From 1975 comes this Piasecki concept for a hybrid heavy lifter, the Model 97-X-0011 “Gargantua.” A Macon-class dirigible (with one center section removed) is mated with four CH-53E helicopters to create a cargo zeppelin “Heli-Stat” capable of lifting 280,000 pounds of payload. In this case, the cargo is shown as a Space Shuttle Orbiter.
It’s a neat idea, but the one heli-stat that c built came to a very quick, very sudden and very permanent end during a test flight in 1986:
[youtube _7jENWKgMPY]
The PA-97 Heli-Stat was brought down due to the structure being shaken apart. It certainly *looked* like a crudely-cludged assemblage… combining the appearance of both a whole lot of mass and a whole lot of frailty. A lack of precise controls between the wide separated choppers, combined with winds and ground resonance, led to a spectacular self-dis-assembly.
Ground resonance is a hell of a thing, generally to be avoided.
[youtube D2tHA7KmRME]
3 Responses to “Gargantua”
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Sure, I’d hang my $2 Billion Shuttle Orbiter under this overgrown erector set project.
Piasecki sure seemed to spend a lot of time after its founder departed the company screwing around with attaching helicopters together or to things, when they should have been designing new helicopters.
This concept ha a lot going for it:
http://www.aviastar.org/helicopters_eng/piasecki_path.php
hell i knew that resonance weak the Aircraft fuselage
but this complet new insight to that problem !