Many people think that if the engine fails in a helicopter, youre doomed!

They assume that the aircraft will simply fall out of the sky like a stone, and that the pilot will be utterly helpless. In fact, I have even seen this scenario described in a bestselling book by an author who should know better. But nothing could be further from the truth. If the helicopter engine stops, the pilot simply puts the machine into a controlled descent which allows air from below to turn the rotors. This is known as autorotation. The pilot can then manoeuvre the helicopter to a safe landing site, and so long as he or she is reasonably skilled, this will not be a crash site. In fact, everyone in the aircraft ought to be able to walk away safely, and the machine should even be in one piece too. So how does autorotation work?

Air From Below Keeps the Rotor Blades Turning

In normal flight, the engine drives the rotor. But it is not the engine which actually keeps the helicopter flying. It is the air flowing over the turning blades which produces lift, and it is this lift which keeps the helicopter in the air. So if the engine stops actually, a very unlikely event with modern helicopters we just need another way to produce lift.
If a descent begins immediately after the engine stops, the airflow from below will keep the blades rotating. This might be a little hard to visualize, but it works a little like a windmill, or a descending sycamore leaf. In any event, it works! The helicopter will descend, but it will do so at a steady pace, and its direction can be controlled. It can then be manoeuvred into wind and landed safely.

Successful Autorotation: The Pilots Role

If the helicopter engine stops, everything will go quiet in the cockpit, and the machine will yaw violently to one side. When this happens, the pilot needs to instantly lower the collective, taking the pitch off the rotor blades, and initiating a descent. This is the most important thing, as it is crucial to maintain rotor RPM, ie keep the blades turning. He or she also needs to keep the aircraft straight with the pedals, and make sure the helicopters nose does not drop. These are the only things which need to be done rather quickly. Once the helicopter is established in autorotation, it will be descending at around 1,700 feet per minute, which means at a normal flying height of around 2,000 feet there is over a minute to sort things out not a lot of time, but enough.

Landing Without an Engine

The pilot now looks for a safe landing site a flat area where he can land into wind. A flat field without crops or other obstacles is best, but in a city a playing field will do, or even a flat roof! At this point, the pilot puts out an emergency or Mayday radio call if possible. At about 40 feet above the ground, he starts to raise the nose of the helicopter by pulling back on the cyclic. This slows the helicopter down, and his aim is for it to be level and moving slowly when just a few feet above the ground. At this point the collective is raised, using the last available pitch of the blades to produce lift and cushion the landing. Ideally the landing is normal and gentle, but helicopter skids are designed to absorb shock and thereby cushion a less-than-perfect autorotative landing.

Autorotative Landings
Autorotative landings are not easy for the beginner. However, prospective pilots practice this exercise many, many times during the PPL(H) course, and regularly afterwards. It is rare for any pilot to have to do an autorotation in earnest, but I have known some who have, and they have all walked away safely. If you know how to fly a helicopter, engine failure is an emergency, but not necessarily a disaster. Pages: 1 2

What About Helicopters?

While a helicopter is a far more complex machine than an aeroplane, the fundamental principles of flight are the same. The rotor blades of a helicopter are identical to the wings of an aeroplane when air is blown over them, lift is produced. The crucial difference is that the flow of air is produced by rotating the wings or rotor blades rather than by moving the whole aircraft. When the rotor blades start to spin, the air flowing over them produces lift, and this can cause the helicopter to rise into the air. So, the engine is used to turn the blades, and the turning blades produce the required lift. Very simple!

Controlling the Helicopter

However, there is rather more to it than that. You need to be able to lift your helicopter into the air when you want to, rather than just have it rise up as soon as you start the engine. In the case of an aeroplane, flight can start as soon as the aircraft is moving fast enough. But in a helicopter, for all sorts of reasons, the blades need to turn at the same speed all the time. So you need a different way to control the amount of lift produced.

How Do Helicopters Fly?

November 21, 2012 by Helen Krasner Leave a Comment

The turning of the rotor blades produces lift. Photo by Helen Krasner The magnitude of this lift is actually changed by altering the angle at which the rotor blades meet the air blowing over them. This is known as increasing or decreasing the pitch angle of the rotor blades, and this alters the amount of lift produced. The pilot does this by using a control called the collective, which is on his left side in the cockpit. This control collectively alters the pitch of the blades, and means the pilot can lift the helicopter into the hover when he decides to, by increasing the pitch on the rotor blades. However, increasing the lift also means that there is more drag. So when the collective is raised, the pilot needs to open the throttle to produce more engine power in order to prevent the rotor blades slowing down. There is a twist-grip throttle on the end of the collective for this purpose, but in most modern helicopters it is operated automatically, and the helicopter can be safely lifted into the hover using the collective alone.

Forwards, Backwards, and Sideways

The pilot now needs to be able to move the helicopter in different directions. This is done primarily by means of another control, the cyclic, which the pilot holds in his right hand. The cyclic also changes the pitch angle of the rotor blades, but it alters each blade individually and by a different amount. The helicopter is designed so that the net result of this is that when the cyclic is moved forward, the helicopter moves forwards, when it is moved aft the helicopter moves backwards, and similarly to move sideways something aeroplanes cannot do!

Turning the Helicopter

The fourth helicopter control is the yaw pedals. These alter the pitch angle of the tail rotor the small rotor at the end of the helicopter. Doing this enables the pilot to turn the helicopter either left or right.

Coordination of Helicopter Controls

In practice, the three controls all affect each other to a certain extent, and have to be coordinated carefully in order for controlled flight to happen. It is this fact which makes helicopter flying rather difficult in the beginning. Also, various other aerodynamic factors complicate matters. For example, the turning of the rotor blades causes differing amounts of air to flow over each blade, and if this is not corrected for, a helicopter could easily turn over as soon as it started to move! So, there is actually a lot more to understanding the principles of helicopter flight than the above. We will look at some of the other things involved in later articles.

What is Autorotation?
Autorotation is a controlled non-powered descent of a helicopter. Normally it is the engine which keeps the helicopters rotors turning. However, it is the turning of the rotors themselves which produces lift and actually keeps the helicopter in the air. If the engine fails, something else is needed to rotate the rotors to prevent a crash. Therefore the pilot needs to initiate a descent, which causes the upflowing air to turn the rotors, much in the manner of a windmill or a falling sycamore leaf. The helicopter will then be descending, usually at around 1000 feet per minute But it will be under control, and the pilot can steer it to an appropriate landing site.

What is an AutoGyro?

The helicopter has a power driven rotor to remain airborne It also needs a tail rotor to prevent the body of the aircraft from rotating in the opposite direction to the main rotor The autogyro's main rotor acts as a circular wing and draws energy from the airstream to rotate and generate lift. It is not powered. The aircraft is either pulled or pushed by an engine and propeller thus driving the rotor into the airstream. When the rotor attains sufficient revolutions per minute (depending on type and make) it begins to 'Fly' like a solid circular wing. No air passes through it only under and over it. This is called Autorotation and allows the aircraft to fly and land even with engines stopped. The autogiro also has a vertical and /or horizontal tail planes. The aircraft is controlled by the same basic controls, stick, throttle and rudder pedals as a fixed wing aeroplane but is significantly more manoeuverable. (Note: The small drive shaft you may see attached to the rotorhead is used only to spin-up the rotor, while the giroplane is on the ground. This provides a shorter take-off distance.

Whats the difference between an autogyro and a helicopter?

At first sight an autogyro looks like a rudimentary helicopter as they both have large horizontal rotor blades. But unlike a helicopter, the rotors on an autogyro are not powered. Instead, the thrust comes from a propeller either at the front or rear of the aircraft. The blades spin because of the air rushing up through them, providing lift and stability. Though this is an unusual design, autogyros are popular with recreational pilots and theyre well suited to lowspeed flight.

What is an autogyro?
Answer: An autogyro looks like a helicopter with a rotor blade on the top of the fuselage but it also has another propeller in back to push it. The autogyro uses the air passing UP through the rotor blade to turn the main rotor blade and give it LIFT. So it needs something to provide THRUST to propel it forward. An autogyro can NOT take off vertically and go straight up. Instead it must have a take-off roll to get it flying. The main rotor of a helicopter is more complicated and it produces both LIFT and THRUST. Their controls are more complicated and the loads on the blades and blade attachments and the rotor Mast. The Autogyro's blades turns due to air passing through it just like a maple seed "flys" with its single wing as it falls from the tree. Since the main rotor of the Autogyro does not produce a vertical Lift, that means the Mast of the rotor does not carry a torque load. The Mast only supports the weight of the Autogyro. Whereas, the Mast of the Helicopter is experiencing Torque loads and Bending loads(for some types of helicopters) as well as Tension forces by the weight of the helicopter.

What is an Autogyro?
An autogyro is an aircraft that uses a freely rotating rotor as a wing. Because the rotor rotates freely, it does not apply an axis torque on the fuselage and there is therefore no reason for a tail rotor. Furthermore, the rotor is not attached to the engine, so a propulsion in the form of a propeller or jet engine is needed for powered flight. A Crickett "hovering against the wind" You have understood by now that an autogyro is not a helicopter. An autogyro is by all means an aircraft that is "half fixed-wing, half helicopter". In most cases it is as stable as a fixedwing aircraft. It can land almost vertically and, with a trick that is called a jump start, some

autogyros can also take-off vertically. Autogyros can fly very slow, "sink" vertically down and even fly somewhat backwards. They can not hover or fly vertically up. They can "hover against the wind", but that is just flying slowly with headwind. Autogyros can land on platforms on ships and oilrigs. Autogyros are also called "windmill planes". This name describes the autogyro nicely: it is nothing more than a flying windmill. The only difference between an autogyro rotor and a normal windmill is the fact that an autogyro rotor is designed to generate lift instead of shaft power.