Planet Aircraft Ltd and Firth Helicopter Prototypes

[Cy-27]

The four sides from a 1947 Planet Aircraft Limited Satellite brochure.

It says the aircraft is an "H W & S design" and appears to be a bargain at £3,500 !

 

[Stargazer]

Fabulous document, Cy-27! You've made my day here.

 

[hesham]

here is a mobile-car or flying car from Planet,I can't make a bigger view to can read.

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/1950-DOCUMENT-ref-Lim-083-AVIATION-LAVION-AUTO-PLANETE-SATELLITE-1p-/370785447100?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_71&hash=item565488ecbc&_uhb=1

Who can make it bigger to can read it ?.

 

[hesham]

here is a mobile-car or flying car from Planet,I can't make a bigger view to can read.

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/1950-DOCUMENT-ref-Lim-083-AVIATION-LAVION-AUTO-PLANETE-SATELLITE-1p-/370785447100?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_71&hash=item565488ecbc&_uhb=1

Who can make it bigger to can read it ?.

I think the Planet proposal for Spec. T.16/48 was developed from this aircraft ?.

 

[Schneiderman]

There are some interesting additions to make to this story, starting with the Burnley Satellite. (see post #37 and https://hushkit.net/2015/10/16/whisky-business-the-strange-story-of-the-planet-satellite/
Sir Charles Dennistoun Burney was a freelance engineer with a long history of innovative inventions mainly concerned with armaments. Just prior to WW2 he was working with Neville Shute Norway, who had been ‘kicked-out’ of Airspeed, on a new form of weapon sight and two types of gliding ordnance, the Toraplane and Doravane. Both designs were patented by Burney.https://weaponsandwarfare.com/british-aerial-ordnance-exotica/
In 1941 Burley submitted a patent for a large aircraft designed to carry a number of smaller ‘satellites’, which were small pusher aircraft. These were like sleeker versions of the McDonnell XF-85 Goblin fighter and were to be launched and retrieved in a similar way. The drawing in post #37 is derived from the patent and was produced by the Broadway Trust Co Ltd, an investment fund company associated with ordnance development with whom Burley held patents.
Moving on to the Planet Satellite. Major Dundas Heenan was an engineer, the son or grandson of the co-founder of the large engineering group Heenan and Froude. He worked for this company for many years and judging from his patents this was mainly associated with high-pressure vessels, valves and similar. When the company went into liquidation in 1935 he appears to have moved on to work freelance. In the war he was deeply involved, on the Air Ministry side, in the development of jet engines. In early 1946 he formed the consultancy Heenan, Winn and Steel (HW & S) and Planet Aircraft Ltd must have been launched around the same time with Managing Director Gp Cpt F.H.L Searl. The first report of the Satellite project appeared in Flight in November. Heenan applied for a patent for the construction methods associated with the Satellite in early 1947. In mid-1948, just before the first flight attempt of the Satellite, Gp Capt H.J.Wilson resigned his commission in the RAF and joined as a Director. Wilson had taken the air speed record in 1945 flying a Gloster Meteor.
I can find no direct link between Burney and Heenan but as reporting in wartime was highly restricted this does not mean that there was no connection between the two Satellite projects. It does seem more than a coincidence that two aircraft sharing an unusual configuration would have the same name.

 

[hesham]

Thank you my dear Schneiderman,

and I want to ask you if the flying car in the picture was belonged to Planet
or not ?,I can't read it well.

 

[Schneiderman]

I don't know but it does seem a little unlikely that a non-technical 1950 French magazine would be the only source for an unknown Planet design. The page is still available on ebay if you want to buy it.

I forgot to mention that the business address for Planet Aircraft Ltd is the same as that given by Heenan as his residential address in his patent. (It is now a bistro called Burger and Lobster )

 

[hesham]

Thank you my dear Schneiderman,

and can anybody make it bigger to can read it ?.

 

[Schneiderman]

Basically, no. It is easy to make it better but that will not improve the resolution.

 

[avion ancien]

..... a non-technical 1950 French magazine .....

Do/did you know the title of the magazine and the date of the 1950 issue in which the article appeared? I can't find that information on the thumbnail copy and, unsurprisingly, the original no longer is listed on eBay.

 

[riggerrob]

Dear Schneidermann,
Post 45, first illustration ... cable and cradle reminds us of the (1960s) Royal Canadian Navy's "Beartrap" helicopter haul-down and securing system.
Cable would allow the "parasite" to connect while staying outside of turbulence created by the "mothership." Turbulence during docking be-devilled the USAF Goblin parasite fighter program.

 

[Schneiderman]

Do/did you know the title of the magazine and the date of the 1950 issue in which the article appeared? I can't find that information on the thumbnail copy and, unsurprisingly, the original no longer is listed on eBay.

Sorry, I failed to make a note of that.

 

[avion ancien]

Do/did you know the title of the magazine and the date of the 1950 issue in which the article appeared? I can't find that information on the thumbnail copy and, unsurprisingly, the original no longer is listed on eBay.

Sorry, I failed to make a note of that.

Ah well, tant pis!

 

[hesham]

From Aeroplane monthly 1983.

 

[hesham]

I hope to see a drawing to T16/48 Proposal.

 

[hesham]

I'd like to add to this, though slightly off-topic.

The FH-1 was based on patents by Landgraf when his company folded in 1949 (due to the withdraw of funding from the military to further develop the H-2 helicopter). It's possible that the FH-1 would have been the "H-4" four-seat proposal of the H-2, had it been developed by Landgraf.

I can't remember where I obtained the below photos:

It's from Flight 1955.