초록 ▼

A hingeless helicopter rotor including an aerodynamically shaped hub having a flexible diaphragm as its bottom wall, which diaphragm is connected to the rotor drive shaft and is elastically deformable in response to blade loading to tilt in any direction with respect to the axis of rotation, and fur

A hingeless helicopter rotor including an aerodynamically shaped hub having a flexible diaphragm as its bottom wall, which diaphragm is connected to the rotor drive shaft and is elastically deformable in response to blade loading to tilt in any direction with respect to the axis of rotation, and further having at least three equally spaced helicopter blades projecting from and supported from within the hub for rotation therewith and for flexing with respect thereto in response to blade loading so that the flexible hub and the blades coact to produce a low equivalent offset rotor and minimized Coriolis effect.

대표청구항 ▼

A hingeless helicopter rotor adapted to be mounted for rotation from the fuselage about an axis of rotation and having a low equivalent offset comprising: (A) a hub mounted for rotation about the axis of rotation and having: (1) a flexible diaphragm forming the hub bottom wall portion and extending

A hingeless helicopter rotor adapted to be mounted for rotation from the fuselage about an axis of rotation and having a low equivalent offset comprising: (A) a hub mounted for rotation about the axis of rotation and having: (1) a flexible diaphragm forming the hub bottom wall portion and extending when unloaded in a plane substantially perpendicular to the axis of rotation and being of selected flexibility so as to be tiltable with respect thereto due to elastic deformation in response to blade loading imparted thereto so that the flexible diaphragm acts as an elastic gimbal to produce a constant-speed universal joint action thereacross unaffected by hub tilting, and (B) a hub center body connected to said hub for rotation therewith and including blade root attachment means to accommodate blade pitch change motion and adapted to receive the blade roots so that the blade centrifugal force is imparted to the hub center body therethrough, (C) at least three blades extending radially from said hub with equal circumferential spacing therebetween and having root sections connected to the center body blade attachment means for centrifugal force support therefrom and pitch change motion with respect thereto and extending radially therefrom to present blade airfoil sections outboard thereof and to produce lead-lag and flapping motion with respect thereto, so that the blades impose cancelling centrifugal loads on the center body, so that said blades, hub and center body coact to center said blades on said hub, and so that the flexing of the hub and flexing of the blades in response to blade loading coact to produce a low equivalent offset rotor, and to establish the tilt of the rotor blade tip path plane relative to the axis to thereby minimize blade flexing and reduce the angle between the rotor constant speed plane and the blade tip path plane to minimize Coriolis effect, and (D) means to selectively vary the pitch of said blades both collectively and cyclicly.