Are you saying the Lockheed system deserves to see the light of day again, or should it be consigned to the history books? Most folks seem to feel that way about the Bell bars and Hiller paddles.
"On a conventional helicopter the pilot has to maintain the cyclic in the commanded position in order to maintain the control input."
I thought that the spanwise offset of the pitch horn from articulating hinge was to allow blade lift to cause a nutating "feedback" force to the gyro. This meant that the gyro would gently respond to a continued rotor input, from say forward flight. Unless the pilot provided a constant input the effect was like fixed wing longitudinal and lateral dihedral.
"The couple between the rotorblades and the rotorhead was so strong that the cyclic could not be displaced when on the ground."
Yeah this could be a problem, but the cyclic should be central on a conventioanl during run-up and shut-down anyway. Maybe a cyclic lock or limiter in place of the normal frictions. It does prove that the machine could "fly" hands off though...
Mart