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Rotary Wing Flight Tests
On this page is a collection of photographs taken during flight tests supported by Robert Allen and Allen Technology. All photographs were taken by Robert Allen and all rights to their use are retained by him. Please do not use without permission.
WindStar Helicopter In Flight
Another personal interest of Robert Allen to which he has applied his electronics skills is flight. Robert and Allen Technology have provided support for aircraft development projects in both the US and Canada.
In 1987 Robert worked as a consultant for Vertical Lift Technologies of Phoenix, Arizona, to design and implement a system to measure the dynamics of the WindStar helicopter rotor - in flight.
The WindStar was, at the time, a new design for a four-passenger executive helicopter, powered by a piston engine designed specifically for the craft. It also used a revolutionary hinge-less, bearing-less main rotor system.
Allen Technology Instrument Package
Measuring the dynamics of a helicopter rotor in-flight is a considerable challenge! Making those measurements without hinge or bearing axes for measurement points was daunting! The system designed by Robert, accepted by VLT and successfully flown, was based on the output of precision accelerometers embedded into the rotor blades. These signals were passed through an instrumentation slip-ring mounted above the rotor (see picture above) and into an analog amplifier-mixer mounted in the engine compartment - the orange box in photo at left.
Pilot Awareness Instrumentation
Here, the various accelerometer signals were conditioned, integrated and mixed to provide precision analog representations of all components of motion of the rotor blades to be fed to a flight data recorder inside the cockpit.
In addition to making measurements for later analysis, it was also important to provide visual indications of rotor dynamics to the test pilot to keep him aware of what was going on above his head, and to keep the flight envelope within safety limits.
This function was provided by feeding properly scaled and buffered signals from the instrumentation package to a panel of analog meters mounted atop the normal instrument panel.
The pilot awarness instrumentation is visible in the picture at right.
Although two airframes were built and the Windstar flew many test flights, it never went into production. But the parent company is still flying high, RotorWay International, click here to see what they are up to now!
