Did you use a gyro for the tail? Do you think it is possible to make it hover by putting under the airflow a command like a vertical flap under the tail?
Guys, dont give this guy too much credit for this stuff. It has been done time and again. There are full scale helis that have used this single rotor blade concept, and other it has been done with RC as well!!! Same goes for single blade airplane props!!!
Dave, this question just hit me today as I am getting ready to get back into RC Helicopters after being a few years absent. Real choppers experience a retreating blade stall above a given velocity, so what do you think would happen to a one bladed chopper? I have never heard of this phenomenon hurting model copters, but I imagine if you got big enough, something would happen. I would guess a loss in cyclic control, but I really don't know. What do you think? Just seemed like an interesting question to me. Thanks, Andy
Interesting experiment. But I would think there might be 2 issues relative to full-size versions. 1st. Stability. Helicopters are known for their vibration. I would think that this would increase that vibration. There would also be an issue of a constant heading. It can go in a straight line, but there is also a constant sea-saw of the body. This is seen when you slow the motor down. You do a turn with just the speed of the blade. 2nd. Auto-rotation when the motor dies. A single blade would probably push the body over sideways. And you don't want to hit the ground that way. Just my speculation. I would think that the FAA would put a nix on this idea for a full-size copter due to the stress on parts. But it is definitely worth playing with.
The inertial momentum grows by the square of the distance of the counterweight from the axis and it grows linearly by raising the mass of the counterweight. So a counterweight half half the mass can be approximately compensated by raising the distance of the counterweight by √2 or 1.41.
Hey Dave , you might already know this but on the remote controller, if you push the throttle adjust thing (tweak control) all the way up while the throttle is still at the down position, your air craft will start on it's own without any throttle , then if you push the throttle control up it's like a massive power boost. Maybe you already know that but just my 2 cent for others out there.
Very cool and totally makes sense. As long as you are dynamically balanced on both sides of the shaft, the opposing radial thrusts will cancel out and you will be free to rotate to your hearts content. In a strange way, it is simular to how big dynamic (axial) compressors are balanced to cancel out axial thrusts that cause havoc on the bearings and stresses on the machine.......gotta love physics....nicely done Dave!
The most important thing not mentioned in the video is that the rotor must spin twice as fast because it does half as much work per RPM than a rotor with two blades. ricglos speculates below this was the limiting factor eliminating the design during the 1920's but offers no citations to back up his claim.
Impressive! In the late 90s I saw an experimental single bladed wind turbine at university and thought it would be cool to build a similar propeller since then. But I am not that good at model making. Great work and video!
@NightFlyyer I think he means that by moving the weight away from the center of the blades the overal mass of the counterweight could be reduced therefore making a lighter heli.
This video earned a place on my "quiet prop" playlist because this is the only guy I know of making one blade, no tail rotor, light, quiet, efficient RC fliers. This technology would be revolutionary on a micro-flier like the hornet micro-drone, a nano-UAV. Then again, so would pop-up MEMS... the process Harvard used to make its dime-sized robotic fly... also a good candidate for mass-production.
Great video. Love the experiments. I've often thought that if a maple seed can fly with one blade, why not a helicopter. What I don't understand is how it can steer without tail rotor. Anyone care to explain? Much obliged.
@NightFlyyer You don't understand basic physics, do you? It's all about the moment of inertia. So the further it moves out, the lighter the weight needs to be due to the relation I = mr^2. So since the radius is increased, mass needs to decrease (by a stronger factor) to maintain a constant moment of inertia. The only benefit to moving it further out would be an overall decrease in mass. The moment of inertia will stay the same (which creates the balance).
There ist, but it is compensated by forward flight as the tail acts like a weather Vane. When the motor is slowed down, the counter torque also goes way down making it very easy to fly, as I show in many other videos. Here is a good explanation with my original Hyperfly invention. th-cam.com/video/H8fO_t6LkXM/w-d-xo.html
Amazing!!! You control uncommanded yaw with the throttle and slip stream airflow and a large tail vertical stabilizer airfoil, requiring hand launch and run on landings. You can't hover without uncontrollable adverse yaw. Amazing still. All real heli flight schools should show this video, and teach the flight physics and mechanics behind this unexpected possibility.
and what about two counter rotating coaxial one rotor blades ? It has already been done by an Austrian guy , in the ' 30 ... it seemed to be working fine ! The idea that one blade is better because it does not interfere with turbulence with the other one , is smart ... never thought it could be done ... good job ! I just don't get it , why there is no need of tail rotor , any more ...
Yes, I have done that already too. No need for tail rotor, just like Blade CX 2, because there is no body torque created when both blades are spinning in different directions as the same speed. Speed one up and it turns one way without the tail rotor, slow it down and it torques the body and turns the other way. Thanks.
this stuff requires to be further investigated ... seriously ! I dream of a a two rotors configuration with single blade each ... can you post that too , please ?
Ok, i know this is quite an old video, but... I don't think it's correct : The counterweight has to be lighter as its distance with the rotor center increase ! Unless "heavier" didn't refer to the total mass of the heli ?
Excellent and thought provoking experiment, I wonder how well a motorised glider would work with a single large bladed prop? Probably would need geared reduction from the motor but may offer mad efficiency due to lack of "slip" and drag reduction. would be interesting to see what flight durations you could achieve.... Once again well done!
@NightFlyyer Thanks for the reply! Here's hoping the kit makers and parts people are watching ;-) It wouldn't be the first time you've advanced the hobby.
@NightFlyyer Sorry this is not correct. The further out the counterweight is moved, the more centripetal force it creates because it is moving at a faster speed. Therefore yes, a lighter counterweight can be moved outward to balance.
I do wish they'd try this concept on full scaled aircrafts. With the fuel price the way they are, any designs that might increase the efficiency should be attemped. Though I'll admit, it's quite eery to watch the thing in action.
Very good but can you answer me two things... 1....Can it hover or take of vertically? I see you are throwing it which is not exactly safe with a blade spinning beside your head. 2....Can it turn right? It looks like it can only turn left due to having no tail control.
Great work! It makes for a more efficient aircraft and allows for longer flight time, a few people here want to see a co-axial rotor configuration of your concept, try it out I wanna see!
how did you work out how much weight to add to the opposite side of the single blade. I'm guessing you just balanced the same as you would a 2 bladed prop and just kept adding weight until the single blade balanced against the weight added?
Not likely both the US and Russia experimented with full sized single bladed helicopters back in the late 60's early 70's Several full sized single bladed prototype helicopters where built and flown by both countries so its really nothing new..
When I got into heli's in 2001 I started with the Falcon by century with a .46 FX with a piezo gyro and was doing mild 3D. But then in 2002 I got a Raptor 50 with O,S 50 FX along with the famus Futaba 401 / 9253 combo and one day I lost control and the heli threw a blade and went right by me and hit the ground behind me !! I told everyone that I seen the heli throw a blade and was still flying intill it hit the ground from my mistake !!! And everyone thought I was full of it !! I'm so glad I seen this. Because it just proves that I was right 😎🚁🏁🇺🇸
Doesn't the flybar also provide lift for the helicopter? I would like to see you make a FBL single rotor heli to truly validate your design. The flybar also will act like a gyro to help stabilize the heli. Just my 2 cents.
Fly bar is more for stabilisation, fly bar can be completely removed and a 3 axis gyro "virtual" fly bar installed in its place. Works like a yaw gyro but in 3 axis preventing unintentional direction changes. I use a Mikado V-bar on a nitro trex600, saves fly bar drag and weight and is programable, like a yaw gyro, as to how aggressively it holds flight tracking. It's not auto hovering or auto pilot, you can get them too. Comes with required parts to change rotor head from fb to vfb.
I saw another one blade heli on youtube. Search for "Dragonus Single Blade Rotor" That one really seemed to fly well too! It was collective a pitch heli. I love the combination of the one blade and the Hyeperfly's no tail rotor. Pretty cool!
Good morning gentleman. That is certainly a one of a kind unique design but I'm curious about the flight characteristics. I started flying R/C fixed wing aircraft in 1982 and then I moved up to R/C rotary wing in 1992. Having knowledge of the physics of helicopter flight, it would seem that one rotor blade would result in reduced collective and cyclic control since the rotor disc is reduced by 50% on a two blade head. It's obvious that you solved the counter balance issue (excellent work) and it most certainly flies but without actually taking the controls, I don't have a reference to compare it with. Since you have designed, built and flown it, what is the practical advantage of only having one rotor blade? I completely understand the NOTAR setup. Please do not think I'm criticizing you or your design because I'm not, I'm just intrigued and curious. It's possible that you may have changed the future of vertical flight, lol. There used to be a lot of people, including some at Bell Boeing who started to doubt that the V-22 Osprey would ever be a practical aircraft. Nobody says that now.
Man I can't believe that you answered my email twice. Thanks Dave, I know how many people are interested in your projects. Keep it up Teacher! Bye for now
to my knowledge this wouldnt work full scale the vibration would be intence not because of mass imbalance but due to asymmetric blade effect and that the rotor blade is producing a lot of of center lift this is usually dampened by the opposing rotor to some degree but as speed increases this usually decreases creating a larger off balance in thrust as the into wind rotor has a higher speed than the downwind blade
I've seen pictures from the 50's and 60's when they used to race control line airplanes using one bladed props and ONE WING and even half a tail.... all in the interest of saving weight and eliminating drag.....
Wonder about getting some air blown back over the vertical stab and putting a servo on it. May be able to hover albeit a bit nose up 😎🚁💨💨💨💨 great bit of model work 👍🏻
@NightFlyyer surely not?? Turning moment ("balance" required by other blade) = force (the mass of the weight) x distance from the pivot, therefore the further away from the pivot (heli's head), the smaller the weight will need to be, hence why so little force is required to undo a bolt with a long wrench, but a lot is needed if the wrench is short to undo the same bolt. Great video by the way.
Hi Dave! Please bear with me-what about the Bearings? Even though you balanced it -statically- isn't there a lot of dynamic stress coming from flying it and using the pitch that is increased by it not beaing aerodynamically balanced? Just a thought, might be wrong. Nevertheless, nice concept;-) Cheers, Michael
Holy mackerel it works! I would have to see it to believe too! Well done my friend, leave it up to DAVE! Well it looks like it flies better than allot of dual bladed normal heli's for that fact too!
As long and your moving forward, it flies like an airplane. It is like a windmill tail. It just stays back there. Its just simple physics and it certainly works, as I have made many many videos using different helis and using this method and good enough even for Kyosho to buy my idea and manufacture it. Here is another more recent video, that may explain it better. Hope this helps. th-cam.com/video/2yuQkRQi0aQ/w-d-xo.html
Agree that some toy helis tail rotor consumes 30% power of the whole heli. But hobby grade helis can be tuned to go lower than 15% power on the tail. And it is not hard for this tuning.
***** Probably because he took 2 minutes and 20 seconds to actually do something. Ususally, TH-cam videos just waste the 1st minute. Once he got going, it was okay. A closer look at the entire blade including the 2 attachments would have been a better use of the time loss. Still, kudos for actually doing it.
+Ron Garza Yeah. And next time someone actually gets going immediately, there will be TH-cam audience nagging ... "naaah I want a foreplay... :-p" If I have only the options to like/dislike/notvote I do not see how anybody not out of their f*king mind would use dislike.
Thanks for all your test videos on anything that flies i guess.i have watch several. I just dug out my Apache hyper fly from the 90's and found it to be in good shape. Never had much fun or luck flying the thing, mostly to heavy not enough power. What mods do you suggest to liven this apache up. I was shocked to find out you invented these. I am also shocked they will fly one on rotor blade, just shows your a Genius!
WOW!!! but i think it can't hover no? I think it needs some speed to control the wind with the tail wing, or am I wrong?. Great video... its fun I study phisics and I was thinkin that you were wrong until I saw this video... great!
Question: at 5:55, the blade seems to be attached to the hub with a lead/lag pivot. Does the single rotor blade has this pivot moveable ? Thank you for the video !
@NightFlyyer Thanks for posting this great proof of concept.Why would it not fly as well as agyrocopter? I was thinking of making a one bladed (hinged)gyrokite.Thanks
G'day Dave . Very good review.I remember many years ago these models being available but unfortunately I never got to see one.You would have to think in this day and age a model like this with a brushless set up and a throttle would be a good line to market. I have been looking on Ebay ,with no luck Happy Landings Chris.........
Hey dave! you should take a flybarless 450 size heli, put the smallest blades you can, and pie tin the tail rotor. single blade, not even any paddles. the ultimate single blade experience.
that's brilliant I wouldn't have believed if I hadn't seen it. It looked so manageable or is that your years of experience. Thanks Dave. I love this sort of innovation. Thinking outside the square. Cheers
The single blade concept has been around since at least 1940. Do a search on it before your patent lawyer takes your money. There are plenty of single-bladed wind turbines in operation today. Same principle. And, just want to point out that the tail is just there to keep the nose pointed in the direction of movement. It doesn't even need a tail, or a nose for that matter.
I've seen this done before Dave but with a Belt CP about a year ago and the bloke had great success ;-) i'll send you a link in a PM ok ;-) but great job with this heli = thumbs up.
Dave that is to cool! I remember reading about this and using with planes for more speed. Was a big article on it and was interesting. This right here though is a whole different level to cool!. Okay so I guess now a test or Turbulance would be to try it out on a two bladed boat lol. Water is sticky with drag so that would be a good test there.if it would work. Nice job as always!
You can do better. NO rotorblade.
well you could use 2 tubes instead of blades but then it would fly like a plane. th-cam.com/video/K6geOms33Dk/w-d-xo.html
other than it spinning at really high rpms, my brain does not understand the physics. Thats amazing
zero rotors, and ill be impressed.
1 blade still has lift.
The wind blowing over the slanted tail pushes it to counteract torque, so you cannot 'hover'
Did you use a gyro for the tail? Do you think it is possible to make it hover by putting under the airflow a command like a vertical flap under the tail?
Guys, dont give this guy too much credit for this stuff. It has been done time and again. There are full scale helis that have used this single rotor blade concept, and other it has been done with RC as well!!! Same goes for single blade airplane props!!!
Dave, this question just hit me today as I am getting ready to get back into RC Helicopters after being a few years absent.
Real choppers experience a retreating blade stall above a given velocity, so what do you think would happen to a one bladed chopper? I have never heard of this phenomenon hurting model copters, but I imagine if you got big enough, something would happen. I would guess a loss in cyclic control, but I really don't know. What do you think?
Just seemed like an interesting question to me.
Thanks,
Andy
Interesting experiment. But I would think there might be 2 issues relative to full-size versions.
1st. Stability. Helicopters are known for their vibration. I would think that this would increase that vibration. There would also be an issue of a constant heading. It can go in a straight line, but there is also a constant sea-saw of the body. This is seen when you slow the motor down. You do a turn with just the speed of the blade.
2nd. Auto-rotation when the motor dies. A single blade would probably push the body over sideways. And you don't want to hit the ground that way.
Just my speculation. I would think that the FAA would put a nix on this idea for a full-size copter due to the stress on parts.
But it is definitely worth playing with.
The inertial momentum grows by the square of the distance of the counterweight from the axis and it grows linearly by raising the mass of the counterweight. So a counterweight half half the mass can be approximately compensated by raising the distance of the counterweight by √2 or 1.41.
Hey Dave , you might already know this but on the remote controller, if you push the throttle adjust thing (tweak control) all the way up while the throttle is still at the down position, your air craft will start on it's own without any throttle , then if you push the throttle control up it's like a massive power boost.
Maybe you already know that but just my 2 cent for others out there.
Very cool and totally makes sense. As long as you are dynamically balanced on both sides of the shaft, the opposing radial thrusts will cancel out and you will be free to rotate to your hearts content. In a strange way, it is simular to how big dynamic (axial) compressors are balanced to cancel out axial thrusts that cause havoc on the bearings and stresses on the machine.......gotta love physics....nicely done Dave!
The most important thing not mentioned in the video is that the rotor must spin twice as fast because it does half as much work per RPM than a rotor with two blades. ricglos speculates below this was the limiting factor eliminating the design during the 1920's but offers no citations to back up his claim.
I did this on my mcpx while waiting for new pairs of blades, and rpm is just the same. needed more pitch though.
Impressive!
In the late 90s I saw an experimental single bladed wind turbine at university and thought it would be cool to build a similar propeller since then. But I am not that good at model making.
Great work and video!
@NightFlyyer I think he means that by moving the weight away from the center of the blades the overal mass of the counterweight could be reduced therefore making a lighter heli.
This video earned a place on my "quiet prop" playlist because this is the only guy I know of making one blade, no tail rotor, light, quiet, efficient RC fliers. This technology would be revolutionary on a micro-flier like the hornet micro-drone, a nano-UAV. Then again, so would pop-up MEMS... the process Harvard used to make its dime-sized robotic fly... also a good candidate for mass-production.
Bramshall
Great video. Love the experiments. I've often thought that if a maple seed can fly with one blade, why not a helicopter. What I don't understand is how it can steer without tail rotor. Anyone care to explain? Much obliged.
When I think of all the half broken props and blades I have tossed in the bin...ARGHHHH
really nice work. Very cool!
@NightFlyyer You don't understand basic physics, do you? It's all about the moment of inertia. So the further it moves out, the lighter the weight needs to be due to the relation I = mr^2. So since the radius is increased, mass needs to decrease (by a stronger factor) to maintain a constant moment of inertia.
The only benefit to moving it further out would be an overall decrease in mass. The moment of inertia will stay the same (which creates the balance).
Why is there no gyroscopic rotation, without the tail rotor ? I'm sure you could weight a four blade minus two as well I guess.........
There ist, but it is compensated by forward flight as the tail acts like a weather Vane. When the motor is slowed down, the counter torque also goes way down making it very easy to fly, as I show in many other videos. Here is a good explanation with my original Hyperfly invention. th-cam.com/video/H8fO_t6LkXM/w-d-xo.html
in 1958 MBB came out with the bo 103 ,even the tail rotor was one bladed.kudos!
Amazing!!! You control uncommanded yaw with the throttle and slip stream airflow and a large tail vertical stabilizer airfoil, requiring hand launch and run on landings. You can't hover without uncontrollable adverse yaw. Amazing still. All real heli flight schools should show this video, and teach the flight physics and mechanics behind this unexpected possibility.
and what about two counter rotating coaxial one rotor blades ? It has already been done by an Austrian guy , in the ' 30 ... it seemed to be working fine !
The idea that one blade is better because it does not interfere with turbulence with the other one , is smart ... never thought it could be done ... good job !
I just don't get it , why there is no need of tail rotor , any more ...
Yes, I have done that already too. No need for tail rotor, just like Blade CX 2, because there is no body torque created when both blades are spinning in different directions as the same speed. Speed one up and it turns one way without the tail rotor, slow it down and it torques the body and turns the other way. Thanks.
this stuff requires to be further investigated ... seriously ! I dream of a a two rotors configuration with single blade each ... can you post that too , please ?
Ok, i know this is quite an old video, but...
I don't think it's correct :
The counterweight has to be lighter as its distance with the rotor center increase !
Unless "heavier" didn't refer to the total mass of the heli ?
Excellent and thought provoking experiment, I wonder how well a motorised glider would work with a single large bladed prop? Probably would need geared reduction from the motor but may offer mad efficiency due to lack of "slip" and drag reduction.
would be interesting to see what flight durations you could achieve....
Once again well done!
@NightFlyyer Thanks for the reply! Here's hoping the kit makers and parts people are watching ;-) It wouldn't be the first time you've advanced the hobby.
Still a pioneer of the hobby all these years later. Thanks for sharing Dave, this is a great experiment !!
There is another factor, less blade drag as well as not in the other blade's turbulence.
If you had 2 counter rotating rotors, like in avatar(movie), with 1 blade each, would you have more maneuverablity
@NightFlyyer Sorry this is not correct. The further out the counterweight is moved, the more centripetal force it creates because it is moving at a faster speed. Therefore yes, a lighter counterweight can be moved outward to balance.
That's amazing! Well done sir!
Yeah that's amazing
I do wish they'd try this concept on full scaled aircrafts. With the fuel price the way they are, any designs that might increase the efficiency should be attemped.
Though I'll admit, it's quite eery to watch the thing in action.
For airplanes or fixed pitch helis I wonder if you could use a higher pitched single blade of equal length to the original two blade version?
Very good but can you answer me two things...
1....Can it hover or take of vertically? I see you are throwing it which is not exactly safe with a blade spinning beside your head.
2....Can it turn right? It looks like it can only turn left due to having no tail control.
I wonder if you could use a higher pitched single blade of equal length to the original two blade version?
Great work! It makes for a more efficient aircraft and allows for longer flight time, a few people here want to see a co-axial rotor configuration of your concept, try it out I wanna see!
how did you work out how much weight to add to the opposite side of the single blade. I'm guessing you just balanced the same as you would a 2 bladed prop and just kept adding weight until the single blade balanced against the weight added?
.....and that's why everyone needs a Dave.
Not likely both the US and Russia experimented with full sized single bladed helicopters back in the late 60's early 70's Several full sized single bladed prototype helicopters where built and flown by both countries so its really nothing new..
When I got into heli's in 2001 I started with the Falcon by century with a .46 FX with a piezo gyro and was doing mild 3D. But then in 2002 I got a Raptor 50 with O,S 50 FX along with the famus Futaba 401 / 9253 combo and one day I lost control and the heli threw a blade and went right by me and hit the ground behind me !! I told everyone that I seen the heli throw a blade and was still flying intill it hit the ground from my mistake !!! And everyone thought I was full of it !! I'm so glad I seen this. Because it just proves that I was right 😎🚁🏁🇺🇸
Doesn't the flybar also provide lift for the helicopter? I would like to see you make a FBL single rotor heli to truly validate your design. The flybar also will act like a gyro to help stabilize the heli. Just my 2 cents.
Fly bar is more for stabilisation, fly bar can be completely removed and a 3 axis gyro "virtual" fly bar installed in its place. Works like a yaw gyro but in 3 axis preventing unintentional direction changes. I use a Mikado V-bar on a nitro trex600, saves fly bar drag and weight and is programable, like a yaw gyro, as to how aggressively it holds flight tracking. It's not auto hovering or auto pilot, you can get them too. Comes with required parts to change rotor head from fb to vfb.
You would have done great as a radio announcer!
haha, This is exactly what came to mind when you made that single prop plane video!
Time for Commercial and Military applications
I saw another one blade heli on youtube. Search for "Dragonus Single Blade Rotor" That one really seemed to fly well too! It was collective a pitch heli. I love the combination of the one blade and the Hyeperfly's no tail rotor. Pretty cool!
Good morning gentleman. That is certainly a one of a kind unique design but I'm curious about the flight characteristics. I started flying R/C fixed wing aircraft in 1982 and then I moved up to R/C rotary wing in 1992. Having knowledge of the physics of helicopter flight, it would seem that one rotor blade would result in reduced collective and cyclic control since the rotor disc is reduced by 50% on a two blade head. It's obvious that you solved the counter balance issue (excellent work) and it most certainly flies but without actually taking the controls, I don't have a reference to compare it with. Since you have designed, built and flown it, what is the practical advantage of only having one rotor blade? I completely understand the NOTAR setup. Please do not think I'm criticizing you or your design because I'm not, I'm just intrigued and curious. It's possible that you may have changed the future of vertical flight, lol. There used to be a lot of people, including some at Bell Boeing who started to doubt that the V-22 Osprey would ever be a practical aircraft. Nobody says that now.
I don't know if anyone asked already. But did you have to use a longer blade like with the airplane?
Amazing stuff Dave I would have never thought.
But can it lift off with out holding it are through it into flight ????
But how does it not constantly spin?
Probably the much lessened torque from the main rotor only requires air resistance from the large tail to not spin around.
Man I can't believe that you answered my email twice. Thanks Dave, I know how many people are interested in your projects. Keep it up Teacher! Bye for now
to my knowledge this wouldnt work full scale the vibration would be intence not because of mass imbalance but due to asymmetric blade effect and that the rotor blade is producing a lot of of center lift this is usually dampened by the opposing rotor to some degree but as speed increases this usually decreases creating a larger off balance in thrust as the into wind rotor has a higher speed than the downwind blade
You inspired me to test the notar design on an msr and i did it, it flew grate!
I've seen pictures from the 50's and 60's when they used to race control line airplanes using one bladed props and ONE WING and even half a tail....
all in the interest of saving weight and eliminating drag.....
Thats speedmodels. Since today they are built like this.
Wonder about getting some air blown back over the vertical stab and putting a servo on it. May be able to hover albeit a bit nose up 😎🚁💨💨💨💨 great bit of model work 👍🏻
Nice video. The single blade sounds neat when cutting the wind as it passes by.
@NightFlyyer surely not?? Turning moment ("balance" required by other blade) = force (the mass of the weight) x distance from the pivot, therefore the further away from the pivot (heli's head), the smaller the weight will need to be, hence why so little force is required to undo a bolt with a long wrench, but a lot is needed if the wrench is short to undo the same bolt. Great video by the way.
Do you think that this would also work on larger models...or real helis and planes?
You are the best, Dave !
Alain, 66 y.o. near Paris, France at 05:13 am
@NightFlyyer are you sure ? my blade is 15g, my counter weight is 29g
How can you control the yaw rotation if there isn't a tail rotor?
Hi Dave!
Please bear with me-what about the Bearings?
Even though you balanced it -statically- isn't there a lot of dynamic stress coming from flying it and using the pitch that is increased by it not beaing aerodynamically balanced?
Just a thought, might be wrong. Nevertheless, nice concept;-)
Cheers,
Michael
Holy mackerel it works! I would have to see it to believe too! Well done my friend, leave it up to DAVE! Well it looks like it flies better than allot of dual bladed normal heli's for that fact too!
I still don't understand where there is no need for a tail rotor, albiet LESS torque is produced, but not none.
As long and your moving forward, it flies like an airplane. It is like a windmill tail. It just stays back there. Its just simple physics and it certainly works, as I have made many many videos using different helis and using this method and good enough even for Kyosho to buy my idea and manufacture it. Here is another more recent video, that may explain it better. Hope this helps. th-cam.com/video/2yuQkRQi0aQ/w-d-xo.html
@@NightFlyyer Ahh gotcha, less effective in hover... nice. I like it a lot.
how can the other prop make turbulanse when the plane, or heli is moving??
sorry for my bad english.
Agree that some toy helis tail rotor consumes 30% power of the whole heli. But hobby grade helis can be tuned to go lower than 15% power on the tail. And it is not hard for this tuning.
John C Gibson and with a torque tube it doesn’t use extra
Hello, you seem to me an excellent pilot with a magnificent voice he was speaker of radio or TV?
Not sure who the 22 lames are that disliked the video but I'm guessing they don't fly RC helicopters. Amazing work Dave!!
***** Probably because he took 2 minutes and 20 seconds to actually do something. Ususally, TH-cam videos just waste the 1st minute. Once he got going, it was okay. A closer look at the entire blade including the 2 attachments would have been a better use of the time loss. Still, kudos for actually doing it.
+Ron Garza Yeah. And next time someone actually gets going immediately, there will be TH-cam audience nagging ... "naaah I want a foreplay... :-p" If I have only the options to like/dislike/notvote I do not see how anybody not out of their f*king mind would use dislike.
My pleasure sir. Always enjoy your creative mechanical adventures. Awesome!!! Thanks for all the time you put in on your clips. It shows!
that was a pretty sweet landing, and a sweet poncho on the camra guy lol
good one! ; )
try an mcx with 1 blade cut off the top and the bottom i dont think it will work though cuz the bottom will have interfirence with the top
Saw this concept in the movie Elysium, 5 years after this video was made.
Thanks for all your test videos on anything that flies i guess.i have watch several. I just dug out my Apache hyper fly from the 90's and found it to be in good shape. Never had much fun or luck flying the thing, mostly to heavy not enough power. What mods do you suggest to liven this apache up. I was shocked to find out you invented these. I am also shocked they will fly one on rotor blade, just shows your a Genius!
WOW!!! but i think it can't hover no? I think it needs some speed to control the wind with the tail wing, or am I wrong?. Great video... its fun I study phisics and I was thinkin that you were wrong until I saw this video... great!
Question:
at 5:55, the blade seems to be attached to the hub with a lead/lag pivot. Does the single rotor blade has this pivot moveable ? Thank you for the video !
Wow... I donno what to say... Dave you are genius..
Amazing.... The essence of evolution resides on challenging status quo. Congrats for sharing...
Hey Brother..... no surprise to me that you could fly this without a tail rotor! Awesome video! Sis
@NightFlyyer Thanks for posting this great proof of concept.Why would it not fly as well as agyrocopter? I was thinking of making a one bladed (hinged)gyrokite.Thanks
I like your video and cool helicopter, but how did you exactly make the helicopter into a single blade.
Hi Dave! How heavy should be the counter weight? The same weight as the missing blade?
Thanks
so, why do we put 4 blades on our helicopters? I mean if this works why should someone even think of putting for on?
How in the world do you come up with these ideas?!
excellent test result, I will keep my broken props and blades for sure now ! LOL
wow can this be done on a full scale chopper? and will this work on ducted fan units?
great job and flying
G'day Dave . Very good review.I remember many years ago these models being available but unfortunately I never got to see one.You would have to think in this day and age a model like this with a brushless set up and a throttle would be a good line to market. I have been looking on Ebay ,with no luck
Happy Landings
Chris.........
Hey dave! you should take a flybarless 450 size heli, put the smallest blades you can, and pie tin the tail rotor. single blade, not even any paddles. the ultimate single blade experience.
that's brilliant I wouldn't have believed if I hadn't seen it. It looked so manageable or is that your years of experience. Thanks Dave. I love this sort of innovation. Thinking outside the square. Cheers
The single blade concept has been around since at least 1940. Do a search on it before your patent lawyer takes your money. There are plenty of single-bladed wind turbines in operation today. Same principle. And, just want to point out that the tail is just there to keep the nose pointed in the direction of movement. It doesn't even need a tail, or a nose for that matter.
I've seen this done before Dave but with a Belt CP about a year ago and the bloke had great success ;-) i'll send you a link in a PM ok ;-) but great job with this heli = thumbs up.
wow! are you brave enough to try one blade x2 (tail rotor as well)? Great video!
Bölkow B103 from 1961:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%C3%B6lkow_Bo_103
Have you not heard of the Bolkow 103? Google it.
How bout trying a single rotor blade, single tail rotor blade next?
Can you make a quad with only single blades???
Wow! It works LOL! How about 1 flybar paddle?
Great Dave, How did you do the counter weight for this.
yaw? turn right turn left?
Of course! Watch this single blade 3D flight. th-cam.com/video/abXGxS6CUU4/w-d-xo.html
Dave that is to cool! I remember reading about this and using with planes for more speed. Was a big article on it and was interesting. This right here though is a whole different level to cool!.
Okay so I guess now a test or Turbulance would be to try it out on a two bladed boat lol. Water is sticky with drag so that would be a good test there.if it would work. Nice job as always!
Dave can you say ingenious ingenuity? I knew you could.
Unique, as usual, Dave.
***** Why not make a 3D printed RC helicopter for ThingiVerse which people can 3D print themselves?