Fairey Jet Gyrodyne

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Fairey Jet Gyrodyne
Type	Gyrodyne
Manufacturer	Fairey Aviation
Maiden flight	January 1954 (free flight) 1955-03-01 (transition flight)
Retired	1961
Number built	1

The Fairey Jet Gyrodyne was a British experimental gyrodyne aircraft, a form of compound helicopter related to autogyros, built by Fairey Aviation.

The Jet Gyrodyne was a conversion of one of the earlier Fairey Gyrodyne aircraft, building on the lessons learnt from that design.

The appearance of the Jet Gyrodyne is part way between a small aeroplane and a helicopter. A helicopter type cabin is the front of the aircraft. The engine, an Alvis Leonides 9 cylinder radial, is in the middle of the fuselage. Above the engine is a two bladed rotor. There is a simple tailplane with no tail rotor as might be expected on a helicopter. Two short wings carry rear facing wingtip propellors and also the main wheels of the tricyle undercarriage.

The engine performs two functions; the first is to power, through gearboxes, the two wingtip propellors, the second is to drive two superchargers (taken from Rolls-Royce Merlin engines) whose output goes up through the rotor blades and exhausts through jets at the tips of the rotors. At the jets the compressed air is mixed with fuel and burnt to give more power. As this means of powering the rotor gave no reaction torque, a separate tail rotor was not needed. The rotor jets could be used to power the rotor for vertical takeoff and landing and for the rest of the time, the rotor would autorotate like an autogyro giving lift but not needing power while the forward drive came from the wingtip propellors.

The Jet Gyrodyne (serial XJ389 and G-AJJP) on loan from the RAF Museum collection is preserved at the Museum of Berkshire Aviation.

[edit] Specification

Data from British Aircraft Director^[1]

General characteristics

Crew:
Length: 25 ft (7.6 m)
Rotor diameter: 51 ft 9 in (15.8 m)
Height: 10 ft 2 in (3.10 m)
Disc area: ft² (m²)
Empty weight: 3,600 lb (1,600 kg)
Loaded weight: 4,800 lb (2,200 kg)
Powerplant:
- 2× wingtip compressed air/fuel burning, lbf (kN) each
- 1× Alvis Leonides 9-cylinder radial engine, hp (kW)
  - Propellers: 3-bladed propeller, 2 per engine