Which helicopters can fly upside down

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Will cars ever be able to drive themselves? Browse all questions. Can helicopters fly upside down? Stunt shows are, of course, another story… By Mark Dwortzan To gain altitude and remain airborne, helicopters rely on rotor blades that generate vertical thrust. Posted: September 29, Stage and screen.

Birds and the bees. Brian Clayton, Glasgow, U. I have read of a helicopter being flown upside down during a looping of the loop but that is a short term exercise. If the 'copter was upside down the rotors would be pushing the vehicle upwards and probably the profile of the blades wouldn't allow this to happen.

The wing and propeller are combined in the main rotor. Upside down means going down. Althought the Westland Lynx is capable of performing a loop, sustained inverted flight is not possible.

Why would a helicopter need to fly upside down? The rotor head the bit that connects the blades to the engine and controls the helicopter is only designed to work in normal attitudes.

Peter Elliott, St Albans UK Model helicopters can certainly fly upside down, because their collective pitch control allows the rotors to be negatively pitched. That is, to direct air flow "up" relative to the fuselage instead of "down".

While it is theoretically possible to do this on a full-sized helicopter, it would be a brave pilot indeed to tried it. Simon Blake, Shrewsbury England In theory yes. But not sustained flight. A helicopter with sufficient speed and power could fly a loop without problem. I think this trick is done at air shows sometimes. Flying in a straight line upside down would not work though. Meredydd Wilson, Cincinnati, USA They indeed can, and looping the loop is a common action in higher powered helicopters.

As long as the head can move the rotors the right way, then they could produce enough lift to fly horizontally upside down. David Roberts, Crewe I am not aware of any full-size helicopters that are built so that they can fly upside down.

However, it is certainly possible and model helicopters are flown upside down all the time. All that is required is to have the pitch of the main and tail rotors adjustable to the point where they begin to blow air in the opposite direction to that which they do usually. Michael Fisher, Brisbane, Australia I must take issue with the first sentence of the previous answer.

It is quite right that if a helicopter is upside down with its rotors moving, it will be moving downwards.