Quote:
|
Originally Posted by duncan The Germans certainly were ahead of the Allies in helicopter development during WWII. |
*** When Juan De La Cierva was tragically killed in the thirties ( DC-2 take off at Croydon ) the driving force behind Autogyro development was frozen overnight,nobody had the drive to carry on where he left off until many years later,his Cierva C.30A provided the basic engineering know how to fly a successful rotating wing machine.It was not until the sixties that Cierva- Rotatech ressurected this famous name utilising some of the patents of the original designer,however ground resonance plagued even helicopter development,witness Percivals attempts to build a military helicopter and the tiny Saro Skeeter,although the latter was used with a degree of success by the Army Air Corps in the UK but anyone who worked on them said that engineering was difficult and maintenance tricky.
In America Pitcairns worked wonders with the autogiro and it is interesting to compare the mechanics of this American contemporary with the Cierva designs.
It is a pity that most commercial modern day autogyro designs have now been grounded by the UK authorities,the Air Command 532 series suffering from blade deflection which can literally chop off the tail by in-experienced pilots,despite modifications to try and avoid this the problem still exists.
Thankfully we still have a few people experimenting and perhaps who knows one day we will have the almost foolproof autogyro design in our skies ?
Linear Mode
