Camera attached to Helicopter rotor blade

[Olham 164]

You are looking along one helicopter blade - every full turn you see the rear rotor.

The speaker explains, that the elastic movements of the blade absorb the vorticity forces,

which would otherwise destroy the helicopter.

 

Edited December 8, 2010 by Olham

[DWCAce 19]

That's nuts...

[Olham 164]

Yeah, and it happens thousands of times during one flight! I wonder what they are made of?

[nbryant 8]

Remember seeing that many moons ago. I still find myself amazed when I watch it and I have over 2100 hours crewing/flying in helicopters.

[BirdDogICT 3]

Remember seeing that many moons ago. I still find myself amazed when I watch it and I have over 2100 hours crewing/flying in helicopters.

The blades are usually made of fiber-reinforced resin, which may be adhesively bonded with an external sheet metal layer to protect edges. I remember back around 1968, in my teens, my Dad was loaned from Boeing Wichita to Boeing Vertol in Philadelphia and brought home a sample of the internals of a helicopter blade he was working on...the core looked like very hard rubber, but was flexible, and the blade was made by layering material around the core. The materials are a lot more sophisticated now, but the basic process is the same.

 

Knowing how flimsy the rotors were always made me a little nervous riding in choppers during the 10 years I was part of an air ambulance crew. Really hated flying in icy weather thanks to no de-icing on the rotors. And our pilots flew for days with the chip light on. I was lucky, though, and was in only a couple of near crashes. All of my old flight buddies are nearly deaf thanks to the cabin noise and constant sirens when on the ground. But I have a lot of great memories from those days.

Edited December 9, 2010 by BirdDogICT

[Cameljockey 3]

Flingwings! Bah!

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdFBCQAxMgw

 

[Olham 164]

Good it was only a remote-controlled test crash.

[Slartibartfast 153]

bah Helicopters 25000 nuts and bolts flying in the same direction... never trust em have been up in plenty though and one of them was the first time I actually slept in one

 

Just a note the 50000 nuts and bolts flying together in Formation is the Avro Shackleton ASW/AEW plane noisy as hell with those 4 Griffon Engines running together...

[Mr_Dirt 1]

UncleAl will probably know this, but I have read that chopper pilots in Viet Nam would go into landing zones so small they would break the tops out of small trees. They said it sounded like small explosions. Those blades are pretty tough. My hat is off to UncleAl and all who flew into battle in these insane flying machine. Hts off to Birddog and the people who save lives flying them also. My wife is a nurse who has flown transporting patients on them. I always worried, but she said I.m saving a life.

[Olham 164]

UncleAl has been flying helicopters? Didn't know that - wow, hats off indeed!

[Mr_Dirt 1]

No Olham I believe he was a door gunner in Viet Nam so he has flown on the Huey's I was talking about.

[Olham 164]

Thank you for the info - the helicopter boys were often quite close to the sh*t there.

[Davy TASB 0]

After watching those vids, I have decided that I am never going up in a "ollycepter."

[nbryant 8]

The blades are usually made of fiber-reinforced resin, which may be adhesively bonded with an external sheet metal layer to protect edges. I remember back around 1968, in my teens, my Dad was loaned from Boeing Wichita to Boeing Vertol in Philadelphia and brought home a sample of the internals of a helicopter blade he was working on...the core looked like very hard rubber, but was flexible, and the blade was made by layering material around the core. The materials are a lot more sophisticated now, but the basic process is the same.

 

Knowing how flimsy the rotors were always made me a little nervous riding in choppers during the 10 years I was part of an air ambulance crew. Really hated flying in icy weather thanks to no de-icing on the rotors. And our pilots flew for days with the chip light on. I was lucky, though, and was in only a couple of near crashes. All of my old flight buddies are nearly deaf thanks to the cabin noise and constant sirens when on the ground. But I have a lot of great memories from those days.

 

 

My first expereince was on a tandem rotor CH-46 with "metal" blades. Formed pockets bonded to the spar. Can remember many a day using "blade" tape to make repairs on board ship when blade pockets would separate. Soon they were replaced with fiberglass blades. Stronger, more durable. Today with the proliferation of composites blade technology has come a long way.