This quote illustrates the attempt to package KoolAid:
“As for saying there have been nothing but failures .. I disagree. It's tough to be an R&D company. It takes time and failures to eventually come to a success. Every success was driving by failures. And time will tell. There is still a lot of interest in the cyclone engines. And many company willing to put up large sums of money to get the engine to market. My opinion is that we are very close to seeing this or else why would the company care about bringing the financial up to date ??”
The problem is that Cyclone has consistently and persistently acted in a fashion that disputes the notion that they are solely engaged in R and D. Does the term “market ready” sound like they are still trying to perfect it? Does the assertion that they are in “Beta testing” imply that they still have to solve fundamental design problems? For everyone else it means that all the basic research and development has been successfully completed and preproduction models have been built to localize and correct any minor issues.
Does it seem logical that Cyclone would try to establish a manufacturing base without having developed a product to sell? They have claimed to do so on various occasions. How can you build tooling, let out bids, train workers and establish price points if you still have no idea what the final product is going to look like? Why would you try to sell blueprints for your designs if you haven’t perfected them yet? Why would people be interested in buying them unless they were acting in the belief that the technology embedded in the designs was viable?
Why would Cyclone join a Land Speed Record team, offer to provide the power plant and advertise the venture widely unless they were trying to convince the public that they had a product in hand? This was done knowing that there was a target date for the attempt rather than an unsubstantial commitment to run at Bonneville “whenever an engine materialized”. Heaven knows that commercial R & D has nothing to do with trying to set records. Why engage in this kind of promotion if you’re stuck at the level of basic research? Wouldn’t an average observer have to assume that you are demonstrating a mature piece of hardware?
OK, now. How many times has Cyclone claimed that they were “6 months” away from production? Anyone with any experience would know that you could only make such a claim if you had fully completed all your development and testing and had refined the design to the point that you could start letting out contracts to subcontractors. Heck, six months is such a short time frame that anyone familiar with manufacturing would have to assume that the factory assembly was already underway.What was their point in making such announcements, repeatedly, if they were still struggling in development hell?
Wouldn’t a claim that they were “over-optimistic” or “mistaken” prove that they misrepresented their level of knowledge and expertise? If they were still engaged in R & D, wouldn’t their attempts to sell engines to such companies as Combilift amount to misrepresentation? What is the technical term when you promise to deliver something you do not possess?
If they were actually engaged in basic research, why did they choose the company motto “One Planet, One Engine”? If you haven’t proven that you can make something work, and work as well as you hope, isn’t it untruthful to advertise that it can replace every prime mover on the planet? General Electric does R & D on a scale Cyclone can’t imagine and they ran the motto “We bring good things to light”. Notice that they aren’t promising to deliver what they don’t have? Please, please, can you explain why “One Planet, One Engine” isn’t a declaration that they have succeeded in developing something remarkable?
Then there is the matter of product mix. This is a tiny little company lacking in personnel with proven expertise in the field. Why were they working on a variety of supercritical piston engines, a backpack steam turbine and waste heat engines? If your mission is to develop products, shouldn’t you focus your limited resources on one problem at a time until you either solve it or have to give it up as impractical? Why advertise that you are all things to all people when you actually have nothing to offer anybody … unless you want people to believe otherwise?
If they are still trying to develop a product, why the large number of announcements concerning “strategic partnerships”? These partnerships all depended upon Cyclone having a product to peddle. If they are still in “development hell”, what purpose is there to announce a meaningless “deal” except to convince the public that you have something concrete?
After they announced that they had solved all the major issues, why is it wrong to fault them for not having a product?
They claimed their Genie backpack generator was incredibly efficient, even after people pointed out that it was almost identical to a Terry turbine, one of the most wasteful pieces of hardware ever labelled as turbomachinery. They claimed that their second LSR machine would achieve impossible speeds based on the fact that they calculated aero drag as a function of speed squared instead of cubed. They claimed that bearings are little electrical generators, which they aren’t. Any high school student with 30 minutes on the internet could have figured any of these things out. If this were a serious R & D outfit, how come they didn’t spend part of those millions on competent engineers who would know better? Without competent engineers, how can you claim to be an R & D operation? How can you believe their claims that they are a serious R & D outfit?
Buddy points out the use of rental equipment, very basic rental equipment at that. The kind of thing you absolutely had to have to test most of the products they have claimed. What kind of R & D company spends millions and doesn’t somehow buy the very equipment needed to develop the product?
For that matter, how does an R & D company spend more on Admin than Engineering? From whatever financial reports that have been published, we can conclude that devoting their resources to product development was of secondary importance.
What’s with all the emphasis on patents? Cyclone spent big money on a large number of patents and loudly reported this fact whenever they were seeking investors. Why take out patents if you haven’t developed the idea to the point that you can demonstrate that it works? Why do this if your resources are limited and you need to engage in costly research? Why are the patent drawings highly detailed renderings of a finished product? Are they implying that the hardware is in an advanced state of development? Can anyone explain how the whole patent situation isn’t an implied statement that they have completed the basic research?
Once they finally admitted that they didn’t have a product, they hired CAR at Ohio State to develop the product. Cyclone made sure that people saw CAR’s presentation; they worked to distribute it, actually. We heard all kinds of stuff about the quality of OSU’s resources and the talent of their people. My question then is, why did they terminate the relationship with OSU if that was the route to a successful product? Why was OSU’s involvement so important if Cyclone is the R & D outfit that is claimed? Doesn’t it seem that Cyclone did a much better job of trying to convince people that a product was on the way than they did of actually ensuring it?
How can anyone believe Cyclone? When they want investment they have all these partners, factories tooling up for production in “6 months” and a wide range of products in the pipeline. When they don’t deliver, it isn’t their fault, they are just an R & D outfit. Doesn’t it appear that their word is a bit….elastic? Assertions that they are engaged in R & D won’t cut it. Anyone trying to sell that idea needs a whole bunch of detailed reasons to back up the assertion. This would include a list of developers and their credentials, list of resources, outline of development path with milestones, outline of research already undertaken and useful data collected. And so on. To date we have seen blurry videos showing nothing very spectacular, tons of over-the-top promotion and an incredible number of positive statements. Results matching the hype are notably absent.
