Los Angeles herald., 1910-08-24
INVENTS AIRSHIP THAT
WILL LIFT SELF IN AIR
Spokane Men Claim Solution of
Commercial Aerial NaVi-
cation Problem
Especial to The Herald

SPOKANE, August 2S-Dr. W. e.
S. Coyne and George Foster, of Spo-
kane, claim to have solved the prob
lem of commercial aerial navigation.
Their patents cover a machine of the
helicopter type, intended to ascend
straight up and come straight down
again, under perfect control of the
operator, and may be poised in the air
indefinitely at heretofore impossible
heights.
The problems that have so far re-
tarded fight by man are lack of poise,
safety, a direct lift and the inability
to carry weight sufficient to make it
of commercial Importance. DR.. Coyne
has arranged the lifting power in his
machine in four units, any one of
which having sufficient power to bring
the craft to the ground with safety.
The revolving planes which furnish
the lift are placed above the engine
room and passenger compartments, so
that the car hangs like a plumb-bob,
making the poise of the machine auto
matte and thereby absolutely preclud-
ing the possibility of turning turtle.
1t seems that the elements of dan
ger have been reduced to the mini
mum. It's design enables it to start
from or light on the fiat top of build
ing, which, the inventor says, Will
be the ultimate landing place Of the
commercial airship, and that it will be
able to leave the deck of ship and
come back to, it with certainty.
The Coyne Helicopter is constructed
with two vertical, hollow masts, one
revolving inside of the other, with
total height of twenty-four feet. The
inner mast reaches seven feet above
the outer one, and has rigidly attach
ed to it two cross-arms three and a
half feet apart. Each cross-arm is
thirty-two feet long. To the outer
eight feet of each cross-arm is at
tached a plane surface of solid con-
struction, eight feet long by eight feet
wide, set at an angle of one foot in
eight.
At the top of the outer mast, which
begins three and one-half feet below
the lower cross-arms of the upper
mast, are two cross-arms identical
to the two just described, with planes
of the same dimensions, tilted one foot
in eight, but in the opposite direction.
The two hollow masts pass down into
the motor room of the car. Here the
outer one is rigidly attached to a thir-
ty-flve inch beveled-cogged gear, turn
ing in a horizontal plane. The inner
mast passes down through the upper
gear wheel, ending in a step-bearing
in the bottom of the motor room, which
it is rigidly attached to the outer
mast, These two gears are seven
inches apart in vertical direction. the
teeth of the gear facing each other.
Enmesh with these thirty-five
inch gear wheels are placed four seven
inch beveled pinion wheels, which are
rigidly attached to the driving
shafts of the four one-hundred
horsepower motors, located in
the bottom of the motor room, so that
when the motors are in operation one
of the big gear wheels Is driven in
one direction, corresponding to the tilt
of the planes on it's cross s-arms, and
the other is driven in the opposite di-
rection, corresponding to the tilt OF the
planes on it's crosS-arns.
Thus is transmitted to the planes
on a mean circumference of seventy
five feet a revolving motion, which
can be increased up to four hundred
revolutions per minute, thus giving a
revolving speed in opposite directions
of the planes equal to thirty thousand
feet per minute. This is equal. to three
hundred and forty miles per hour, as
the speed of the revolutions of the
planes, which gives the planes a
thrust that will lift thirty-eight thou
sand pounds. The ship is directly
raised from the ground by the above
described revolving planes and can re-
main poised in the air as long as the
4nnwar 1aGtA-