AHC/WI: autogyros invented before aeroplanes

soundnfury

Banned
As the title says: could the autogyro have been invented before the fixed-wing aircraft? And how would, for instance, WWI, or the interwar airline industry, have been affected if the former, rather than the latter, were in service?

Unlike helicopters, which require high power-to-weight ratios, the autogyro has similar requirements to the fixed-wing aeroplane. It also has simpler controls than either — both pitch and roll simply involve tilting the rotorhead, which (unlike in a helicopter) isn't trying to transmit power at the same time (which also means you don't have torque necessitating a tailrotor). So I think from an engineering point of view an autogyro could have been built in 1903, had anyone known how...
 
I've read that a gyrocopter was proposed in 1794. Why wasn't it built? Ships were propelled by sails and oars but with steam engines, after 1800, they were propelled by paddle wheels. A couple decades later, the Archemedes-inspired screw propeller made an appearance, and proved superior, once they figured out how to make it so. By the time aircraft became propelled by power, the propeller was the chosen method. But propeller technology had not been scientifically quantified despite decades of ship propulsion, so Santos Dumont played by ear, and the Wrights did research, as they had with airfoils. Previous airfoil research had been faulty. So we got a wing that flew, and a propeller which propelled. They did the thinking, and made it real. If you look at early helicopter rotor designs, you might notice that the engineering expertise of the time did not exist to make a vertical rotor. Building a wing was relatively easier. In fact, people were gliding before they flew under power. The dynamics of gyrocopter operation might have been understood by some, but building the hardware to validate that understanding awaited some engineering landmarks yet to come before Kitty Hawk. A gyrocopter is propelled by a propeller, and the Wrights were recognized as building the first scientifically engineered aircraft propeller, just not for a gyrocopter. That was to take another couple of decades, and some failures, before success, using a propeller which was already designed.
 

soundnfury

Banned
I thought you might show up :)
In fact, people were gliding before they flew under power.
Indeed — but gyroplanes can also be glided, or flown as kites (the Fa 330 Bachstelze is a classic example). Wikipedia's rotor kite article mentions a design from 1891. In fact the rotor kite has some advantages, as (if I'm not mistaken) it needs less wind speed than a fixed-wing kite of comparable wing loading. It also lands more safely if the wind drops, being harder to stall.
Is it really so unthinkable that the Wright airscrew and engine (or someone else's; they weren't hugely far ahead of the pack on either count) could have been mated to a gyroglider rather than a regular glider, had a few things gone differently? Of course the POD would have to be well before 1903; there would need to be some heritage of gyrogliding cognate to the Lilienthals and Pilchers of OTL.
 
Top