gizmag: Aero Gizmo

Challis Heliplane: simple, cheap and twice as fast as a normal helicopter

Tue, 06 Jan 2009 16:29:36 +1100

Conventional helicopters are incredibly useful vehicles in many short-range scenarios - but their asymmetrical aerodynamics enforce a fairly low terminal speed limit of around 150mph, making them less than ideal for longer-range missions. Tilt-rotor aircraft like the Falx and Osprey, and coaxial 'copters like the Sikorsky X2 are tackling the problem from different angles, but both result in complicated and expensive solutions - which is what makes the new Challis Heliplane concept quite remarkable. Still in early stages, the Challis uses a very simple design to balance the lift forces of a helicopter and bring top speeds of over 300mph into reach. And wait 'til you see this thing accelerate!..

Tags: Aerodynamics, Helicopters, Sikorsky

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Air New Zealand completes biofuel test flight

Fri, 02 Jan 2009 14:58:56 +1100

Air New Zealand has successfully undertaken the world's first commercial aviation test flight using the second-generation biofuel jatropha. A series of key performance tests were conducted at various altitudes during the two hour flight over New Zealand's North Island in which a 50:50 jatropha and Jet A1 fuel blend was used to power one of four Rolls-Royce RB211 engines on the Air New Zealand Boeing 747-400...

Tags: Aviation, Biofuel, Emissions Control, Environmental

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PCADS – from water balloons to a killer app firefighting technology

Tue, 30 Dec 2008 12:35:30 +1100

Man’s engenuity knows no bounds and we are regularly fortunate enough to report on a technological solution that is so clever that it inspires us all to seek inspired responses to difficult problems. Bushfires deliver destruction and terror throughout the world and are often so powerful they defy man’s attempts to control them. In January 2003, Australians watched aghast as a bushfire destroyed 70% of the entire Australian Capital Territory and entered the suburbs of Canberra, the nation’s capital city. When a bushfire needs to be stopped, most countries simply do not have the resources. Until now! The PCADS system was inspired when a boy accurately dropped a water balloon on his father’s head from three stories up. The father contemplated the accuracy of his son’s handiwork and developed an ingenious firefighting technology – the PCADS...

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WhiteKnightTwo completes historic maiden flight

Tue, 23 Dec 2008 12:37:17 +1100

WhiteKnightTwo (WK2), the carrier aircraft that will become the launch platform for Virgin Galactic's sub-orbital spaceline has taken to the skies over California in its maiden test flight. Powered by four Pratt and Whitney PW308A turbofan engines, the mammoth, 140-foot wingspan carbon composite aircraft launched from the Mojave Air and Space Port on Sunday morning and completed an hour long test flight without a hitch...

Tags: Aviation, Space Tourism, Space Travel

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Revised 787 Dreamliner launch schedule announced

Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:04:01 +1100

Citing disruption caused by the recent Machinists' strike along with the need to replace certain fasteners in early production airplanes, Boeing has announced a set-back to the much anticipated first flight of its 787 Dreamliner. The new-generation composite commercial airliner is now scheduled for its first flight in the second quarter of 2009 with first deliveries in Q1 2010. ..

Tags: 787, Boeing

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Finnair's future fleet: flying into the 21st century

Fri, 05 Dec 2008 15:54:15 +1100

To celebrate its 85th anniversary, Finnair has served up a blue-sky vision of what the next 85 years of aviation could hold. Concentrating mainly on potential developments in environmentally friendly technology and lightweight material, the Departure 2093 website lists five aircraft that could grace our sky later this century. ..

Tags: Aeroplanes, Aviation, Design, Environmental, VTOL

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Boeing's new AH-6 light attack/reconnaissance helicopter

Thu, 27 Nov 2008 09:20:46 +1100

November 27, 2008 Boeing recently announced a new rotorcraft program to develop what will be designated as the AH-6 light attack/reconnaissance helicopter. The AH-6 features an Electro-Optical/Infrared forward-looking sight system as well as a mount for weapons that have been qualified on the aircraft, including Hellfire missiles, the M260 seven-shot rocket pod, a machine gun and a mini-gun integrated with a sensor system...

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Student team sets fuel-cell powered flight record

Mon, 24 Nov 2008 18:36:07 +1100

Fuel-cell manufacturer Adaptive Materials and students from the University of Michigan have teamed up to set a new world record for the longest fuel-cell-powered flight of a radio-controlled aerial vehicle. The flight of 10 hours, 15 minutes and four seconds beats the previous mark of just over nine hours set by AeroVironment's Puma UAV earlier this year...

Tags: AeroVironment, Fuel Cell, UAV

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SJ30 breaks light jet speed record from London to Dubai

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 11:39:51 +1100

The London to Dubai route is probably going to see a lot of private business air traffic in the coming years and Emivest Aerospace has used it to showcase the high speed capabilities of its SJ30 Business Jet. The aircraft has set a speed record for its class, flying from London to Dubai in seven hours and seven minutes, including a 41-minute refueling stop in Istanbul. ..

Tags: Aviation, Design, Dubai

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Compact mortar-based launcher developed for small UAVs

Wed, 19 Nov 2008 21:41:29 +1100

November 19, 2008 Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have been the major innovation of modern warfare in the last decade, offering invaluable and unprecedented information about what the enemy is doing. Though US forces currently have 30 unmanned combat air patrols operating 24 hours a day over Iraq and Afghanistan, increasingly, the need for situational awareness on a micro scale is driving technological development of manpackable UAV systems. Now BAE has announced yet another major UAV breakthrough – a compact mortar-based launcher for small Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs)...

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F-35 Lightning II breaks sound barrier

Wed, 19 Nov 2008 08:30:03 +1100

Lockheed Martin has promised that its fifth gen F-35 fighter will allow pilots to “do things that were previously considered impossible, and to think things that were previously unthinkable.” Almost two years after its maiden flight, the F-35 Lightning II has reached another development milestone – supersonic flight. Test pilot Jon Beesley accelerated the F-35 AA-1 to Mach 1.05, with a full internal load of dummy weapons...

Tags: Aviation, Design, Lockheed Martin, Military, Weapons

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Biofuel-powered jet completes transcontinental flight

Thu, 13 Nov 2008 16:53:05 +1100

Following on from its breakthrough flight in October last year, Green Flight International has set another green-aviation record, this time flying a jet across the U.S. using environmentally-friendly Biofuel. Piloted by President and CEO Douglas Rodante and Chief Pilot Carol Sugars, BioJet 1 completed the flight from Reno, Nevada to Leesburg, Florida in just over 11 hours at altitudes ranging from 13,000 to 17,000 feet. While 1,776 miles where flown on 100% Biofuel, a 50/50 mix of Biofuel and standard jet fuel was used for the remainder of the 2,486 journey in order to compare performance data and also demonstrate the ability to blend these fuel types...

Tags: Aviation, Biofuel, Emissions Control, Global Warming

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SpaceX planning DragonLab craft

Thu, 06 Nov 2008 09:37:22 +1100

SpaceX, the company behind the Falcon series of launch vehicles and the Dragon space capsule, is developing a new free-flying, reusable, commercial craft. To be known as DragonLab, it will transport pressurized and unpressurized payloads to and from space, and will launch aboard a Falcon 9 vehicle...

Tags: NASA, Space Travel

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Air New Zealand moves closer to biofuel flight

Mon, 03 Nov 2008 11:15:49 +1100

Air New Zealand, Boeing, Rolls-Royce and UOP aim to power one of four engines on a Boeing 747-400 on Jatropha-based fuel. The first test flight using the environmentally sustainable oil is scheduled to take place in Auckland in December after fuel testing is completed...

Tags: Aviation, Biofuel, Boeing, Environmental

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Coaxial Rotor System: the future of helicopter design?

Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:03:22 +1100

Helicopters featuring coaxial rotor designs are not exactly new. The co-axial design of a pair of rotors mounted on the same mast and with the same axis of rotation, but turning in different directions, has been utilized on a number of military helicopters for around half a century, most notably those produced by the Russian Kamov helicopter design bureau. The coaxial design offers a number of advantages over the traditional helicopter designs, which makes it difficult to understand why we haven’t seen co-axial rotor designs taking to the skies for civilian uses. Now Australian based Wieland Helicopter Technologies (WHT) is hoping to change that by designing and manufacturing a range of new coaxial rotor system small format helicopters for commercial markets...

Tags: Aerodynamics, Australia, Helicopters

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India launches first lunar mission

Mon, 27 Oct 2008 12:32:32 +1100

The Indian Space Research Organisation has successfully launched Chandrayaan-1, the country’s first scientific mission to the moon. The two-year, USD$80 million mission will see the PSLV-C11 rocket enter lunar orbit in roughly two weeks, before descending to a final 100 km-high circular orbit. The Moon Impact Probe will land on the lunar surface, while the orbiter will continue gathering data with 11 scientific instruments. ..

Tags: ESA, Satellite, Space Travel

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NASA launches Interstellar Boundary Explorer

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 09:41:51 +1000

NASA has launched the Interstellar Boundary Explorer, which will observe the edge of our solar system from a 200,000-mile Earth orbit and determine whether or not we’re... err, doomed. Over the next two years, the 23-inch high octagonal craft will study the area of space where solar wind hits the wider galaxy – hopefully it will also find out why the solar wind, which shields us from harmful cosmic rays, has decreased by 25% in the last ten years...

Tags: Image, NASA, Satellite, Solar

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Autonomous unmanned helicopters designed for disaster relief

Thu, 16 Oct 2008 21:35:46 +1000

European researchers are developing a squadron of co-operating, unmanned helicopters for use in disaster management, civil security, and filmmaking. In addition to ferrying critical supplies, the helicopters can deploy sensor nodes to gather information and establish a communications network in places where the infrastructure is damaged or absent. ..

Tags: Communications, Helicopters, Network, UAV

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Zeppelin Airship travel makes U.S. comeback

Wed, 15 Oct 2008 10:23:01 +1000

Starting this month, Airship Ventures is offering tourists the chance to travel aboard a 246-foot long, semi-rigid Zeppelin NT – the first giant Zeppelin to grace the skies of the US since the Hindenburg tragically caught fire more than 70 years ago. Passengers can enjoy birds-eye views of the San Francisco Bay, Silicon Valley, Sonoma/Napa wine regions, and the Monterey/Big Sur coastline...

Tags: Airship, Aviation

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Richard Garriott enters private astronaut club

Tue, 14 Oct 2008 19:43:35 +1000

Millionaire video game designer Richard Garriott has made history by becoming the world’s first second-generation American astronaut to set off into outer space. Unlike his NASA astronaut father, Owen Garriott, Richard has made his journey courtesy of space tourism provider, Space Adventures...

Tags: NASA, Space Tourism, Tourism

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Sky Warrior unmanned aircraft demonstrates automatic takeoff and landing

Mon, 13 Oct 2008 16:04:20 +1000

General Atomics' Sky Warrior unmanned aircraft system (UAS) has for the first time demonstrated automatic takeoff and landing capabilities under control of the Extended Range/Multi-Purpose (ER/MP) One System® Ground Control Station (OSGCS). Three landings and three takeoffs took place during August and September at the El Mirage Flight Operations Center in Adelanto, California and represent another milestone for the system which is due to be fielded in mid 2009...

Tags: Aviation, UAV

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Pterodactyl-based UAV design for urban combat scenarios

Wed, 08 Oct 2008 09:29:00 +1000

Scientists have designed a highly-maneuverable UAV modeled on a 228-million-year-old pterodactyl. The 30-inch robotic craft would alter its wing shape to “squeeze through confined spaces, dive between buildings, travel under overpasses, land on apartment balconies, and sail along the coastline.”..

Tags: Aviation, Design, Military, Robot, Surveillance, UAV

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Historic WWII Ford airplane to go under the hammer

Fri, 03 Oct 2008 11:08:49 +1000

This rare 1929 Ford 4-AT-E Tri-Motor airplane is set to be auctioned in a No Reserve sale by the Barrett-Jackson Auction Company in January 2009. Recently restored to its original specifications, the plane has a fascinating history, having survived bullet fire during the World War II attack at Pearl Harbor. ..

Tags: Aviation, Ford, History, Military

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Historic Moller flying car prototype up for sale

Thu, 02 Oct 2008 15:06:14 +1000

Moller International is selling its Jetson-like M200X 2-passenger VTOL prototype on eBay. Although it's a long way from the latest designs to rise from the Moller drawing-board like the hybrid flying car, the M200X is a significant piece of aviation history, having completed over 200 manned and unmanned flight demonstrations since 1989...

Tags: Aviation, Moller, VTOL

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SpaceX successfully launches Falcon 1 into orbit

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 12:48:58 +1000

With the Space Shuttle scheduled to retire in 2010, alternative transport vessels will need to be developed to keep the International Space Station manned, and to keep options open for possible manned lunar missions. After three failed attempts, the SpaceX Falcon 1 has successfully achieved Earth orbit – the first privately developed liquid fuel rocket to do so. ..

Tags: NASA, Space Travel, Transport

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