I've just read, with great dismay and disbelief, information which
Rick Stitt and his partner, Andreas, wrote with regards to me.

I'd like to ask...what did I ever do to them to deserve such lies
except give him $22,000 of hard earned cash, a year and a half of my
own sweat, and refusing to lower myself to their level while catching
Rick in lie after lie.

Well, the truth is that he/they were taking me for a ride, selling me
parts that were an inept attempt to copy Joe Rinke's original work.
Realizing this was quite embarrasing, since I had been led to believe
(by Rick Stitt), that Joe was misrepresenting himself and his
abilities, and I had posted a negative comment about Joe earlier this
year on a Google group. God, I am sooooooo sorry about that. I've
made the apology in person, but let me make it public... I was totally
wrong.

Rick Stitt told me back in May of 2002 that he had seven turbine
mini's flying, with THOUSANDS of hours on them (this was later found
to be entirely fabricated). I bit, sent him $22,000, and had my
aircraft delivered to his rented basement in Missouri. When I arrived
there to assemble the conversion, Rick had my entire aircraft totally
disasembled with my parts dented, scratched, and put in piles along
with other victims' parts. I could not retrieve my bird, because I
couldn't even find all my parts. He had already spent my money on
something else, and the machinist he rented space from refused to make
my parts for free. I did my best to forgive him and tried to move
forward. I reassembed my aircraft and allowed Rick Stitt to attempt
to install parts as they came from other machinists in the area that
Rick had not screwed yet. I was told that I would be at Rick's place
for seven days.... however, after three MONTHS and $7000 in hotel
bills, Rick could still not deliver. The horror stories included Rick
attempting to start the turbine backwards, blowing the hot section
completely off the bird, having his attempted copy of an Allouette
clutch lock up and blowing all four Jesus bolts clean off the head.
As it turns out, THE TRUTH is that every part he sold me was an
attempted copy of someone else's work. Rick has misrepresented
himself for profit. He is NOT an engineer, as he claims. He used me
as a testbed and had no qualms about the likelihood that I might die
in the process. Don't let this happen to you.

While my turbine did eventually start, the drive system that he copyed
from Joe Rinke was such a disasterous attempt, that the turbine never
ran for more than two minutes before requiring a complete teardown of
the drive due to the unstopable oil leaks. Sure, NOW I know why....
Rick not only NEVER designed the parts, but he could not even COPY
Joe's work correctly, even leaving critical parts out. To put it
mildly, Rick Stitt VERY obviously did not, and does not, even
understand how Joe's drive works.

Rather than suing Rick, I allowed him to sign an additional contract,
giving him an additional three months to fix his mess and complete the
project as paid. He could not do it. I even allowed him to try for
six MORE months beyond that, when I finally realized that Rick was
probably a fraud and most likely never had the ability to do so. I
have repeatedly asked Rick Stitt to remove all photos and references
of my aircraft from his site (over six months ago) and he still
refuses to do so. He wants it to look like I'm a happy customer
......NOT SO.

By that time I had met a new friend, Richard Runk, who joined me in my
quest. I was frustrated by now and took my wife on vacation.
Meanwhile, Richard did some great investigating, and found the proof
that Rick Stitt is indeed misrepresenting himself. I have been
swindled. I will share that proof with anyone. Richard's recent post
has all the gory details. While I have little hope of regaining my
money, I now feel I MUST sue Rick Stitt in order to stop him before
someone gets killed. Having already told that to Rick, you can see
online his vicious attempts to discredit me and my aircraft. My
subsequent dealings with the FAA went down as expected, of course; I
was vindicated and was told by the FAA that they intended to hand the
case of Rick Stitt over to the FBI. I will not lower myself to Rick's
level and respond to his babble.... I'll let the FBI and the legal
system do that now..

I continued to try to get Rick's copy of Joe's drive to work, but it
was hopelessly flawed. After all was said and done, I was left with
nothing but NINETY pounds of scrap metal.

So.... what does a guy like me do? I've been bled dry by Stitt... my
bird has no drive system, my turbine needs to be rebuilt due to Rick's
attempts to subdue hot starts by adding more fuel to cool the
can????,... and a set of Rick's rebuilt cones that will kill you in a
New York minute ( I'm not dead yet 'cause I haven't been able to get a
full minute on them yet). At this point, normally one would assume
that my dream was over....never to be achieved. However, my friend and
fellow turbine enthusiast, Richard Runk, had the ability to do enough
research to find out who the REAL inventor of the turbine drive system
is... none other than Mr. Joe Rinke himself. Now since I had believed
Rick Stitt when he told me about Joe Rinke, I was foolish enough to
say things online about Joe that I should never have said. I had
badmouthed the only person on the planet who could have truely helped
me. Doh! So who is Joe Rinke REALLY? Joe Rinke is the guy who still
invited me into his home, fed and housed me, while he rewelded my
frame to proper specs, rebuilt my turbine, installed the ORIGINAL
drive system, rebuilt my starting system, rebuilt my cones...... and
MORE.... FOR FREE... yes... all for nothing but the joy of seeing the
truth in flight once again (Joe had long ago moved on to design the
JAG helicopter, which will soon be saving American lives on the
battlefield). Joe also taught us how to do it right... he's a great
teacher. By the way.... Joe was able to remove all the Stitt junk, and
completly rebuild my conversion correctly in less than a WEEK. I am
so embarrassed for what I had said.... Joe and Rebecca are among the
finest examples of human beings I've ever had the good fortune to meet
(not just because of their generosity; they have good hearts). I'm
sure that anyone that reads this will also wonder how Joe and Rebecca
could possibly be so forgiving... it's a God thing. My partner
Richard deserves the credit for opening this door. Joe Rinke allowed
me to remove my foot from my mouth without reinserting it into my
butt. As nervous as I was to call Joe, he made me feel comfortable
enough to drive 2,550 miles to face him. Joe and Rebecca are two of
the very few people on this earth that could call me any time of any
day, and I'd be there...no matter what... how may friends can you say
that about? It is no small wonder why Rick Stitt never wanted me to
have the slightest thought about making contact with Joe.

If anybody wants to see the proof, touch it, feel it, film it, even
watch it outrun an R-44, then by all means, you are welcome to come to
Redding, CA (RDD). We will be home soon. You will not find a single
Rick Stitt component on the aircraft now. Rinke power is alive and
well in Northern California. Don't ya' just love a happy ending?