Flapper Project
Posted on 07/09/2006 12:00:46 PM PDT by oxcart
For an aeronautical engineer it was the perfect day and a perfect end to a quest that has consumed his life for more than 30 years.
Yesterday Dr. James DeLaurier, an aeronautical engineer and professor emeritus at the University of Toronto's Institute for Aerospace Studies, fulfilled a lifelong dream, seeing his manned mechanical flapping-wing airplane, or ornithopter, fly — a dream first imagined by Leonardo da Vinci.
And with the successful flight DeLaurier has been lucky enough to touch what many describe as the Holy Grail of aeronautical design, achieving a place for himself, his team of volunteers and students in aviation history.
The flapper, as it's affectionately known, sustained flight over about a third of a kilometre for 14 seconds at about 10:20 a.m. before being hit by a crosswind and almost flipping over, damaging the nose and front wheel on the runway at Downsview Park.
But the flight was long enough to prove DeLaurier's mechanical flapping-wing design for a manned, jet-boosted aircraft works. The successful test flight was longer than the first powered flight by aviation pioneers the Wright brothers in December 1903 that lasted 12 seconds over a windswept beach in North Carolina. Beating that record was enough for DeLaurier.
"It is a perfect day," he said after the flight. "If I have the big one now, I'll die happy."
After four attempts at getting the ornithopter in the air, the fifth brought glory. The ornithopter, which looks like a cross between an old-fashioned plane and a Canada goose, took off and flew about two metres in the air. DeLaurier whooped and hollered from a truck by the side of the runway, watching it with complete wonder and joy.
"You did it man," he told pilot Jack Sanderson. "You've made an old professor really happy," DeLaurier said as he hugged him, choking back tears. "You've made aviation history." Then DeLaurier matter-of-factly walked down the runway to find a wing tip that broke off during the hard landing.
The team walked the ornithopter quietly down the runway to the hangar.
Like many aeronautical engineers and scientists before him, DeLaurier has long puzzled over the idea of mechanical flapping-wing flight. Indeed, the search for a perfect flapping-wing airplane is, for aeronautical engineers, like mathematicians' quest to solve Fermat's Last Theorem — fuelled by an insatiable hunger for knowledge.
"I hadn't planned on this taking most of my career, but I don't regret it," said DeLaurier. "It has been exciting and interesting. Also it's been a worthy project, a worthy quest. You know that age-old saying: `What's the meaning of life?' Quite frankly, life has meaning if you measure yourself against a worthy goal. And for an aerospace engineer — who loves aviation history — this has been a worthy goal."
Humanity has always been fascinated by the idea of man flying like a bird. The Greeks told mythic tales about Daedalus and Icarus who fled the Labyrinth on wings of wax and feathers. Da Vinci was so fascinated with the idea he conceived an elaborate plan for an ornithopter — a design that, DeLaurier said, would never fly because the materials would be too heavy.
And so DeLaurier was moved to build what many have thought impossible — a manned engine-powered, flapping-wing airplane that would take off unaided. As a teenager DeLaurier was consumed with that dream, playing with rubber band-model ornithopters that he made out of balsa wood. But he didn't get serious about the quest until 1973 when he met Jeremy Harris, a principal researcher and colleague at Battelle Memorial Institute in Columbus, Ohio. The two became inseparable, working on the ornithopter.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- `You did it man. You've made an old professor really happy. You've made aviation history'
Ornithopter developer
James DeLaurier
to test pilot Jack Sanderson
In the novels of the Dune series by Frank Herbert orinthopters were the primary method of atmospheric transport.
I hope there was video made and that it gets posted somewhere.
Ohhhhhh....I haven't read Dune since (mumble mumble mumble)....
Looking now.
The bishop's boys, Wilbur and Orville, spent somewhat less that $1,000 of their own money.
The privatization of space transport could, I believe, lead to a new golden age.
I guess the feather boa helps.
I guess there was some tasty bird seed on the runway?
Thank You...I wish I could do that!
There is just something about those "Ohio" boys and "toys".
LOL, drenched my key board!
I just love inventors who get fixated on something like this. The world would be a much less interesting place without people like this working on an impractical dream for 30 years. More power to them!
LQ
Yes, they make it interesting, but when they make things like this the Darwin Award comes into play.
The same is true of any helicopter. Especially the Piaseki/Vertrol/Boeing design, but also the Kaman, both basic types have overlaping main rotors, which can "become entangled". Not that the single main rotor w/anti torque tail rotor type is without it's problems as well. This actually looks a bit simpler than most helicopters.
LOL - the Chinook - only aircraft capable of having a collision with itself...
I happened to glance at the book while browsing at Barnes & Noble and I couldn't put it down.
Off topic, but is Langley field in Virginia named after Samuel Pierpont Langley?
Oh, very cool. Surely not practical right now, but still interesting. Who knows where it'll lead?
More shots here.
Well ... it worked when I previewed it.
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