temperature for a 2 stroke!) and used it to replace the busted ring that was cracked from an already warped cylinder! Oh, and he forgot to tell me it was warped and cracked, thankfully I have some pictures of the inside which, upon review show this problem to be evident days before Mike opened the case. I’m not sure where this business about a torque wrench came from? As if it even matters, we utilized one during the trip to ensure the bolt heads stayed at their proper setting after every few flights.

Had I known the condition of the motor, I would have never flown it during the trip for even a minute. Mike sent out a letter saying “he pulled his support,” understandably because he needed to save what face he had left. Unfortunately, for him, the entire trip and phone calls were documented including where he admitted to knowing about a cracked cylinder before sending me off to fly 3000 miles over deadly terrain. The reality is, I ultimately made the decision to drop paratoys. We called Nirvana and they kindly sent us a motor and wing to use the rest of the trip without issue the same evening the prop sheered off.

This information is not to bash Mike, everyone makes mistakes… Nevertheless, this was not a mistake, Mike knew the motor was doomed from the beginning and made a bad business and personal decision to still let me fly with it anyways. I encourage everyone to come to 5 Points Film Festival in April and make your own decision when the footage is released. Or look me up on facebook and I would be happy to answer questions about my flight across the country. If you ever get the opportunity to do a personal flight like this, I highly recommend it!

-Jon