OSH14: Monday July 28 - Day One Starts Big And Beautiful! (10 Pix)

The amazing Gee Bee QED replica taxiing in from its OSH14 arrival this morning

click any pic to enlarge

 It was a great opening day at OSH14... the weather was very nice and there were airplanes and people all over the place. I made a couple runs thru much of the grounds and found lots of interesting to take pictures of. The following are some of those pix with simple captions captions. I hope you enjoy!

Rich Alldredge: QED pilot and project leader (after the passing of originator Jim Moss)

A very unique view of a very unique airplane!

As you can see, the Gee Bee QED is a really big airplane!

The cockpit of the big Gee Bee beast

Cessna 170's and other classics in the Vintage parking/camping

The one-week-wonder Zenith project begins on day number 1

A busy build team and lots of observers of the Zenith CH750 quick build project

I'll try to post some updated pix of the project each day

It was my first chance to see a V-22 Osprey fly... I was impressed!

More pix and a little info tomorrow.

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Video: Killer Drones - The Future Of Crop Dusting?

 The idea of killer drones is fine with me if they're all about killing insects that hurt crops. In fact, I'd say that the idea of using Quadcopter-style drones for crop dusting is probably the most logical and viable use for these unusual flying machines.

Video screenshot: view from above a crop dusting quadcopter

 The video above shows a quad from the people at armcopters.com demonstrating an electric powered drone with a nice spray rig installed. Their website says they have systems with 22 and 66 pound payload capacities, tho I don't see them available for purchase at the moment. You might think that payload impractical as a crop duster, but the ability to more accurately target the crops, and do so from a much lower altitude greatly reduces the amount of chemical required to be dispensed to be effective. Even more, the powerful downwash from the rotors helps drive that chemical deeper into the crops where it'll be even more effective.

Video screenshot: underneath view of the crop dusting quadcopter

 While we continue to see electric drone capabilities improve rapidly, their time aloft is often still relatively limited due to battery capacity. That's where an idea like the gas-powered collective pitch quad concept from Curtis Youngblood might be perfectly suited to applications needing higher payloads and much longer durations. 

 Without a doubt, the future of the drone in this world is a sticky wicket, but I gotta say I like 'em as crop dusters!

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Superior Pilots: Trimming Trees From A Helicopter! (Video)

 The first time I viewed a video of a huge 10-blade vertical saw suspended from a helicopter and cutting tree limbs near large power lines was shortly after I launched AirPigz back in 2008. It was crazy and amazing to me back then, an there's no surprise that it remains that way to me still today. It's just much more relevant to me today since I've recently trimmed and cut down some large trees in my neighborhood using a chainsaw. I did not, however, use a helicopter!

 I did use a 60' boom lift tho, which I found to be incredibly enjoyable work (which oddly might lead to a career change here very soon), but it's slow and tedious work even with the lift. I felled an 85' Maple tree that had lots of branches hanging over two houses... hours were spent cutting off limbs from the lift before I could take the saw to the trunk. I can easily understand the massive amount of man-hours and equipment traditionally required to trim trees along a powerline path. The helicopter and the horror-movie-like vertical saw definitely makes quick work of the difficult task of tree trimming! I'm confident however that the pilot would say it's still very tedious from his point of view!

 That's the reason I'm sharing this video, to call attention to the skill and focus these pilots have. Honestly, I'd lean toward calling them crazy if it wasn't for the fact that I've seen lots of videos of this kind of work being done and it always seems to work out just fine. With the right pilot and the proper equipment, it appears to be a completely safe method of tree trimming.

 One of these days I hope to be able to chat with a pilot who has done this and get a better idea of just how challenging it is... and then after that I need to find one of the guys that flies the line-checking helicopters like the one in the video below. Those guys are ARE crazy, even if it seems to work out just fine on a regular basis as well.

 Let's also have a little hat tip to the Hughes 500 since it seems to be the dangerzone helicopter of choice!

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Video: 'Amazon Prime Air' Makes A Fabulous Publicity Stunt For Cyber Monday

 I could be wrong, but Amazon Prime Air looks like nothing more than a very effective publicity stunt to me. The video above has received over 2 million views in well under 24 hours... and it just happens to be Cyber Monday, hmm. If you were in the retail sales biz, offering a massive inventory via the great big interwebs, wouldn't you love to have half the country chatting you up right now? Of course you would.

 Jeff Bezos might be serious about using octocopters (small unmanned electric drones) to deliver five-pound-and-under items directly to people's homes, but I honestly don't wanna see it happen. Ever. I think it's a bad idea.

 In a perfect world they would be great, but this world is far from perfect. Aside from all of the possible mechanical and electrical failure possibilities (which lead to an autonomous 10 pound object falling completely uncontrolled from the sky) the real issue here all about people trying to shoot them out of the air just for fun. And far worse than the 10 pound uncontrolled object falling from the sky that they hit with their favorite rifle, consider the 10 bullets they shot that missed their target... but found your head while you were mowing the backyard half a mile away.

 I say bad, bad, idea... but great publicity stunt. Btw, I love Amazon Prime, let's just keep the Air out of it, ok?!

Video screenshot of the 'Amazon Prime Air' drone concept delivering a small package

Poll: Awesome Or Ugly? The Late 1950's Fairey Rotodyne

The higly unconventional late 1950's Fairey Rotodyne - vote now: Awesome or Ugly?

 The first ever Awesome or Ugly poll with the 1931 Vickers Type 161 was a rather great success, both for the poll in general and for the Type 161... with about 200 votes, that really interesting 1931 pusher biplane snagged an 'awesome' score of almost 87%. Quite an impressive performance for such an unusual looking flying machine! However, I did have a few voters suggest a third option of both 'awesome and ugly', so you'll note that this new poll centered on the late 1950's Fairey Rotodyne gyroplane includes all three options for you. (poll below video)

 Like the first poll, this one is easy for me - the Fairey Rotodyne is pure AWESOME! The tip-jet powered rotor meant that this big boy could make vertical takeoffs without the need for a tailrotor and then that rotor autorotated in cruise flight, using the twin 2,800 shp turboprops and the small wing to push forward cruising to speed to about 175 mph. With a cabin capacity of 40 passengers, the Rotodyne was big enough to offer some serious practicality potential. However, those tip-jets were extreme loud during the few minutes they were used during takeoff and landing which seems to have led the program to cancellation even tho the aircraft performed amazingly well. Watch the video below, and then cast your vote in the second Awesome or Ugly Poll!

Video: MV-22 Osprey Full Demo At Andrews AFB May 20, 2012

 I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure all the people trash talking about the Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey are people who have never designed, engineered and built a machine that can do something no other machine can. When those people accomplish something as full-force awesome as the Osprey, then maybe I'll listen to them. Til then, I'm gonna simply be blown away by what the Osprey can do. When you consider that this aircraft represents the only truly viable tiltrotor to be produced, and that it also has the weight and complexity penalty of massive system redundancy and the ability to fold itself up for storage, it's amazing it can even get off the ground. But it does way more than that! I know it's very expensive and there have been some tragic accidents, but that's the world of military aircraft... always has been.

Video screenshot showing the MV-22 in fast forward flight mode. Awesome!

 
 This excellent video is from the airshowfansh youtube channel and it provides the full MV-22 demo as seen at the Joint Services Open House at Andrews Air Force Base back on May 20, 2012. You get a great view of the entire demo along with very good audio of Rob Reider's announcing and interviews with servicemen related to Osprey operations. Of course they don't get very technical but it's still interesting to hear the commentary. I'm a fan of the V-22 Osprey and the people who have taken the tiltrotor concept and finally put it into operational reality. It's an impressive and amazing accomplishment to which I say: Bravo!

Screenshot of the MV-22 in vertical flight mode during the extensive flight demonstration

Video: PAL-V Flying Car Kinda Motorcycle Gyrocopter Thingy Flies!

 I'm willing to go on record saying that I just don't think the idea of having a car that can fly is a really great idea. My biggest issue relates to the fact that flying machines are lightweight... and lightweight flying machines that can be driven on the road (where pot-holes can do serious structural damage), and can be parked with cars driven by reckless human beings (where all kinds of damage can occur) are just too much at risk for having their airworthiness compromised. The worst case scenario is when damage occurs but remains undetected.

Video screenshot of the Dutch PAL-V roadable gyrocopter which has now flown
 

 But there remains a significant desire among many to see the car and the airplane produce some sort of hybrid offspring. The PAL-V flying car project designed and built by the Dutch company PAL-V Europe NV has recently made its first flight as the video above shows. I'll admit that the overall setup here looks pretty sweet and very well executed, but I'll stand by my love for flying machines that only do their wheel rolling on an airport : )

Swanky Video Of A Swanky Eurocopter (EC130 T2)

 Great flying machines and great video go very well together, and that's what you'll see right here (if you're the impatient type, skip the first 20 seconds) - Eurocopter recently unveiled the EC130 T2, a significant update to their popular EC130 helicopter. With a capacity of 1 pilot and up to 7 passengers in the wide cabin, a horsepower upgrade to 952 shp, and extremely quiet operation, the EC130 T2 is perfectly suited to aerial tour operators. That large cabin is also excellent for air ambulance work as well.

 Maverick Helicopters has ordered 50 of the EC130 T2, and Eurocopter expects to begin deliveries to customers of the updated helicopter later in 2012. Based on both the look and the performance shown in the video, this is one hot whirlybird!

 Screenshot from the video of the Eurocopter EC130 T2 having some fun

Video: Scratch Built Electric RC Autogyro = Fun, Fun, Fun!

Super simple electric RC autogyro - screenshot from the video below

 I admit that I've never been the biggest fan of gyrocopters, but old-time autogyros (or autogiro's) like the 1930's Pitcairn make me tingle as much as any flying machine I've ever seen... so it's no surprise that I really enjoyed seeing this scratch built autogyro from Gary Jones, the man behind ultra cool RC aircraft like the 5.4 pound, 10 foot wingspan C-47and the VTOL Dark Deltoid.

 Not only does this simple little rotary wing flyer with the tractor mounted electric motor fly great, but as usual, Gary's video is very well done too. His secret on the video is a camera mounted on a baseball cap. That way, all he has to do is keep his head pointed at the aircraft to give us a smooth track thru the air. This works much better than trying to have someone who doesn't know where the airplane is headed running the cam. And, these very light weight models also make it safe to fly them very close by so that they fill the frame. It's these great views of slow flying machines that really capture the magic of flight. And listen closely when the autogyro gets really close the the camera... you can hear that awesome 'whirlybirds' rotor sound! I love this stuff!

 If you watch the way Gary flies, you'll also see a pure love for the simple art of steering a flying machine thru an ocean of air. So, if flying is just a job to you, or a means to move you or some stuff from point A to point B, I encourage you to watch a video like this closely and see what it really means to Love To Fly : )

 Here's the simple HatCam that makes these sweet videos possible

Heaven On Earth: 2011 Oshkosh Video Recap From 'Slick'

 Youtuber slickhutto has just completed his 2011 Oshkosh recap video. He's got skills, so you're sure to enjoy this look back at the greatest aviation event in the world. If you haven't seen his past work, check out Video: Oshkosh 2010 Recap Music Video - Wow! (Hot Stuff)

 And goodness sake, if you weren't at OSH11, will you please start making serious plans right now to work this amazing, inspiring, and satisfying extravaganza-of-the-skies into your summer 2012 plans. No more excuses! OSH12: July 23-29