Human powered helicopter

Posted on my flying club email group and I though some of you might find this interesting.


http://www.airspacemag.com/multimedia/videos/Flying-High-Landing-Hard.html

Im really amazed that they could do it at all. Human fixed wing aircraft flight is extremely difficult as it is and this is a lot harder.

Trivia - my r/c flying club is in the Boston suburbs and one of our members, Mark Drela, is an MIT aeronautical engineering professor who was one of the faculty advisors for the Daedalus project

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Daedalus
http://library.propdesigner.co.uk/daedalus.pdf

He once gave a talk at our meeting and explained how the aircraft was built (a lot of similarity to methods and materials used in r/c gliders - the wing was mostly foam and mylar with some carbon fiber) and how they calculated the power required. I dont remember the details but the olympic cyclist who "flew" the plane had to work at something like 90+% of his cardio capacity nonstop for almost 4 hours

"I dont remember the details but the olympic cyclist who "flew" the plane had to work at something like 90+% of his cardio capacity nonstop for almost 4 hours"

I couldn't do that when I was in shape.

You could tell just by watching him start to pedal that it was hard work. Need someone that is a good sprinter or a combination of sprinter and long-distance. Still would be a fun project.

Interesting how the styrofoam (I'm guessing) seat disintegrated on impact like the crumple zone on a car. Well thought out and designed.