Gravityisnotmyfriend

My Feedback: (2)

I went through a brief helicopter phase. I bought a Kyosho Caliber 30 and learned how to fly on it. But, I never enjoyed it. I was always way too nervous to have fun. I crashed it several times and got sick of the large repair bills that came with each repair.

After the last crash, I shelved it. I've since stripped all the radio gear and converted the engine to aircraft use. But, the blades and swashplate are still fine. I'm thinking about experimenting with gyros again and was wondering if my heli could be used. when a heli does a autorotation landing, it's just a gyro-glider. So, why not strap an engine to the front tilt the mast back and make it into a gyrocopter?

I'm thinking I could put the collective pitch on ch 7 so I could control it with a knob. Set alot of negative pitch for the blade to get up to speed, a little less to get into the air. Then, I'd use the swash plate for roll and pitch axis. Slap on a rudder for yaw and ground handling and I've got a gyrocopter.

What am I missing here? Has this been done before?

JoelW

Hello Gravity,

For all the money spent on repairing helicopters as well as the origional purchase expense you might be ahead to build a PT25 or a PTprofile. If you really have a desire to fly an autogyro try going to flyingbalsa.com for a very good gyro experience at a far more reasonable price than Arizona autogyro Co.

Give them a try, the price is right.

Good luck,

Joel

mnowell129

It's quite possible:
http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_2325673/tm.htm
www.mickeynowell.com

You will generally need much bigger blades than the heli had.
For example on mine the original heli blades were about 12" and
the gyrocopter blades are 16".
You may want to make a longer flybar since the RPM is lower and
you will want to get the control response back up.
In any event it makes a very stable gyro.
I tried collective pitch on one and it doesn't add a whole lot,
but if it's easy to keep, leave it on and use it to fine tune the
pitch settings.
Good luck.