Combined Hovercraft and Helicopter

An anonymous reader writes "Has British engineer Geoff Hatton brought us the best of two worlds with his UFO-looking machine? The US military thinks so and are investing in it. The design is sturdy (as opposed to a helicopter) and can fly high (as opposed to a hovercraft). It is based on the Coanda Effect."

Comments

sturdy? as opposed to a helicopter?

[lecithin]

I know the Marines still have CH-46 helicopters in service that took battle damage in Vietnam. Some are 40 years + and none are less than 35 years old.

Saying "The design is sturdy (as opposed to a helicopter)" is really quite a statement since the design is not in service.

Seems pretty cool though.

Re:sturdy? as opposed to a helicopter?

[localroger]

How many of those helicopters that are still flying were flown a wall at any point during their service life?

Re:sturdy? as opposed to a helicopter?

[MindStalker]

He is referring to its ability to handle midair crashes. Of course a larger version would probably handle midair crashes about as well as anything else..

Re:sturdy? as opposed to a helicopter?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only is the rotor protected, it also doesn't extend beyond the edge of the non-moving parts, making it very unlikely that something bumping into the device would come close to the rotor cage. I'd like to see some fluid dynamics simulations of an obstruction on one side of the "wing" though.

Anyone see a parallel here?

[Anonymous Coward]

This guy in his shed is the same as many of the Linux kernel developers in their basements.
People laughed at them, but then they came up with something that changed the world!

Re:Anyone see a parallel here?

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish him success. Here is a man who didn't troll physics forums with crank theories, he produced results.

Coand effect

[Manhigh]

Aren't pretty much all low-speed aerodynamics based on this? Isn't this pretty similar to the Kutta Condition? (Air tends to leave a sharp edge parallel to that edge).

If air didn't stick to smooth leading edges, aircraft could never get enough L/D to fly subsonic.

Re:My one question

[RegularFry]

Observe the channelling fins around the edge along each side. They aren't quite vertical. My guess is that the angular velocity they impart balances the torque of the rotor.

Re:Why is this a great idea?

[fiannaFailMan]

This thing has to carry heavy batteries or fuel, limiting its range. And it's ungodly loud. A small dirigible is silent and I imagine you can make one pretty small given how lightweight today's surveillance tech is.

Sounds like a great argument against helicopters too.

Re:DIY rc coanda effect saucer (with plans)

[Anonymous Coward]

What's really amazing is that the company you mentioned that already invented this (gfsprojects) was founded by someone *with the same name* as the person who invented that which is mentioned in the article. What are the odds? Staggering! Staggering I say!

Re:Maintenance?

[budgenator]

If you want to know how to get around the rotor stall problem, you have to look to the masters of rotory wing flight, the Russians. The Russian answer is contra-rotating wing, each side has equal lift and the additional benefit is you get to have two Jesus nuts instead of one. The Jesus nut is the nut that holds the rotor shaft on, if the Jesus nut falls off all you can do is say "Oh Jesus"

Did the military forget they tried this already?

[CXI]

Linked from the Wikipedia article in the summary is the Avrocar: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avrocar_(aircraft)

That's a full scale model of the very same technology! I imagine in this day and age of computer control it will be more successful, especially as a UAV, but how can this guy get a patent on technology from 1958 and claim it as new?