Perhaps there may be a future for slats on the blades of a helicopter.
On January 11, 2005, Sikorsky was granted US patent 6,840,741. It is for 'Leading edge slat airfoil for multi-element rotor blade airfoils'.
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There must be at least one or two thousand helicopter patents. Sikorsky alone, has approximately 335 US patents.
It would be interesting to know;
- What percentage of these patents ever made it into a production craft?
- What percentage of these patents ever deterred another party from putting that patent, or a derivative of it, into a production craft?