A vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft is one that can take off and land vertically without relying on a runway. This classification can include a variety of types of aircraft including helicopters as well as thrust-vectoring fixed-wing aircraft and other hybrid aircraft with powered rotors such as cyclogyros/cyclocopters and gyrodynes.
An autogyro, or gyroplane, is a class of rotorcraft that uses an unpowered rotor in free autorotation to develop lift. While similar to a helicopter rotor in appearance, the autogyro's unpowered rotor disc must have air flowing upward across it to make it rotate.
The CarterCopter is an experimental compound autogyro developed by Carter Aviation Technologies in the United States to demonstrate slowed rotor technology. On 17 June 2005, the CarterCopter became the first rotorcraft to achieve mu-1 (μ=1), an equal ratio of airspeed to rotor tip speed, but crashed on the next flight and has been inoperable since. It is being replaced by the Carter Personal Air Vehicle.
The Fairey Rotodyne was a 1950s British compound gyroplane designed and built by Fairey Aviation and intended for commercial and military uses. A development of the earlier Fairey Jet Gyrodyne, which had established a world helicopter speed record, the Rotodyne featured a tip-jet-powered rotor that burned a mixture of fuel and compressed air bled from two wing-mounted Napier Eland turboprops. The rotor was driven for vertical takeoffs, landings and hovering, as well as low-speed translational flight, but autorotated during cruise flight with all engine power applied to two propellers.
The tail rotor is a smaller rotor mounted vertically or near-vertically at the tail of a traditional single-rotor helicopter, where it rotates to generate a propeller-like horizontal thrust in the same direction as the main rotor's rotation. The tail rotor's position and distance from the helicopter's center of mass allow it to develop enough thrust leverage to counter the reactional torque exerted on the fuselage by the spinning of the main rotor. Without the tail rotor or other anti-torque mechanisms, the helicopter would be constantly spinning in the opposite direction of the main rotor when flying.
The Flettner 184 was a German night reconnaissance and anti-submarine autogyro developed during the 1930s.
A tip jet is a jet nozzle at the tip of some helicopter rotor blades, used to spin the rotor, much like a Catherine wheel firework. Tip jets replace the normal shaft drive and have the advantage of placing no torque on the airframe, thus not requiring the presence of a tail rotor. Some simple monocopters are composed of nothing but a single blade with a tip rocket.
A gyrodyne is a type of VTOL aircraft with a helicopter rotor-like system that is driven by its engine for takeoff and landing only, and includes one or more conventional propeller or jet engines to provide forward thrust during cruising flight. During forward flight the rotor is unpowered and free-spinning, like an autogyro, and lift is provided by a combination of the rotor and conventional wings. The gyrodyne is one of a number of similar concepts which attempt to combine helicopter-like low-speed performance with conventional fixed-wing high-speeds, including tiltrotors and tiltwings.
A rotorcraft or rotary-wing aircraft is a heavier-than-air aircraft with rotary wings or rotor blades, which generate lift by rotating around a vertical mast. Several rotor blades mounted on a single mast are referred to as a rotor. The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) defines a rotorcraft as "supported in flight by the reactions of the air on one or more rotors".
The Alvis Leonides is a British air-cooled nine-cylinder radial aero engine first developed by Alvis Car and Engineering Company in 1936.
The Napier Eland is a British turboshaft or turboprop gas-turbine engine built by Napier & Son in the early 1950s. Production of the Eland ceased in 1961 when the Napier company was taken over by Rolls-Royce.
The Fairey FB-1 Gyrodyne is an experimental British rotorcraft that used single lifting rotor and a tractor propeller mounted on the tip of the starboard stub wing to provide both propulsion and anti-torque reaction.
The Flettner Fl 185 was an experimental German gyrodyne developed by Anton Flettner, a machine which could fly both as a helicopter and as a gyroplane.
The Pitcairn PCA-2 was an autogyro developed in the United States in the early 1930s. It was Harold F. Pitcairn's first autogyro design to be sold in quantity. It had a conventional design for its day – an airplane-like fuselage with two open cockpits in tandem, and an engine mounted tractor-fashion in the nose. The lift by the four-blade main rotor was augmented by stubby, low-set monoplane wings that also carried the control surfaces. The wingtips featured considerable dihedral that acted as winglets for added stability.
The slowed rotor principle is used in the design of some helicopters. On a conventional helicopter the rotational speed of the rotor is constant; reducing it at lower flight speeds can reduce fuel consumption and enable the aircraft to fly more economically. In the compound helicopter and related aircraft configurations such as the gyrodyne and winged autogyro, reducing the rotational speed of the rotor and offloading part of its lift to a fixed wing reduces drag, enabling the aircraft to fly faster.
The SNCASO SO.1310 Farfadet was an experimental French convertiplane of the 1950s.
The Avian 2/180 Gyroplane was a two-seat, single-engine autogyro built in Canada in the 1960s. Several prototypes were built but production was not achieved.
Skyworks Aeronautics Corp., formerly Groen Brothers Aviation, Inc., Groen Aeronautics Corporation and Skyworks Global, is an American autogyro research and development company based in Chicago. The company was founded in 1986 by David Groen and his late brother Jay Groen in Salt Lake City, Utah. David Groen remains as Senior Advisor.
The Calumet Snobird Explorer was an American autogyro designed and produced by Calumet Motorsports of Lansing, Illinois, introduced in May 1997. Now out of production, when it was available, the aircraft was supplied as a kit for amateur construction.
The Kayaba Heliplane Type-1 was a gyrodyne designed by Shiro Kayaba and prototyped by Kayaba Industry in Japan during the early 1950s.
