World's Biggest Helicopter Mid-Air Rocket Recovery: The Hillers Air Tug
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 18 พ.ย. 2022
- Back in the Apollo program Hiller Aircraft proposed catching the entire 1st stage of the Saturn V under a giant helicopter. They called it the Rotary Wing System for Booster Recovery.
The rotor diameter would be over 120 meters (400 feet). Empty weight would be over 200,000 kilograms (450,000 pounds), with a useful load of nearly 250,000 kilograms (550,000 pounds)for a gross weight of a whopping 453,000 kilograms (1,000,000 pounds) With internal and external fuel tanks the helicopter would be capable of loitering in the recovery area for up to six hours
Epic Unease by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. creativecommons.org/licenses/...
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Ok, not even a few seconds in, and I love the detail of the rotors slowly bouncing in the wind.
That, and the slight haze of dust kicked up off the grass during takeoff. Just... mwah.
So much attention to detail. The ground effect disturbance, amazing. I absolutely love these videos and watch them over and over. A NASA that was denied to us brought to life. Thank you.
Good job showing the thermal blankets on the F-1 engines. Most people (including model makers and the movie Apollo 13) forget them.
OMG, it's huge. You don't really realise till you see the overhead shot and and it's bigger than most of the buildings. It's like something out of Thunderbirds!
Despite how real it looks, it has a very 'Thunderbirds' feel to it, which is certainly era-appropriate.
Awesome! Thank you Hazegray. One of the things I love about your videos is that they portray the astonishing bonkers audacity the humans are sometimes capable of.
We love being batshit crazy
Yeah, on rewatching it it occurs to me that the stuffy old folks in the 60s thought huge, not even big.
Thank you for bringing these crazy concepts to life, I love them!
Fusslage of an MI-8 and MI-10, a gigantic rotor of a R-44, and a horrifying landing set up. I’m scared.
Everything you wanted to know about helicopter breeding, but were afraid to ask.. :)
You mean R-44 rotor mast, because it got a 2 blade rotor and this is 3 blades
@@lil__boi3027 The rotor is also about twice the size of the largest one ever flown, on the H-17 which had a 134 foot rotor span.
I estimate this from the video where it shows each blade being a bit longer then the first stage which was 138 feet.
To be fair and honest, there is no vehicle to compare this to. Not even close, what a beast it would have been..
I have no words, your videos are beyond awesome! Thanks for making them!
The Hillers Air Tug is just insane on this scale!
Also a really fitting choice of Ride of the Valkyries, but this music forces me to imagine the gunship version of the Air Tug. LOL
Imagine this armed monstrosity leading an attack on some Vietnam village.
Also the Ride of the Valkyries was in fact a scene in an opera(Richard Wagner's Die Walküre/The Valkyrie) where the Valkyries were picking up KIA warriors after a battle, which makes the Hillers Air Tug recovering the spent S-1C even more poignant!
And which also begats a mind picture of this thing blasting out "Fortune Son" flying low over a jungle...
Robert Duvall says "good morning."
Great minds think alike ! I downloaded that video (for strict personal use only, I don't want to sabotage Hazegrayart efforts in any way) and then I put Wagner's Valkyries as background music. Also found on TH-cam: that one. th-cam.com/video/XRU1AJsXN1g/w-d-xo.html
End result: Crowning Moment of Awesomeness.
It'd be like enlisting in the Persian army to defend against Ceaser's invasion in 363 CE only to be faced with the war elephant, A tamed beast so impossibly large that you don't even know how to damage it, never mind actually take it down.
Of all the unbuilt projects, this one hits my top want-to-see list.
You totally outdid yourself with this one, the render detail, quality and life-likeness are insane!
This was an amazing animation hazegrayart. Imagine living on the Florida space coast and seeing this beast flying around with a Saturn V first stage 😂😂😂
Great animation as usual, but even with that, this doesn't even remotely look physically possible. Keep up the great work!
So, just like RocketLab Electron, only ten times bigger and hundred times crazier. 😀
Great video, as always.
Nothing short of amazing; the concept and this thoroughly believable animated realization. Ah, the future; wasn't it wonderful.
Visited the Hiller Aviation Museum in San Carlos, California about 20 years ago. I remember seeing a drawing and a model of the Saturn Recovery System. It was so cool to see your video of the system in action. Keep up the good work!
If you are looking for ideas for future videos may I suggest the “Starduster” rocket ship from the 1960’s cartoon “Space Angel”. I always thought it was one of the sleekest rockets from the 60’s.
The idea is pretty credible today considering how nimble quadcopter drones have gotten. If we can make light show concerts with drones, we can make a fleet of heavy lift drones that can fly circles around these falling stages.
I never heard of this thing before and yet it feels as satisfying as the self-landing booster!
Even at their lowest flying speed, those blades are practically moving at supersonic speeds! It's crazy!
No. The one or two advancing blades may be close to supersonic, but the remaining two or one retreating blades would then be below stall speed. That'll be just one of the reasons why this thing was never built.
It's amazing how you bring all these concept aircrafts and rockets to life.
I've been watching this channel since the beginning. SOOO UNDERRATED!. This is so much better than those futuristic BS video circulating in tiktok. Really great job with the details btw
i love how this thing is just so ridiculously huge that the rotors sound like they're in slow motion.
Setting it back down? How would that work? Another video?
@TheJackyBear as soon as it goes subsonic it is cools down really quickly by air flow
Helicopter hovers over an area and they lower it down.
@@motokid6008 Well sure, but it would have to rotate it vertical again and on the four little support posts. Would like to see it visualized.
@@odess4sd4d Probably just set it down horizontal as it was stressed to be able to handle that when empty
That last shot had a very "Thunderbirds Are Go!" look and feel to it.
The "Ride of the Valkyries" with the chopper reminds us of "Apocalypse Now": I love the smell of rocket fuel in the morning, it reminds me of victory.
Have you considered making an animation of the Aldebaran nuclear pulse seaplane ssto? Seems right up your alley.
THIS PLEASE
The rotor length to fuselage area ratio, amazing
Great video as usual. Would like to see the OTHER recovery idea using just parachutes and the forward LOX tank as a pneumatic piston :)
Absolutely love this concept, fun to finally see it "in action"
The landing would have been interesting-another idea thankfully left on the drawing board. Marvellous video.
I like the Kaman style rotor ailerons. This video is similar to the Escape Velocity version. Reminds me of the James Bond movie Thunderball plane pickup from raft or maybe Thunderbirds are Go.
This is insane lol! I like the little details you added. Such as the air shock effect at the end tip of the blades. The water getting disturbed by the massive wake. Awesome animation!
I love the smell of RP-1 in the morning. It smells like... victory.
A preposterous looking aircraft. I liked the Saturn 5 launch sequence in the middle, you really went the extra mile on that. :)
Richard Wagner - Ride of The Valkyries was the perfect choice, loved it.
the cabin this helicopter looks like cabin from russian Mi/Mil-8 :D
Outrageously insane, but creative.
Looks like a Stratocruiser, LA class sub and an AH-64 had a baby.
Great animation! Interesting concept, but I guess only Major "King" Kong could perform such insane rodeo stunt.
Incredible attention to detail! I really love the light distortions created by the rotors draft
If you replaced the running gear with tank treads the Three Stooges could go around the world in a daze with that thing.
I got the reference.... How do you write "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em!" in Martian? ;-)
The helicopter rotors are so
B E E G even the video is realistic great work!
when building and operating an helicopter is more expensive than losing first stages at each launch...
Wow, what great quality of video
What an incredible recovery system- the pilots would need nerves of steel for that role !
Hang on, is that just a submarine with aircraft parts? I love it 😂
Thanks for animating this one. Will you be covering the scheme where they planned to have the S-I stages of the S-Ib rocket land using a Rogallo glider?
That is a big helicopter. Quality of the saturn footage suffers in comparison to the Haze footage, but we can do nothing about that 40+ years later. And the ground crew had quite a jaunty walk.
Insane concept, they must had a very low budget when they had to take cockpits from Russian Mil-Mi 8 helicopters😉 Love the details like the non-existent Shuttle Landing Facility
another excellent banger lad, love to see it
two videos in one week! Wow!
You truly bring these wacky forgotten concepts from the past to life.
This thing is awesome! It looks like something the Thunderbirds would have lol 😆
whoop whoop whoop whoop whoop whoop whoop... 😁
But yeah, even with modern material science those massive rotor blades would be nearly impossible to realize. The forces involved must be crazy. And don't even start on rotor tip nozzles for propulsion - there's a good reason why this technology never took off on the commercial market... 😉✌️
That isn't right. There was the Sud Aviation Djinn that used a turbine compressor and compressed air nozzles.
Great work!
Wow, somebody was ambitious with that one! 😁
Wow great stuff!!
Am i the only one who thinks it looks like it belongs in kerbal space program because of how ridiculously big the rotor blades are and they probally need to spin faster
Okay, so once the chopper grabs and stows the booster...how to they set it down?
The only thing I can say about this is that it's freaking ridiculous. So cool
Was it practical? I wonder how it would have changed things.
Not at all sadly. This whole tether mechanism to catch a rocket booster floating down was very complicated. Catching and then lifting the booster under the tugs belly etc. The project was therefore scrapped.
Thunderbird 13 is GO!
The Marshalls got that Swagger.
*Mindblowing*
Well done...
This looks straight outta a James Bond movie
AMAZINGNES!!!
How did they manage to change one rope hooked to the pilot chute to pair of ropes hooked to stage itself?
Oh to have lived in the future that never was.
Thank goodness that propulsive landing renders this obsolete. You don't want to recover the airplane with another larger airplane for reuse afterall...
I found the project very incredible I found the shape of the fuselage very funny, too bad the project never became a reality!
How did the first stage get into a horizonal position to fit in the helicopter?
Magic. Not that they would ever have needed to solve that problem, since the chances are that as soon as the drogue line was snagged the entire system would have been turned into an uncontrollable pendulum by the slightest side wind.
Amazing. Who knew?
This is amazing! Just one question: what are the propellers made out of?
Impossibilium. They didn't have the composites that we have today. Even titanium would have been too heavy, and then there's the problem of providing enough force in the rotor hub to change the blades' angle of attack.
Модель вертолёта с тремя винтами МИ-32, в этом ролике смотрелась бы лучше.
Look, ya'll. In the cockpit. Its TinTin and Captain Haddock.
To me, the forward fuselage looked Sikorski-ish. I couldn't tell if the rotars were powered by internal engines or were tip (jet) propelled. As others said, it would have been a beast.
IT'S A PLANE!
IT'S A SUBMARINE!
*NO, IT'S A ROCKET RECOVERY SYSTEM!*
Imagine if this was a stock vehicle in ksp
Was this to "Recover" the first stage? Or the second?
The fastest helicopters don't often exceed 200 mph. Some are faster, but only for short bursts, say in a Combat situation.
Ok but why does 2:48 remind me of a Wes Anderson movie? lol
nose fuselage section from Mi-8 russian helicopter?
Here before the "better than shuttle" comments
It's funny how slow they can rotate to lift the vehicle. Even the wing flex....or rotor flex is insane
Rotary wing, so yes, wing flex or rotor flex.
only issue is they mentioned the pressurising of the cabin which is fine and they mentioned oxygen being at low levels at that altitude. This also means a helicopter would not be able to fly at that altitude.
Heard in Houston: "You want to catch a What?"
I don't even read the description. I just watch it wondering what I'm about to see.
This is an obscenely bonkers leviathan of a helicopter concept that would probably have taken much longer to pull off than the Apollo program had time for. And it would probably end up being massively impractical. Helicopter recovery is fine for something the size of the Electron's first stage which is slightly larger than the launch escape system, but for the huge first stage of the Saturn V it would just not be worth it. Why purpose build such a large helicopter when you can just use that time and money to build a whole new rocket.
"Thunderbird go!"
I wonder if this is where rocket labs got inspiration from
Actually from ULA's tests of helicopter recovery for their engine set for Vulcan I think :)
@@randycampbell6307 Good point, I always forget about smart reuse
Shoulda given it a try.
Ist tha original or animated??
Amazing
How would it land?
What's the point in having a giant helicopter that's probably more expensive than the rocket section it's chasing after that's already safely parachuting down
It's isn't safely parachuting down because the parachutes aren't big enough, if it hit the ground it would break
Just for the record, that S-IC weighed (aproximately) 140 metric tons. Which is a bit more than the payload of a Boeing 747. 3:52 Imagine the size of parachutes ! For the sake of comparison, the Shuttle SRBs at 91 tons each were the heaviest things ever parachuted (and must still are). But they were left splashing down in the ocean. Frack, I just realized that helicopter could easily have catched them. Plus their parachute wouldn't be much smaller than the ones seen there.
I see the Mi-8 fore part !
How would it land???
Extended landing gear.
how many round/s. of Rotor
Two videos in two days!
The guy who designed this was definitely neurodivergent
Air Thug Fo Life !