Tiny Personal Helicopter

That thing is so simple in its control system. Bravo!

I wonder why he didn't fly out of ground effect. I also wonder how his hearing is & will be...
 
Don't stick your hand up to waive down to the crowd!

That's pretty cool but I'd highly recommend some good hearing protection!
 
Ay carumba -- as Benjamin Franklin once said, no f'in way :hairraise:

God gave us feet to work the pedals, a left hand to work the collective, and a right hand to work the cyclic. He did not intend that the feet cushion the landing, nor that the hands grip the tripo legs. :no:

That would, after all, be unamerican :yes:
 
I saw another one like this that was only slightly more substantial. You learned to fly it while tethered.
 
I'd be willing to bet there's no autorotation capability so you sure wouldn't want to fly any higher than you were willing to fall.

I'm curious whether or not there is the normal 90 degree phase shift between control inputs and the rotor's reaction? If true you'd have to shift your weight laterally to control pitch and longitudinally to control roll. Perhaps the counter-rotating rotors eliminates this?
 
If that ever made it to the market, how long until someone sues (or their estate sues) after they stand up without powering down and brain themselves on the rotors? Still pretty damn cool.
 
Teller1900 said:
If that ever made it to the market, how long until someone sues (or their estate sues) after they stand up without powering down and brain themselves on the rotors? Still pretty damn cool.
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No underwriter with a lick of sense would carry those as a consumer item.
 
It at least needs a cage around the propellers. But yeah, an engine failure would not be pretty.
 
lancefisher said:
I'd be willing to bet there's no autorotation capability so you sure wouldn't want to fly any higher than you were willing to fall.

I'm curious whether or not there is the normal 90 degree phase shift between control inputs and the rotor's reaction? If true you'd have to shift your weight laterally to control pitch and longitudinally to control roll. Perhaps the counter-rotating rotors eliminates this?
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Correct, the contra rotating should cancel the effect. If it could make translational flight and make a 50 mile range, I'd buy one in a heartbeat.
 
JohnR said:
It at least needs a cage around the propellers. But yeah, an engine failure would not be pretty.
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I'd rather see the bases of the existing tubes connected with more tube to form a sturdy, 4 sided roll cage to harness into with maybe a triangle of thin Lexan riveted in as a windshield on the upper portion of the forward triangle. Leave the blades free to generate all possible lift.
 
AuntPeggy said:
Personal sized:
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These are what we should use for POA caps!

multipropeller.gif

http://www.geekculture.com/geekculturestore/webstore/caps.html
 
gismo said:
I'm curious whether or not there is the normal 90 degree phase shift between control inputs and the rotor's reaction? If true you'd have to shift your weight laterally to control pitch and longitudinally to control roll. Perhaps the counter-rotating rotors eliminates this?
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angular momentum is conserved. If you tilt the rotor disk back the blade on your right sees a greater angle of attack and thus more lift. The force results 90 degrees from here (in front of you in my clockwise rotor) and so you pitch back. Those flying platform things from Johnny Quest work becuase gyroscopic forces act in a stabilizing direction (if the disk tilts the 90 degree displaced force acts to right it). Its the opposite in a helicopter with the mass slung below the rotor which is why I tip my hat to the pilots.

The flying hat thing should dynamically unstable. I would have told Inspector Gadget "It'd never fly." There was another helicopter thing in PopSci that flew on weight shift so I must be sketching it backwards.

Todd
 
Henning said:
Correct, the contra rotating should cancel the effect. If it could make translational flight and make a 50 mile range, I'd buy one in a heartbeat.
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Actually no the two rotors cancel the drive torque but the conservation of angular momentum that implies that a force applied to a gyroscope results in a moment displaced 90 degrees in the direction of rotation still applies.

picture a single blade rotating counter-clockwise when viewed from the top. tilt back. The highest AoA occurs at your outstretched right arm, so the highest force on the disk is in front of you. Which is bad, becuase your dynamically unstable and the thing tries to flip over. What I cannot sort out is the second rotor (going the other way) experiences the exact same effect only the AoA is highest on the opposite side, its spinning the other way and the force is applied again to the front. It should want to flip over really bad.

Again, it must work somehow, but I cannot get the sketch to fly so take my rebuttal with a grain of salt -- but I am sure my physics teacher would assure us that the law of angular momentum still applies, just twice as much.

However I am sure that you lean front to back to go forwards and backwards. Just like the direct control rotorheads on a bensen gyrocopter.
 
bbchien said:
Larry is a head case....a clever one, but- 30 miles to a fillup of Jet-A?
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He's only flying around the river and neighbors in his backyard, so that works. An ultralight is a "fun" machine, not a "traveling" machine, for most that fly them. I'd love to hear the sound of that turbine ultralight going overhead! He's got beautiful scenery in Grants Pass Oregon, for sure!
 
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