Autogiro

The Pitcairn-Cierva Autogyro. Note the rotor on the top of the aircraft and the propeller at the front of the aircraft.

Credits - Civil Air Patrol

An autogiro is a rotary-wing aircraft that uses a propeller for forward motion and a freely rotating, unmotorized rotor for lift. The Spanish aeronautical engineer Juan de la Cierva invented it in the early 1920s.

The rotor looks like a propeller with three or four very long blades. This rotor mounted is mounted above the fuselage at the top or a vertical shaft. The blades of the rotor spin horizontally around the shaft, making the autogiro resemble a windmill that is lying on its side.

The autogiro differs from the helicopter in that the engine does not continuously move the rotor, as the engine on a helicopter does. The engine is connected to the prerotator and is engaged only before takeoff. The small propeller at the front of the machine is vertical to the fuselage and pulls the autogiro forward as the propeller on an aircraft does. The forward motion causes the rotor to turn automatically.

Like an airplane, the autogiro must move along the ground before lifting off. The engine drives the rotor blades at a high rate of speed before the machine can leave the ground. Once in the air, the rotors are disconnected from the engine. The blades continue to revolve because of the air pressure against the bottom of the blades. These revolutions create sufficient lift to keep the autogiro aloft. This phenomenon is called autorotation.

As the rotor turns, each blade moves forward on one side of the aircraft and backward on the other, thus creating more lift on the advancing side. Cierva joined each blade separately to the hub of the rotor so that each blade could rise automatically to avoid producing too much lift or could fall automatically to avoid producing insufficient lift. An autogiro is difficult to maneuver at low speeds because they use airplane-like controls that were dependant on forward speed to work. Later machines had the wings removed and were controlled by a tilting main rotor. An aircraft that is equipped this way can be directly controlled by varying the pitch or speed of the rotor blades or by tilting the rotors. Thus, it does not need conventional rudders, elevators, or ailerons. No autogiro has ever had a tail rotor.

The autogiro can climb or descend very steeply and descend vertically. However, it cannot climb vertically or hover over one spot like a helicopter.