Volocopter manned flight

[William Gaatjes]

not exactly as cutting edge as (or as cheese grater i guess)
http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/dapras-revolutionary-new-vtol-x-plane-design-looks-out-1762948914

That is interesting. Gives whole new possibilities to hide the exhaust. I wonder what the maximum speed would be.

 

[William Gaatjes]

Yep, producing a swash plate right is a pretty high precision operation to begin with.

Are some pretty high tolerances involved.

I've never been a big Osprey fan myself, but seems they finally got them to fly after 35 years or so in development.

Kinda of like what is going on with the F-35 these days.

I was thinking, it would be an advantage because it would require less maintenance. When it comes to power, Chinook helicopters ,Sikorsky and the mil Mi-26 (largest helicopter with highest available payload) take the cake. But as all helicopters, the need a lot of maintenance.

edit:
Forgot to write : What forces that shaft, rotor blades, swashplate and rods must be able to handle. Scary...

 

[Imp]

I like this thing:

https://youtu.be/oMdIijWIE_A

Lot less tough love. I'm willing to wait longer to get somewhere if the probability of me hitting the ground at mach 3 is virtually nil.

 

[Darwin333]

I ride in helicopters fairly regularly and as impressive as they are, they scare the chit out of me. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE flying in helicopters but when one reflects on the stupidly large forces at work in a very light weight vehicle, it boggles the mind that helicopters don't tear themselves apart upon spool up. The volocopter looks interesting to me because it spreads those forces around a bit and appears to place less stress on any one piece. On the other hand, the same basic physics applies. Karlsruhe, Germany is at 400 feet above sea level. The flights I take routinely land at 7000-9000 feet msl. That's a work out for most light to medium helicopters. The power requirements to fly at elevation are significantly higher than for sea level flight.

"My definition of a helicopter is 6 million separate pieces flying in an unstable formation, I hate 'em like the plague."

Bonus points for anyone who knows the TV show that came from.

 

[John Connor]

Meh. I'd rather have one of there: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dv5I_07Gpmc

 

[Blitzvogel]

On the plus side
I think maintenance costs would be less. Common recip engines cost around $15k-$20k to overhaul. Common time between overhauls is 2000 hours.
All you'd have to do on a brushless motor is replace the bearings at some point.

On the down side.
I don't think these things can auto-rotate. Low mass, fixed pitch. Probably going to drop like a rock. Possibly countered by having so many rotors/batteries.

If you're concerned about reciprocating engines, then this machine really has no use outside of very light utility helicopters like Robinsons. Any bigger and it just makes more sense to use a turbine (which has much longer time between overhauls) and pitched blades that will supply so much more power.

I do wonder how much all those motors and batteries cost though, especially if the quality and reliability has to be worthy of a man-rated aircraft.

More than anything, I think the Volocopter just plays on the modern fascination with multi-rotor drones. It really is just a scaled up remote control drone, with more rotors and the pilot sits inside a compartment. Not to mention to totally exudes the whole iPod design motif.