Adam A500 & 700

[Dave T]

Two really nice aircraft the Adam A500 and 700.

A500


A700

Really enjoyed a flight from KSEA to KLAX in the A700.

[yancovitch]

super dave.............never understood that two motor configuration ....thought the extra weight would nullify any advantage.....

[Dave T]

Probably the biggest advantage it has over a conventional twin, is you will not get the asymmetrical yaw induced by a dead engine. Probably less drag as well but cooling of the rear engine might be a problem.

[Flacke]

Probably the biggest advantage it has over a conventional twin, is you will not get the asymmetrical yaw induced by a dead engine. Probably less drag as well but cooling of the rear engine might be a problem.

Yes Dave the "push-pull" engine layout is much safer if you lose an engine at v1 or beyond. And, the loss of the front engine affects the performance to a lesser degree. The rear "pusher" engine is more efficient and thus provides more thrust if its running.
The drag reduction is a real bonus because it reduces the "flat plate drag areas" from 3 on the conventional Twin to just one on the Push-Pull designs. The conventional twin has drag areas on the left engine, the nose, and the right engine. The push pull has only the nose drag. With all other things being equal you can use a bigger cabin, and still fly at good cruise speeds while using smaller engines and burning less fuel. The Cessna 336 had only 195Hp per engine and the Cessna 337 with retractable gear had only little 210hp engines. Yet it had a fairly big cabin and good performance. One funny thing on the C337 was that they put a lot of gear doors on it to reduce drag at cruise. You could hear each gear door slap shut on initial climb after takeoff and you could feel the extra drag from the doors until they were all retracted. Overall it was a good safe and fun airplane to fly. It could also land and take off on some fairly short runways even with the small engines.

I have seen the Adam 500 up close and I would love to own one if they were available in a nice highly developed final version. Unfortunately, they're not.

[Nighthawk117]

I read on an av blog can't remember which one a former employee posted the plane was not very safe it was rushed to oshkosh and was held together with 200 mph tape,the faa was bribed by the owner and looked the other way. in the end alot of investors were duped out of tons of cash and the plane was never airworthy. I will have to find it

[Nighthawk117]

Warning it is a long read long story short it's a sad end to a really cool looking plane that never had a chance to reach its potential.

Posted byu/AdamAirVet
5 years ago
A few frightening tales of Adam Aircraft from someone who was there.
I posted this in a thread about dodgy business practices, but I don't think anyone saw it I was so late. I put my heart and soul in to AAI and had it crushed. Writing this anecdote about what went on there was good for me. I also thought x-posting it to the flying subreddit would be interesting for others.

I used to work for Adam Aircraft, makers of the A500 CarbonAero and the A700 AdamJet. Rick Adam is the father of dodgy business practices. He started with a grand vision - to build twin engine inline turboprop. He bilked many people (including Sybase) out of millions at New Era of Networks, then used that to fund AAI where he eventually stole the money of investors, city governments, and the numerous pre-buyers who put tens of thousands down on planes they never got.

Rick pushed everyone to work 20 hours a day and do the absolute minimum to get the plane flying so it could go to Oshkosh. There was little interest in quality control or simply doing things right. Rick said you could literally hire a monkey to lay the carbon composite that the aircraft was made out of. So he hired the least qualified people that were available - even the janitor eventually did layups.

They pushed and pushed everyone down to the wire. The first flight of the A500 was nearly a disaster. The flight controls were rigged so loose that both pilots had to push both sticks hard left to keep the plane from rolling right. They were lucky to land that day.

The nose gear was designed without any coordination between the landing gear engineer and the person who designed the wheel well. When it came it the nose gear strut wouldn't fit. They had to carve out a hole big enough for it. Also the mounts were so weak that the gear bent left and right as it taxied around.

That led directly to the inevitable nose gear collapse on landing after a test flight. Well, they just dusted it off and kept flying it.

I digress.

Leading up to Oshkosh, Rick Adam was a rampaging beast who would yell at people using the foulest language possible. He tore people down on a regular basis, even the FAA examiner. There were serious problems with flutter on the tailbooms, but he said to fix that later. The G test showed the A500 couldn't even handle 3 Gs, but that's okay, we'll strengthen it later. Rick wanted that airframe in Oshkosh even if it killed someone.

At one point after arguing with Rick the FAA inspector threw up his hands in disgust, yelled "I don't have to fly the fucking thing" and walked out of the hangar. The Chief A&P mechanic for the A500 was told he would be fired if he did not sign off on the airplane for the Oshkosh trip. To his credit, the A&P quit and wrote a damning email to the whole company.

The A500 eventually went to Oshkosh, covered in 200MPH speed tape and every ugly bit hidden from view. People oohed and ahhed over the plane but they didn't know the secrets it held.

Eventually Adam Aircraft failed as we all predicted it would. There was just no way it could make it with a man like Rick Adam in charge.

Many people lost their jobs and their money, but not Rick - he had managed to start a datacenter company that caught his fall and that of the cronies he brought in to manage AAI. Even he saw the writing on the wall.

Ask me anything if you like. I'm glad to get it all off my chest. Can't promise I'll answer everything - I don't want to give away exactly who I am.

[Flacke]

Hi Nighthawk, I have seen reports of dodgy business practices in the Airplane business before but this is by far the worst. It would have been wonderful if the airplane was owned by an honest man who could have gotten the A500 to market with the two small Turbprop engines. THAT would have been a successful aircraft due to the many virtues of a Push-Pull TurboProp. Thanks for posting this.

[Nighthawk117]

so much potential, hopefully someone realizes it and builds it proper