I've been going back in the archives and reading up on the multiple problems Air 403s seem to have. If I understand this correctly, the main problems seem to be (1) noisy blades, (2) a high cut-in speed (at high winds), (3) more noise at that speed, and (4) low output at low wind.
Now, this is just a "hypothetical", as I don't have one of these and don't have any plans for getting one... and I know that "gearing up" is generally a bad thing... but would it be reasonable for an experimenter with one of these to use a system of pullies to convert from a quiet, slow moving blade set that would start in low winds to to work with the high rpms needed by this thing? Has anybody done it just for grins?