Evening star., 1909-07-17
HEuOCOPTER CAN FLY
But Problem of Descent, if
Engines Give Out, Serious.
PARACHUTE Is USED
Williams to Build Machine With
Lighter Engine.
HIS TESTS NEAR WASHINGTON
Berliner Has Had Some Success
With His Aeromobile-Wiu
Lift His Weight.
HIS TESTS NEAR WASHINGTON

Lift His Weight.
| Since the Williams heliocopter has lifted
| itself and its operator, j. Newton Will
| liams. the builder is SO well satisfied
with it's performance that he Is going to
work on a more powerful engine OF less
! weight than the two heretofore used. AS
| soon as completed he expects. to have
a successful trial of the machine on the
outskirts of Washington.
| Mr.. Williams has been working on the
heliocopter problem since 1900. 1t is only
| with the advance in the building of gas
olinc engines that he has been able to
get power enough to raise both the ma
chine and the operator
Early this spring he came to Washing
| ton and started work in conjunction with
Emile Berliner of this city. who was
also interested in the same problem.
Aeromobile Will Work.
Mr.. Berliner has made number of
trials of a machine that he calls an aero
| mobile and has succeeded in lifting al
| most though not quite weight enough
to fly. He had two small and very pow
erful engines that he had been trying out,
| and it was the use of these that Mr.. Will
liams wanted In his experiments.
The engines are made by a western
firm and stripped down weigh but ninety
eight pounds each and furnish each thir-
ty-sfx-horsepower. When ready to install.
however. they weigh 124 pounds each.
Mr.. Williams tried one Of these engines
at first and found it would not quite lift
the weight of the machine. He then at
tached additional wing surface to his pro-
pellers and found he still did not have
enough power.
Finally he attached the second engine
and found that with it he could lift not
only the machine and engines. but himself
as WE'LL. This was all he was after.
Though the lift was only ten inches and
the engine power was unquestionably too
great for the machine as 1t was built he
was satisfied with the result and is now
weight and greater propeller area. suit
able for the more powerful engine that is
being built.
Looks Like Fly Chaser.
The heliocopter is a queer looking ma
chine to those who have been accustomed
to associating the word flying machine
merely with an aeroplane such as the
Wright brothers are using at Fort Myer.
1t is more than anything else like NAM
moth edition of one Of the horizontal fly
fans that are common in dairy lunch
rooms
But instead of one horizontal propeller
there are two working on concentric
shafts. one of them about three feet above
the other The propellers. too, are inl-
mensely bigger than lunchroom fly fam
They are built of three thicknesses of We
neer wood, the three layers aggregating
only One-eighth of an inch in thickness.
They had originally an area of sxtyfour
feet, but this has been extended by add
ing plate of aluminium a foot long to
the tip of each wing and brings the whole
area of the propellers up to eighty square
feet. They made the lift of the entire
machine with engine and operator at a
speed of 12O revolutions. The total weight
lifted was $50 pounds.
The main shaft on which these propel-
lers run is about eighteen feet high. The
platform on which the engines rest and
the operator stands is built of white
spruce, a very tough and yielding wood.
the thin Stats set on edge. so as to offer
the least resistance to the down draft
from the propellers. One of the propellers
revolves to the left and the other to
the right SO that the platform under
them remains stationary OF course, 1t
is impossible to gauge just what the
pulling effect of each propeller will be.
and there is an ingenious device controll-
ed by a small lever that will just bal
ance the power of the two propellers and
| make the platform remain at rest with
regard to the compass points.
How It Is Done.
The travel of the machine is controlled
simply by the operator moving to the
edge Of the platform. AS soon as he
does this and the upright shaft is In
clined the machine moves off in the di
rection of the tilt. 1t can be guided in
any direction by simply moving around
the edge of the platform.
OF course, with heliocopter the seri
Gus problem is what will happen if the
engine stops while the machine is in the
air. The heliocopter cannot glide down
from a height like an aeroplane, and no
body wants to drop from height of 500
or 600 feet with a big machine. To
copter carries parachute about forty
feet in Observation-Disclosures to hold the
weight of the machine and bring it down
at the rate of an ordinary parachute fall.
This parachute is carried in a small
box like a two-foot length OF stove pipe
on the top of the propeller shaft Around
the rim of the upper propeller there is
control ring with suspension spoke like
a bicycle wheel This is eighteen feet
in diameter.
The parachute cords run from that to
the small box mentioned and the para
chute is released and thrown out by
spring. 1t takes about a fifty-foot drop
to get the parachute to working. This
| d
parachute jumper from balloon, as they
always count fall of 80 feet before
the parachute slows them up.
Machine Had Mishap.
The test of the Williams machine with
the two engines was too much for the
machine as built. 1t had not been con-
structed with a view to standing any
such experiment and one of the concentlfc
shafts cracked through at the base but
was prevented from doing any damage
| by the way the lower gears were tied
| together.
| There was an accident. however. for
| a very small bolt worked loose on the
| top of the machine and falling on the
engine. was thrown off with great vio-
| lence and hit Mr.. Moore. Mr. Berliner' s
chief mechanic in the arm. The effect
| was just as though he had been shot
| with high power rife and the bleeding
| was serious but soon checked.
| Mr.. Williams says now that he knows
| just what he has to deal with in the
way OF weight and engine power, he will
| be able to build a larger machine of the
| same weight, or machine of the same
| size and good deaf less weight Both
| he and Mr.. Berliner are thoroughly salts
with the result of the trial, but it will
| be some time before the more powerful
engine for the new machine is completed
| nPnpS I'M MAN EAYNr