An autogyro, also called a gyroplane or gyrocopter, is a rotorcraft that generates lift from an unpowered rotor turning by autorotation as air flows upward through it, while a separate engine-driven propeller supplies forward thrust; unlike a helicopter's rotor, the autogyro's rotor is never engine-driven except to start it spinning. The Spanish engineer and pilot Juan de la Cierva developed the aircraft after a bomber he designed crashed during testing in 1921, and after three unsuccessful prototypes his fourth design, the C.4, made the first documented autogyro flight on January 17, 1923, piloted by Alejandro Gomez Spencer at the Cuatro Vientos airfield near Madrid. De la Cierva originally called his invention the autogiro, a name later trademarked by the Cierva Autogiro Company he founded to develop it commercially.
Facts
YearRecords Juan de la Cierva's first flight of a practical autogyro, in January 1923 at Cuatro Vientos Airport, Madrid; the source elsewhere dates the specific first documented flight of the C.4 design to 17 January 1923 (9 January per de la Cierva himself). SignificanceDe la Cierva's Autogiro is considered the predecessor of the modern helicopter. 1 Connections
In Field
Source Autogyro (Wikipedia)Wikipedia contributors
Invented By
His fourth design, the C.4, made the first documented autogyro flight on January 17, 1923.
Sources
1. Autogyro (Wikipedia)
Wikipedia contributors, Wikimedia FoundationLead section, first-flight sentence
He first flew one in January 1923, at Cuatro Vientos Airport in Madrid.
Lead section, predecessor sentence
De la Cierva's Autogiro is considered the predecessor of the modern helicopter.
- In Group: Rotorcraft (Helicopters and Autogyros), lead: class of rotorcraft using an unpowered rotor in free autorotation to generate lift
In Field: Aerospace Engineering, Categories
Aircraft configurations
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