Cool Videos of a Kellet gyros

[GrantR]

I saw this on the r/c gyrocopter website. I tried to save and put on youtube but I couldnt get it to work.

Anyway just goto the website http://www.autogyro-rc.com/

And scroll all the way down and you will see:
View this old archive clip and learn more about Autorotational Flight:

And click how they fly.

I did get this one on youtube. http://youtube.com/watch?v=UBVPG0XLbv0

Notice he says the blades turn at only 130 rpms in flight! WOW

[Timchick]

Excellent video. Here's a direct link to the video.

http://www.autogyro-rc.com/user/Kellett_1.wmv

[GrantR]

The performance on that gyro is amazing! I am really impressed with the deadstick vertical decent rate. its like a feather. And the take off rolls are short.

Why are the modern gyro not like that? Higher disk loading?

This one appears to have a fixed rotor as well.

Here is the Pitcairn video. No wings!

http://www.autogyro-rc.com/user/Pitcairn%20PA%2022.WMV

[Timchick]

Grant,
The first video of the kellet has a fixed rotor head. The elevator and aerlerons on the short wings controlled it. I think the video said that was in a 20 knot wind.

[dragonflyerthom]

Grant

It appeared he had a hard landing in the Pitcairn with no wings. Interesting tho.

[JPHarrison]

The Kellett archives auction I won back in December included 60 movies which I have just had digitized. Footage includes:

1. C.6 flights at Farnborough.
2. C.8L2 flight across the English Channel and start of Cierva's first European tour.
3. C.30A takeoffs/landings, airborne package pickup
4. K-3 takeoffs/landings.
5. PCA-2 takeoffs/landings.
6. Hafner AR.3 gyroplane operations.
7. USAAC KD-1 operations.
8. USAAC XO-60 operations.
9. XR-8 development, testing and operations.
10. XH-10 development, testing and operations.
11. Stable Mable testing.
12. Testing of Kellett-modified rotor system on Piasecki HRP-1.

etc., etc., etc.

Will advise when this material is available to the public.

[Timchick]

Jean-Pierre, Will you be selling copies of those videos?

[JPHarrison]

Among my multitude of other projects, the idea is make available the video in raw form, and also edited into a coherent narrative of the Autogiro. I have also started cataloging the 30 or so boxes of Kellett reports, photographs, etc. with the idea of digitizing them and making them available also.

My biggest challenge in speeding this along is finding assistance that is knowledgeable enough about Kellett Autogiros so I don't end up answering endless questions about how to catalogue or categorize a particular item.

As a side note, I recently discovered that Piasecki Aircraft in Essington, PA, has a large archive of Kellett Autogiro Company documents.