Tuesday, December 31, 2024

The Fairey Rotodyne, an early VTOL design. The rotor was driven by simple jets at the blade tips, and overall the Rotodyne was a lot less complicated than a tilt-rotor.

 





9 comments:

  1. Looks like a better fit to haul the troops than the Osprey

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    1. Lot more sensible. Only drawback are those turboprop blades near the cabin entrance, say under fire at night your in a hurry to get on or off, middle of excitement be easy to run into them, they are rather close to the ground.

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    2. Run into the blades once, and you won't do it again.

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  2. The rotor hub does not handle hot gas: "Rotodyne featured a tip-jet-powered rotor that burned a mixture of fuel and compressed air bled from two wing-mounted Napier Eland turboprops. The rotor was driven for vertical takeoffs, landings and hovering, as well as low-speed translational flight, but autorotated during cruise flight with all engine power applied to two propellers." Wikipedia. Later the article states that the engines ran separate compressors.

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  3. Osprey has greater speed, range and the ability to aerial refuel. OTOH the downwash has destroyed landing pads and injured people.
    In the end you're comparing a military system to a commuter short haul ferry.

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    1. A little redesigning and tweeking would fix the negatives.

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  4. How many people were killed in testing the osprey? How many have continued to die?

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    1. As many as required to maintain the corporate gravy train, must be a huge juicy billion dollar boondoggle for maintenance and overhaul contracts.

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  5. But you could hear it three counties away.

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