Human-Powered Helicopter: Straight Up Difficult 5

Read the full story here: http://www.npr.org/2012/10/14/160670295/flight-club-human-powered-helic…

Explore the history of human flight here: http://www.npr.org/2012/10/12/159773795/timeline-the-history-of-human-p…...

It's difficult to build a working four-rotor helicopter that spans 100 feet and only weighs 80 pounds. It's even harder when your engine is a 0.7-horsepower person. But one team of engineering students is trying to do just that.
Produced by
Maggie Starbard
Correspondent
Adam Cole
Senior Editor
Ben De La Cruz
Credit: NPR.org
5 comments

View replies to: Human-Powered Helicopter: Straight Up Difficult

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Scrub
12 years ago
They're over-engineering it. Make it simple and use one rotor with the blades angled @ 32* with a coefficient of 5 squared to the 3rd power and make sure there is a static atmosphere of 55* @ 120ft of altitude. geesh..
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syngltrkmnd
12 years ago
Pretty awesome - I gotta wonder if they could get more power (and hence, lift) to the rotors if the seat position was optimized for each pilot. Watch the last 5 seconds and you see how close the pilot is to the cranks. He could possible put down more watts if he could extend his legs more.