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I lost a friend to a gyrocopter accident ten years ago.. I begged him to sell it. They found his body a half mile short of the airport runway. Neverrr heard the cause. Did you know that Igor Benson was an ordained minister? No doubt so that he could give last rites with his machines.
I worked on Bensens brothers house in Raleigh NC and they had the original gyro copter in their yard. Had lots of fun talking with his nephew Mark about the machine which was powered by a snowmobile engine.
The issue for me with this aircraft [Niki] - and I've physically been to the factory - is the support. It is a relatively tiny operation and personally I don't think there is really a big enough network to give credibility to a statement that suggests it is "a far better choice".
I’ve learned from pilots, doctors, engineers that they think they are NEVER wrong. They also feel untouchable because they are stimulated by what they do each day and feel not like the rest of humanity. Only upon their deaths do they learn reality and while alive, they listen to no one and lack empathy for those they crush in their decision-making.
I believe that the profusion of digital flying aids focuses the pilots eyes inside the cockpit and not outside on the rotor characteristics. Its the rotor that keeps you in the air. Gyrocopters were always meant to be simple not loaded with multiple instrumentation.
I never want to fart in church. If I did fart in church, it would be a tragedy. If you farted in church, it would be hilarious. Car wrecks and plane crashes are like that.........Sorta.....KInda.......
Hi and no. So rotors in autorotation do so because of airflow through the blade and because of the position of the aerodynamic force the rotor continues to rotate. Therefore "unloading the rotors" to mean a g value less than 1, means airflow is taken away.
Why hasn't it occurred to the Gyro pilots that the major safety deficiency of the aircraft is it's natural stability? In other words, pilots are assuming a safe aircraft is much safer than it actually is. In other words...... A grotesque and unreasonable overconfidence...... In other words....Pilot fuck up.
Always been intrigued by gyroplanes, though have no experience of flying. So trust you don’t mind my question. Why no side by side two rotor configuration? Any advantages? I see with one clockwise one anti-clockwise, you have balance, and low rotor speeds not an issue.
Hey mark - no problems at all with the questions. So in helicopters the two rotor clock-wise / anti clockwise configuration was to deal with the torque produced and of course in the tandem rotor configuration one rotor cancel the torque of the other when the rotors are powered. However gyroplanes have no power to the rotor so the problem doesn't exist so no solution needs to be found. The first helicopter with this tandem relationship was the Focke FW61 - the worlds first practical helicopter. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Focke-Wulf_Fw_61
Hey Mark - Yeah I think they likely were compared to the modern sport types and that is because they are much bigger entities in that the motor / prop would have generated more thrust and the rotors much bigger and with 3 blades - and that in combination would have been useful to that. You might also factor in that much of the footage of the old aircraft would have been with professional pilots and in part for the camera.
"I like your preflight check illustration of the new T-600x craft. That is how an introduction should be. I feel? All small clinics or private medical practice facilities should have one of these(Gyro-Aircraft) stationed in their parking lot for emergency purposes. The company manufactures need to construct a larger flex-glass capsule fuselage to hold: a standard size stretcher, two occupants(A doctor with a med assistance personnel.) and a Pilot(Or multi-task med personnel)to carryout Med emergencies. Please note: Gyro must include a ballistic parachute deployment system referenced from Curti Industries; To avoid auto-rotation practices during engine failure for none experienced operators, and the safety of the patient during flight. Personally? I feel; This craft can save many lives. It moves and lifts? Quickly! And? That is what a patient needs most; Efficient transport. Meaning: No talk? No wait! Just simply?.. We have the ride ready, Let's go." 👍 ~I strongly support your development. It is needed, I know it could save many lives.~ Sincerely: A. Munnings, Date:Tuesday April 23(T=10:31pm, ET)- Wed. 24th(T=5:20pm, ET), 2024.
Hi, thank you for this history on gyroplanes. I wonder why there's not a gyroplane company out there that's focusing on engineering more advanced tractor style gyros for safer, faster flying? Again, thanks for the info.
Glad you enjoy them and I apologies for the poor production! In terms of new aircraft the issue really is regulation cripples the efforts - in the UK you can see that actually we only have gyroplanes from 2 manufacturers for the last 20 years!
@@gyrocopterflyingclub6148 Wish there was a company here in the US would take this project. The scorpion model that was supposed to be for law enforcement was a nice design. Just wondering why it was never manufactured?
The Instructor instruments and controls in teh back seat seem to have everything except the flight/brake selector, I wonder why they didnt do that as well.
Back in the 1960s there was a line a firearms developed in the US called _"GYROJET."_ These fired one-piece 'mini-rockets', instead of bullets contained in separate cartridges. The system never worked well, and it faded from the market.
Brilliant innovation, what an unusual way to move large batteries around, known for their propensity to explode and burn with an ardent fury. Gyrocopters taking off and landing with their big volatile batteries, sounds like a plan, lol. Wonder if there's any room left for passengers and luggage, or does that have to go by train?
On newer builds what about an assist system for the rotor blades ? Sure if you Bunt/loop that's all she wrote, but what about a high torque starter motor with capacitors and programmable rpm switch 🤔 Machine the gyrohead with an outside gear similar to an outboard flywheel, the bendix is far enough away from the rotor to be safe but in the event you lose rotor speed it can engage even if just briefly and get you back 300-400 rpm Would that give you back enough lift to get out this scenario ? Or would that initiate a horizontal spin without a tail rotor even if it's only a brief second?
Observation here from my prospective as a non-experienced pilot. He went waaaaay to fast for the crafts design, pulling up at those speeds made it completely unstable resulting this crash
If you look through all of the films at one point I always tried to start with an odd military themed image / video for no other reason than I liked them!
Back in the late 1980's we built a two-engine gyro, and the engines were closer to the center using overlapping propellers. Even at that, it was a deathtrap because if one engine died, the other engine thrust would yaw the aircraft so fast that you would lose control before you could throttle down the other engine. Even at low power, one engine would spin the gyroplane uncontrollably. In reality, there was no dual-engine reliability because you would need to add an auto-kill switch to both engines if one quit, which means you now had twice the chance of an engine failure, and a gyroplane twice as heavy to land. Even Dr. Bensen tried the crisscross one over the other rotor system and found metal failure developing due to the constant variant speed difference between the to rotors. Before you spend so much money on a project like this, just look at history and see what didn't work. There is nothing new under the sun in gyroplanes.
Thanks for that insight Dennis and hope you are well. Do you have any old images of that aircraft? You are right there is so much time and energy spent in trying to re-invent what has likely been invented / tried before. I was at an airfield last week looking at one of the original Avian gyroplanes that is being rebuilt.
@@gyrocopterflyingclub6148 Perhaps 2 engines inline like the Cessna Skyhawk would be the best choice. They would also cancel out the torque issue that appears to be present on the newer 915is powered gyro's.
