Visitors to the 1998 Farnbotough Air Show may remember the Intora Firebird Dragonfly and Atlas H2o2 powered helicopters. Examples of both were delivered to the museum today from storage in Surrey,after the owner kindly donated them for restoration and display. Their origins date back to the 1950s and a project to produce a foldable one man helicopter thst could be dropped to downed fighter pilots as a means of escape, Uniquely powered in effect by steam forced out through tip jets by mixing hydrogen peroxide with a silver catalyst to cause a chemical reaction, the two helicopters add to the wide variety of rotary wing designs at the .weston super Mare collection.
Further information from anyone who sae the project at Sothend in the late 1990s – early 2003,great fully received.
By: heli1 - 20th July 2017 at 06:48
First…apologies for the spell check errors!
This was the same project as described by tecaeromex. Intora bought the rights and airframes from Liteco,who in turn had worked with the original US company. Post Intora,which folded in 2003, the directors split up with some of the assets moving to Switzerland and Swisscopter. These are believed to now be back in the USA with Swisscopter Americas in Tucson. It is suspected two-three of the single seat Dragonflys were built…at least two were test flown with US registrations ,whilst three Atlas airframes were registered in France to Liteco,although only one or at best two were flown. The museum has inherited parts of 01 and the airfame of 03 plus a complete Dragonfly.
By: Consul - 19th July 2017 at 23:34
I attended Farnborough that year, but have no recollection of either. I have found the following website, concerning a different but related project, which offers some historical details about the power concept including illustrations of the two types you mention, so may be of interest: http://www.tecaeromex.com/ingles/RH-i.htm
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July 19, 2017 at 11:23 pm