Word: rotors
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...plane air force for its annual flyin, put on a dazzling display of aerial stunts, precision landings, and simulated bombing with colored flour sacks. The gyrocopters came as plain or fancy as the owners could afford, but all were equipped with a pusher engine, one rudder, one rotor blade, and a single seat with steering stick. The gas tank holds six gallons, good for about an hour's flight. The craft can rise to an altitude of two miles, but most flyers preferred to stay under...
Zero Landings. Since the Federal Aviation Agency requires all gyrocopters to be at least 51% homemade, there were hairy tales of accidents to swap. One builder had mounted his rotor blade upside down, then vainly tried taking off with it that way. Another had added bolts to eliminate rotor teetering; when he took off, his craft turned into a gyroscope, flipped over and collapsed...
Crumpled Craft. "The main fear is losing your rotor blade," says Don White, a mechanical engineer at Douglas Aircraft. "I imagine nearly every guy has had at least one engine failure, and this is something you can cope with. The gyrocopter just settles down to earth. But if you lose your rotor blade, you're out of luck. It's like a wing on an airplane." Fortunately, the gyrocopter is what pilots call "a forgiving plane"; the construction tends to give on crashing, and there is little mass to crush or entangle the pilot. "If he lands...
...industry's eleven companies are also working on some major innovations. Lockheed is experimenting with an odd-looking, stub-winged plane that takes off as a helicopter with rotors spinning overhead, folds the rotors into its body, then flies on at speeds of up to 500 m.p.h. Vertol is designing a tilt-winged aircraft that also lifts off as a copter, with its wings in a vertical position, then speeds forward as the wings are tilted horizontally and propellers take over to pull it along. Hughes's experimental XV-9A shoots hot gases out of rotor-tip vents...
...Spider, the only car in the world powered by the Wankel engine. Twelve companies in the U.S., Britain, France, Italy and Japan are now experimenting with the engine (which was developed in 1954 by Felix Wankel, a German engineer). The Wankel replaces conventional pistons and cylinders with a triangular rotor, has only two major moving parts and weighs much less than conventional engines. Other engineering trends showed off: a swing toward a combination of disk and drum brakes even in some of the lower-priced cars, reduction in the number of lubrication points, wider use of double carburetors to provide...