The Hiller VZ-1 Pawnee (U.S. Army designation; earlier Army designation: HO-1) is a unique direct-lift rotor aircraft, using contra-rotating ducted fans for lift inside a flying platform upon which the single pilot shifted body weight for directional control. The platform was developed starting in 1953 under an Office of Naval Research (ONR) contract to Hiller Aircraft, and flew successfully beginning in 1955.[1]
Design and development
The original concept had been developed by Charles H. Zimmerman in the late 1940s.[2] Further development followed, both by Hiller Aircraft and the De Lackner Company. There were two main models, the ONR model 1031-A-1, and the somewhat larger VZ-1 Pawnee model produced in 1956 for the U.S. Army. Three of each model were built as prototypes. Neither of the variants was put into production.[3]
The smaller ONR model used two 44 horsepower (33 kW) Nelson H-59 piston engines, coupled to the propellers by a modified helicopter transmission built by the Industrial Power Division of Hall-Scott. The larger Pawnee model used three of those engines and had an extended duct area. The Pawnee had ineffective "kinesthetic control" and instead had the operator seated on a platform controlling the flight with conventional helicopter controls.[4]
Testing and evaluation
Due to aerodynamic effects in the duct within which the propellers rotated, the platform was dynamically stable, even though the pilot and center of gravity of the platform were fairly high up. In testing, the prototypes flew well, but the U.S. Army judged them to be impractical as combat vehicles as they were small, limited in speed and only barely flew out of the ground cushion effect.[5]
^1955 Hall-Scott Industrial Power Division Annual Report
Bibliography
Rogers, Mike (1989). VTOL: Military Research Aircraft. New York: Orion. ISBN978-0-517-57684-7.
Taylor, Michael John Haddrick (1999). The World's Strangest Aircraft. London: Grange. ISBN978-0-7607-2102-5.
Winchester, Jim (2005). The World's Worst Aircraft: From Pioneering Failures to Multimillion Dollar Disasters. London: Amber. ISBN978-1-904687-34-4.
Bradford, Francis H.; Dias, Ric A. (2007). Hall-Scott: The Untold Story of a Great American Engine Maker. Warrendale, PA: SAE International. ISBN978-0-7680-1660-4.