The Gyroplane Laboratoire was an early

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which Lift (force), lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning Helicopter rotor, rotors. This allows the helicopter to VTOL, take off and land vertically, to hover (helicopter), hover, and ...

. Its designer, Frenchman

Louis Breguet Louis Charles Breguet (; 2 January 1880 in Paris – 4 May 1955 in Saint-Germain-en-Laye) was a French aircraft designer and builder, one of the early aviation pioneers. Biography Louis Charles Breguet was the grandson of Louis Clément ...

, had already experimented with

rotorcraft A rotary-wing aircraft, rotorwing aircraft or rotorcraft is a heavier-than-air aircraft with rotor wing, rotary wings that spin around a vertical mast to generate lift (force), lift. Part 1 (Definitions and Abbreviations) of Subchapter A of Chapt ...

in 1909; however, he chose to concentrate on

airplanes An airplane (American English), or aeroplane (Commonwealth English), informally plane, is a fixed-wing aircraft that is propelled forward by thrust from a jet engine, propeller, or rocket engine. Airplanes come in a variety of sizes, shapes, ...

until the end of the 1920s. In 1929 he announced a set of patents which addressed the flight stabilization of rotorcraft, and, in 1931, Breguet created the ''Syndicat d'Etudes de Gyroplane'' ( French for "Syndicate for Gyroplane Studies"), together with Rene Dorand as technical director. Their goal was the development of an experimental helicopter, the Gyroplane Laboratoire.

Design

The aircraft consisted of an open steel tube framework, within which the engine, fuel tank, controls and pilot were situated, together with a tail assembly with

plywood Plywood is a composite material manufactured from thin layers, or "plies", of wood veneer that have been stacked and glued together. It is an engineered wood from the family of manufactured boards, which include plywood, medium-density fibreboa ...

tail surfaces. The tailwheel landing gear was installed with the mainwheels on outriggers and with an additional small wheel at the front to avoid nosing-over during landing. Power was provided by a 240 HP

Hispano The term Hispanic () are people, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an ethnic or meta-ethnic term. The term commonly applie ...

radial engine which propelled the two contra-rotating, coaxial rotors. The coaxial rotor design was chosen because with the rotors turning in opposite directions the

torque In physics and mechanics, torque is the rotational analogue of linear force. It is also referred to as the moment of force (also abbreviated to moment). The symbol for torque is typically \boldsymbol\tau, the lowercase Greek letter ''tau''. Wh ...

from one rotor was canceled out by the torque produced by the other rotor. The two twin-bladed rotors made of metal were shaped like arrows and incorporated both cyclic and

collective A collective is a group of entities that share or are motivated by at least one common issue or interest or work together to achieve a common objective. Collectives can differ from cooperatives in that they are not necessarily focused upon an e ...

pitch blade control, with which movement around the pitch and roll axis was controlled, as well as climb and descent.

Operational history

The Bréguet Dorand aircraft was finished in 1933. After ground tests and an accident, the first flight took place on 26 June 1935. Within a short time the pilot, Maurice Claisse, was setting records with the aircraft : * 14 December 1935: Closed-circuit flight with 500 m diameters * 26 September 1936: Height of 158 m * 24 November 1936: Flight duration of 1:02:50 hours over a 44 km closed circuit at 44.7 km/h * Maximum speed 120 km/h The Gyroplane Laboratoire and its accomplishments were soon overshadowed by the German Fw 61. Bréguet and Dorand continued to conduct further experiments to improve the design until the aircraft experienced a hard landing in June 1939. Development was abandoned with the outbreak of

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. The only prototype was destroyed in 1943 during an Allied air attack on the airfield at Villacoublay.

Specifications (Gyroplane Laboratoire)

ModellBreguetDorandGyroplaneLaboratoireHubMus1zu11

References

External links

"Twin Windmill Blades Fly Wingless Ship" ''Popular Mechanics'', April 1936Model of the "Gyroplane Laboratoire" in scale of 1 : 11 as shown at the Helicopter Museum of Bückeburg
{{Breguet aircraft 1930s French experimental aircraft 1930s French helicopters Coaxial rotor helicopters

Gyro Gyro may refer to: Science and technology * GYRO, a computer program for tokamak plasma simulation * Gyro Motor Company, an American aircraft engine manufacturer * '' Gyrodactylus salaris'', a parasite in salmon * Gyroscope, an orientation-sta ...

Aircraft first flown in 1935

Design

Operational history

Specifications (Gyroplane Laboratoire)

See also

References

Further reading

External links