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Home > The Craft Of Creating Model Helicopters
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The Craft Of Creating Model Helicopters
by Victor Epand
Today, collecting model helicopters has become one of the more popular hobbies. This is true for kids as well as adults. Some may prefer to build model helicopters themselves just to add to their collection, while others will want to build them and learn how to fly them.
Putting a scale model together can be as simple as buying a kit from your local hobby store, or it can be as complicated as creating everything from scratch and modeling it after a real full scale helicopter right down to the smallest detail.
You will find that model helicopters come in all shapes and sizes. Some may require more skill than others to complete the construction. If you would like to build a radio-controlled model helicopter, then you will have to take on the task of learning how to fly it. No matter which model you decide on, you will have a lot fun putting it together.
To start your hobby, you should choose a design based on your skill level (and patience). You have several options to choose from. You can either go for flying model helicopters, or you may want to start with a scale-model plastic helicopter. There are also model helicopters that are made from wood. There are many model helicopters that are easy to build even for a beginner. They often contain parts which have been pre-assembled, so all you need to do is to install them into the chassis of the helicopter.
Electric r/c helicopters, are a relatively new development that is made possible by the latest advances in radio control unit miniaturization and improvements in electric motors and rechargeable batteries. There are a variety of different models that are now available both in kit form and as ready-to-fly kits.
Learning how to fly R/C helicopters is the most challenging aspect of model flying. There are many different types of model helicopters available now including mini electric models and large internal combustion powered models.
Planning, creating, building and sculpting a scale model RC helicopter from scratch can be a great deal of fun, and can give you a great sense of accomplishment when everything fits together and looks just the way you want it to. All over the country and across the world there are competitions where scratch built scale models are judged based on how closely they resemble the full sized helicopter they are modeled after.
About the Author
Victor Epand is an expert consultant for model planes and model helicopters. We recommend these sites for model planes, model fighter planes, and collectible model helicopters.
Sikorsky Vs Flettner: The Single rotor Helicopter
Igor Sikorsky is commonly credited as creating the world's first Single main rotor helicopter, the VS-300 which first flew untethered in 1940 and was partly flown lashed to the ground in 1939.
Sikorsky used a vertically oriented anti torque rotor to stop his machine spinning out of control.
Sikorsky's first helicopter flight in 1940 employed no less than 4 rotors. A single main rotor and three rotors on the tail. The VS-300 had framework booms protruding from either side of the craft which each mounted a separate control rotor.
In fact a number of single main rotor helicopters preceeded this by many years, the first by Yurev had a modern configuration, and lift offs such as A.G. Von Baumhauver's 1925 flight of single main rotor and anti torque tail rotormachine, and the Russian TsAGI 1-EA which flew to 650 metres altitude in 1930. That machine had no collective control of the main rotor and relied on extreme skill of the pilot to balance and control it.
Here however is visual proof that Anton Flettner flew the first practical single rotor helicopter, the Fl-185 .
The film shown here was taken in 1936 and 1937, years before Sikorsky left the ground.
The craft is not an autogyro but takes off vertically and hovers. Unlike the VS-300, the German Fl-185 has gyro actuated anti torque rotors which means that the craft is stable in yaw regardless of changes in main blade torque. The pilot can then just over-ride the gyro if he wishes to yaw the craft but otherwise directional stability is automatic.
Modern model rc helicopters use the same system.
Flettner understood that anti torque vertical rotors were susceptible to damage and failure and progressed beyond the single rotor configuration to introduce the intermeshing synchropter design which became the worlds first production combat helicopter as the Fl 282.
Flettner had also investigated the tailboom and tail rotor configuration later employed by Sikorsky but engineering analysis had indicated such a configuration would waste a considerable percentage of engine power and would be a major area of mechanical failure and lead to fatalities unrelated to combat.
This correct prediction led to his adoption of the synchropter principle. All engine power is employed for lift in a synchropter and thus they have a substantially higher lift to engine power ratio than conventional tail boomers. Post war variants such as the Kaman Huskie have the best safety record of any military chopper. Kaman also field the Kmax heavy lift chopper in common use today.
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