5 Countries in one day

“An Autogyro, Ah yes! That’s one of those Microlight things that the wings go round about on”, or “An Autogyro, Oh yes, marvellous little machines, but you would not catch me up in one”.

These are the type of comments and reaction I would normally get from the rest of the flying world who know very little or nothing about the versatile and safe little machines. Another very common statement from the partially informed is, “You can not fly them in negative G". This is very true but who wants to do a loop with a roll off the top anyway. You would not expect anyone to try this type of manoeuvre in a rotorwing any more than you would expect anyone to try to hover a Pitts Special. All aircraft are built with a specific purpose in mind and have to be flown within their own flight envelope and the Autogyro is no exception to this rule. So what is an Autogyro? What can it do? How difficult is it to fly? The empty Aircraft weighs 325 lbs. With rotor dia. of 22ft The rotor is not coupled to the engine, but is driven as a result of the Airflow produced by either the wind or the forward motion of the Aircraft.

“What turns the Rotor in auto-rotation? This question is put to me in thousands of variations by many who insist that it should turn backwards since its blades are at positive pitch. This “common-sense” conclusion is not borne out however by the rotor’s actual behaviour. True enough if a rotor were to start from standing still in the vertical descent it would begin to turn backwards and the airflow pattern through it would then fall into the category of “windmilling” which is a completely different thing from “Autorotation”. But if the “Autorotation” has previously been begun in the right direction the rotor will continue to rotate in the same direction even in vertical descent.

It is difficult to describe the principles of Autorotation without going into two or three pages of text and vector diagrams. But one may say that the same type of forces pull the blade forward into rotation as those that enable a sailboat to make headway against the wind. This autorotation characteristic means that the Aircraft can not “stall” or “spin” it can hover indefinitely in a 15mph headwind and even in still air forward speed can be reduced to zero and the aircraft is allowed to descend vertically. The speed range of the latest Aircraft is as low as 15mph in level flight, up to 90mph with a cruise of 70mph and can be flown in wind conditions of up to 40mph. Take off run in still air with a good pre-rotator can be as little as 80ft. or in windy conditions down to l0ft. with landing runs of 30 to 0ft.Rate of climb with my latest Rotax 582 powered Autogyro is over l000 ft per min

Are they difficult to fly? No with proper training they are no more difficult or easier to fly than a conventional fixed wing aircraft. The controls are the same as a conventional fixed wing Aircraft ie. Joystick and rudder, but having said that a fixed wing pilot should not expect to be able to strap himself in and fly off without at least 10 hrs. of conversion training for his PPL-G. When this instruction is done properly the pilot will realise that the Autogyro is one of the safest forms of flying there is, as, in the event of engine failure or precautionary landings he can put his Aircraft into an area as small as 30ft. with a landing speed as slow as 7mph.

When I first became interested in Autogyros, I found it very difficult to get the type of information I required in the UK. So I contacted the manufacturers in North Carolina USA And eventually after spending a week at the factory, became the “Benson Aircraft Corporation” Importer and Agent for the UK. And Europe, from 1979 until March 1987 when Dr. Benson retired with his Autogyro Co. closing down.. Engines or the lack of them have been the most significant factor holding back the progress of Autogyros throughout the World. The original “Bensen” Airframe was designed around the McCulloch 4318 AX American Air Force surplus Target Drone Engine, which despite having a good power to weight ratio, was prone to overheating problems and proved to be very unreliable. It was not a question of if your engine was going to seize but more a question of when. In the UK. and Europe most Autogyros were fitted with the type 3 Volkswagen 1600cc car engine modified for the purpose by changing the carburation, magneto, camshaft and usually fitted with larger cylinders and modified cylinder heads to increase the capacity to 1835cc. This engine was twice the weight of the McCulloch but, even though much more reliable, they still bad a slight overheating problem and were very noisy.

With these problems in mind I decided some years ago to carry out my own R. & D. work to find a more suitable engine. After studying many types like the Subaru, Mazda twin rotary and various air cooled two strokes, I finally decided on the liquid cooled 64hp Rotax 532 c/w 2.58-1 reduction gearbox driving a 60” dia. three bladed propeller. I designed and built a new Airframe with a taller mast to allow the use of the larger dia. more efficient propeller. Altered the axle position to improve ground handling, manufactured a new engine mount, fitted a canopy with built in fuel tank and modified the horizontal stability. The “Rotax” was matched up to the new Airframe and after many months of ground testing I was issued with a “Permit to Fly” for testing and proving flights.

The results were even better than I had predicted, the rate of climb was twice that of the Volkswagen powered machines. The cruising speed was increased by 10mph, the slow flying speed reduced by 5mph and the liquid cooled Rotax engine temperature was stable and well within the manufacturers recommended range, even on long climbouts at full power. After these first months of testing and proving flights, I then decided that the best way to prove to the sceptic. that this is a safe and reliable Aircraft capable of long cross country flights: was to fly from my base here in Scotland to the Popular Flying Association Rally, which is held annually at Cranfield in Bedfordshire, a trip of over 400 miles. After studying my Aviation maps, I decided that instead of flying direct over land through the various areas of controlled Airspace I would fly from Turnberry in Scotland across to Ireland, from Ireland across to the Isle of Man and then on to England via Wales. So on the afternoon of Friday 3rd July 1987 I set out from Turnberry and successfully completed this journey.

The flight all went according to plan apart from a brief unscheduled precautionary landing at Caldy, South of Liverpool to visually check my fuel contents. Unfortunately my achievements were somewhat overshadowed by Richard Branson, as this was the same day as he arrived off the coast of South West Scotland, after his Transatlantic Balloon Trip. However like him I also managed to pick up a few records of my own on the way. These were:

     1)The first Autogyro to fly from Scotland to Ireland.
     2)The first Autogyro to fly from Ireland to Isle of Man.
     3)The first Autogyro to fly from Isle of Man to Mainland Britain.
     4)The first Autogyro to fly to all 5 Countries in the one day.
     5)World record for the longest Sea Crossing by this class of Aircraft

So we now at last have a British Autogyro costing £6250 (plus VAT, rotor and engine) in kit form, capable of long cross country flights in wind conditions that would ground other forms of Microlight Aircraft