I saw a heli (real) doing a a nice steep tail down funnel at the airshow last year - wasn't inverted, but still impressive
Simon

 

Yes i saw that too @simon, it was pretty impressive. I remember looking at the heli and thinking - it could bounce into a forward piro from the funnel position - but alas it was all in my head. I wonder if there are motors strong enough, blades capable enough and materials light enough to do real 3d maneuvers. Im going to hit the heli fields now!!!! catch ya later!

 

I just can't see a pilot being able to withstand the g-force that would result from 3D maneuvering at full scale velocity. Sure, fighter pilots endure such g-forces, but the transitions in thrust vectors and inertial vectors are a bit more gradual than they would be in full-scale 3d heli maneuvers. ....... assuming for a moment that a heli could be built with a rigid enough rotor blades and head to make this possible. 3d maneuvers would create more structural fatigue than even today's best materials could handle unless of course billions of dollars are invested into research and development.

 

Do full scale helis really need a pilot anymore? UAV do not.

Does 3-5 minutes hard 3D flight make any sense in full scale?

Can RC heli reach flight times of full scale helis? (3-4 hours)

Can full scale heli be powered with lipos? Would it provide more power?

 

Back from the helifields! Great fly but really really windy (thanks @Storm Heligod!) smaked it around a bit, feel a bit bettter now. @Beaver I tend to agree - the violent transitions might be way to much for a person to endure.

The redbull helicopter really struggles to do what it does compared to an aggressive collective pitch RC Heli. But it is still amazing to see.

But as @utrinque states what about a full size drone?. Would it make any sense? Hell NO... Would it be an incredible sight? Hell YES! - I would pay money to see it thats for sure.

But are there materials as pointed out by @Beaver that could make this heli? Lets start with the motor. I think it would have to be a pretty powerful but light motor. Almost like an F1 motor that is running flat stick with turbo chargers.

Then what material could be used for the chassis to stop it being torn apart during transitions? Maybe carbon fiber? The same thing about the blades... Most heli blades are floppy and don't appear to be anywhere near capable of supporting 3d. what material could be used that would stand such abuse?

 

Regarding materials RC helis are far from using extreme materials. They are build as cheap as possible.

Look:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceramic_matrix_composite

Funny that carbon fibers can also be considered a ceramic material.

We still do not use kevlar reinforced CF. Rarely titanium alloys are used. Ceramic bearings are used rarely due to high cost.

CNC is primitive comparing with 3D printing.


http://www.cnet.com/news/3d-printed...create-the-human-body-in-the-eye-of-a-needle/

 

At this point there is no motivation in full scale to build a 3D machine... Just because we could is not enough when you talk about the millions it would cost!

Full scale fixed wing has fairly rapid development in the Acrobatic department, why... Because there are rich dudes out there competing... So guys like Walter Extra build them 10+G machines... What is the drive to even build a full scale that could do sustained inverted? None, could they... you bet they could, will they, probably not...

An important thing to consider is FPV, while inside a full scale, it is scary to even just hover taxi backwards, because you can't see back there, even if you know it's clear, it is still pretty scary to go blindly backwards. Alot of the moves that seem really cool to do while flying a model would be pretty impossible in a full scale, even if they could be done physically, just because you couldn't see where you were going...

 

@utrinque makes a good point regarding materials. Our small scale helis don't use especially exotic materials except for more recent employment of carbon fiber, but then, small scale models exempt themselves from real-world physics by having lower mass, lower inertial effects, therefore: less structural fatigue per given components and materials used. A component such as a rotor blade will become proportionally less rigid with increased size due to the effects of gravity/mass reactance when using same material because as mass increases, tensile strength and molecular cohesion of said material does not change. Example: A micro-heli such as a NCPx will be more resilient in a crash as compared to a larger (500-700 class) heli given same conditions and scale speeds because the larger heli has more mass.