AeroCopter to Develop a “Mono Tiltrotor”
AeroCopter wants to develop what they are claiming to be the next big thing in helicopter design. As pictured above, the aircraft will have an outer ring which will have blades on the outside of the ring for vertical lift. The ring will be comprised an upper and lower ring which will counter-rotate in order to eliminate the need for a tail rotor for stabilization.
The ring will employ a combination of electromagnetic and permanent magnetism to control the ring. Once off the ground and at a significant altitude, the ring can be tilted forward to almost 90 degrees. At that point the blades used to provide vertical lift will stop and rotate to a wing like position in order to reduce drag. The helicopter will then fly much like a plane.
I see some flaws with this design, first and foremost is how amazingly complicated it is. Not to say that complicated will not work, but I don’t see something that requires this level of complexity ever becoming a mainstream design. Frankly I think Sikorsky’s X2 aircraft design would be far more likely to become the standard then this “Mono Tiltrotor.”
Another potential problem I could see arising is the shear weight of the vehicle. All of these parts, especially the huge ring, would add a lot of weight to the aircraft and either make the aircraft to heavy, or require huge rotor blades on the outside of the ring to produce the required lift for vertical flight.
This would be an interesting design to see in action, so we’ll definitely have to keep and eye on this and see how things turn out.