DaSH PA -- Dead Simple Human Powered Airplane: BHPFC HPA Rally, Lasham, England

Airglow flies past the ATC hangers at Lasham

The chase is on

A little bump from thermal lift

I got the opportunity to travel to Lasham Airfield, near Basingstoke about 1 1/2 hours Southwest of London, to attend the BHPFC (British Human Powered Flying Club) Rally. It was a 10 day affair, I got to attend the first 4 days, from June 29th to July 2nd. It is a new event started to replace the hole in the schedule because the Icarus Cup did not happen this year.

It was great to get to meet HPA pioneers and innovators like Chris Roper, Fred To, John McIntyre, John Edgley, Bill Brooks and many others, and to see working HPAs up close and in person.

There were 5 HPAs there, from 4 teams, plus a few prospective teams (like ours) visiting as well. Airglow, a design from 1990 by John and Mark McIntyre that still looks and flies like new was there, as were two designs by John Edgley, Aerocycle 1 and Aerocycle 3, and a new design from Sheffield University called Volaticus, plus a recent design from Southampton University called SUHPA.

I got to see Airglow and the two Aerocycles fly under human power (Aerocycle 3 for the first time), and Volaticus had several towed flights as they work out their power system. SUHPA had not been fully assembled by the time I got to leave.

I also got a chance to give a presentation on the DaSH project that was well received.

Lasham is a former WW II airfield that was converted to a glider field, and is the biggest sailplane port in the world -- there are over 400 sailplanes that line the field there. There is also a large Boeing repair facility there run by a company called (confusingly) ATC, but there isn't much jet traffic (I saw one DHL jet land in the 4 days I was there). My new friend Will took me on a tandem glider ride where we tried to sort out the best way to use a sailplane for HPA training, and got some good soaring in as well. (The weather was beautiful the last three days I was there).

The trip was great for not only seeing HPAs fly in person, but to get a sense of how field operations are conducted, and what kind of crew we might need, with what kind of training and preparation, as we get ready to test our airplane.

A typical hangar scene before flying (Aerocycle 1)

The outside of the hangars

Volaticus

Volaticus is a new team from University of Sheffield that is designing a speed plane for one of the Kremer competitions.

Official BHPA sticker on Volaticus

Making some last minute changes to the Volaticus control system

The Volaticus team from Sheffield University

Getting ready for a test

After some problems with their drivetrain, they removed the prop and did tests with other humans towing (pushing and pulling), and managed to get some good flights in and collect some good data. As their plane is built for speed, it requires a fast take off (around 20 mph), and so unlike most human powered airplanes, they were hoping for wind the the runners could run fast enough to bring it to flight speed. Therefore, they were more successful later in the morning as the wind came up.

They have an unusual design that is basically a flying with, with direct pitch of the wing, but they had a rudder for lateral control and stability because their wingtip roll control system was not set up yet.

Closeup of Volaticus wing pitch system

Damage to Volaticus wingtip after hard ground loop (it was fixed the next day)

Surveying the damage

Human towed testing

Volaticus test flight, towed

Aerocycle 1

Aerocycle 1 and 3 are designed by John Edgley, who also designed the Optica observation airplane: ( http://www.optica.co.uk/index2.html ).

Aerocycle 1 is a somewhat unusual looking design with a canard control (though not that unusual, since the Gossamer planes were also canards).

Assembling Aerocycle 1

Aerocycle 1 canard flying surface

Bringing the wings out of the hangars

Cleaning the dew off the canard surface

Starting a flight attempt

A short test hop by Aerocycle 1

A higher short test flight by Aerocycle 1

(video by Fred To)

An exhausted pilot

The Aerocycle 1 team

Aerocycle 3

Aerocycle 3 is a new airplane that uses the wings from Aerocycle 2, with a completely new fuselage and drivetrain system. It had its first successful short flight on Day 4 of the rally, July 2nd, 2014.

Closeup of Aerocycle 3 prop shaft concentric with the tail boom

Cranks and front of drivetrain

Both Aerocycle 3 and Airglow use a gear system in the front to transmit power via shaft to a chainring in the rear, that then transmits power by chain up to the concentric prop shaft.

Good view of rear drive chain

Aerocycle 3's controls are pushrod actuated

Ribs are laser cut foam (notice ridges) with carbon cap strips, and taped on film (not Mylar)

Walking to setup position for a test flight

Ready to go, fourth flight attempt

Starting the takeoff run

Success! First flight. Pilot Bill Brooks.

Video of Aerocycle 3 First Flight

(video by Fred To)

Airglow

Airglow was built in 1990 by John and Mark McIntyre. Until just a couple of years ago, it was the only flying HPA in Britain (and was so for a couple of decades). It is in really good shape and is flown regularly. The folks who are taking care of her now, Robin, Roger and Mike have made some tweaks and changes, and it also has a longer set of wingtips that they sometimes fly with. It had by far the longest flights of the rally, going just under half the length of the 1+ mile (~1.7 km) runway at Lasham on several flights.

Mike Truelove fetching the Airglow wingtips

Underside of Airglow center wing section

The Airglow trailer

Airglow partially set up indoors

Setting up Airglow outdoors on their handy center stand

Airglow fuselage showing transmission front

Airglow with Roger Warren ready to fly, showing clear view of the rear chain

Another view of the rear drive chain

Airglow uses servo controls for pitch and yaw

The "Supertips" extended wingtips (added about 2.5 m to wingspan)

Airglow in flight

Another view of Airglow in flight

Videos of Airglow

First Flight on 30-Jun

Fourth Flight on 30-Jun

On the Fourth flight of Day 2, Airglow groundlooped. Speculation was that it was due to low dihedral and thus reduced lateral control response because it was flying with the lighter pilot (Robin) and shorter wingtips. Note the very low dihedral angle in the video above.

First flight, 2-July, Robin Kraike Piloting

2nd Flight, 2-Jul, Bill Brooks Piloting

(Apologies for the shaky cam, I was concentrating on still photos)

3rd flight, 2-Jul

4th Flight, 2-Jul

When I was chasing after and filming the flights, I was riding on a rental Brompton folding bike. Since Airglow was flying at nearly 20 mph, it was a good workout to keep up.

My rental Brompton

The gang reviewing Fred's videos of one of the flights

SUHPA

The Southampton team had not fully assembled or flown their airplane by the time I arrived.

It was originally built in 5 weeks (!) for a BBC program called "Speed with Guy Martin", and flew successfully last year.

It has a really clever construction technique, cutting the entire wing out of foam, in two pieces, a top and bottom half, with webs in between.

SUHPA wing sections in rack

Closeup of SUHPA wing construction

SUHPA Wing Tips

SUHPA under assembly

Yes, they use a bicycle as their main frame...

Lasham as Glider field

Lasham has a new vintage glider museum, and we got a personal tour of the facilities. The collection includes many stunning aircraft, and an accurate flying replica of the Colditz Glider (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colditz_glider ), a glider built surreptitiously in the attic of Colditz Castle by Allied POWs, when they were held prisoner there. It was built out of all sorts of scrounged materials. They never got to fly it because they were liberated just before the planned escape, but the replica proved it would fly.. Some photos:

Colditz Glider replica

My Glider Ride

I took a sailplane ride with Will, a Lasham Gliding Society member and participant in the BHPFC rally all the days I was there. We flew in the glider below (I didn't take any photos during flight since I was concentrating on flying).