Cracking new homebuilt helicopter

[Cyclic Hotline]

Three Somaliland nationals build the first ever helicopter | SomalilandPress (http://somalilandpress.com/10733/three-somaliland-nationals-build-the-first-ever-helicopter/)

HARGEISA (Somalilandpress) — Three men from Somaliland who, ever since they were young dreamed of building a helicopter have designed and built their own helicopter in their own backyard using scrap metals and an old engine from a van.

The trio, Mohamed Abdi Barkadle, Saed Abdi Jide and Abdi Farah Lidan said the purpose of their helicopter was to be used to fight fire in the city and surrounding area. They receive no major sponsors, financial nor material support from any one including the government, it is a three men vision and ingenuity.

This is the first ever helicopter built in any Somali speaking state. The fact that the trio could do so much with so little will inspire a lot of Somalilanders.

To many Somalilanders, this is historical moment for Somaliland and it is possible very soon others will start manufacturing their own electronics and devices.

This is the time to support these promising Somalilanders!, all stakeholders and regulatory agencies should rally round and assist these men to achieve their goal.

We wish them all the best from here Somalilandpress, we are certainly with you and we hope all the Somalilanders, friends and others who might be inspired by them get involved.

Somalilandpress, 9 January 2010

[Noah Zark.]

I admire their resilience. Sadly misguided however. Did anyone notice the backdrop of the guy giving the final commentary? Old 45 gallon oil drums cut open and flattened out to make a wall!

[bolkow]

the rotors looked very out of track also and the din it made did not suggest it would be flyable, but then you have to admire the effort and interest.

[Aesir]

I always when I see videos of this nature have to wonder if these are really sincere efforts at building flying machines or jost jokes of sort?

[ricksheli]

Having worked in Somaliland ( and Somalia ), it's good to see 3 individuals doing something other than chewing "Chatt", however I strongly suspect it's a bid to get attention, they've probably already sent their resume's to Bell, Eurocopter, etc. claiming to be truly expert helicopter designers. I don't think fighting "forest fires" is ever going to be a huge problem in Somalia, their efforts would be better directed trying to grow a forest!:uhoh:
I last escaped Somaliland by taking off early in the morning in a Dauphin loaded with 2x 40 gallon drums of fuel in the back as ferry fuel, to get us and a As350 back to Kenya. This was all after an Arab's "hunting trip" went badly wrong - long story.

[Coconutty]

you have to admire the effort

Err - No - I don't :uhoh:

I did like the design of the starboard skid though -
obviously designed to help spread the weight if landing in soft sand,
( or snow ;) ) and cunningly designed to look like a cylinder block,
presumably from another "old van engine".

Or was that the anchor :confused:

I think they might have problems with the installed engine though -
on start up there was a horrible screech -
sounds like the water pump might be on the way out,
or could be a fan belt slipping ??

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d129/coconut11/Coconutty.jpg

[oldbeefer]

Not sure if it's my eyes, but it seemed to be missing a tail rotor?

[VfrpilotPB/2]

Ths really takes me back, I donated a Massey Ferguson 35 Tractor yonks ago to the Help Africa cause, Gordon Bennett I would recognise that sound anywhere, along with the tick, tick of the difff that was missing the tops off a few teeth, however me thinks this is just a mock up testing out the design for the pilot would have to sit near to the rotor drive to balance things out, so I am convinced this is meerly a test bench ready for the Mark 2.......:eek:

Peter R-B

[helirider]

I have a similar story. In 1978 in Ghana, in the town of Ho, a man tried to build his own helicopter.
At that time, I was based in Accra as a helicopter pilot, and the man on the picture came to meet me at the airport to get some technical information, bringing this photo with him to show his project.
He told me that he had installed a VW Kombi engine, and he had also managed to perform some ground runs...
Not surprisingly, he had a lot of vibration and ground resonance problems...
No more news since that time.

http://i859.photobucket.com/albums/ab151/helirider_photos/GhanaHomebuiltHelicopter.jpg

[widgeon]

I would have thought a better market would have been supplying the pirates. Just the sound of that thing bearing down on your freighter would put the fear of god into the captain. I am sure a maritime version with floats and 4 axis autopilot is not far behind.
I did not see evidence of any pitch llinks , it must have those servo flaps on the blades then.

[lpokijuhyt]

They should use better material so that it is not a cracking helicopter.

[ShyTorque]

Very nice. I would offer to do the test flights but unfortunately I'm busy that day.

Holy ****!

[slowrotor]

The most laughable comment in the article was this:
"regulatory agencies should rally round and assist these men to achieve their goal."

[VfrpilotPB/2]

Do you think this could be the start of a cunning plot to help capture more shipping of the Horn!!:E

Peter R-B
Vfr

[Flyting]

I've been in some tight spots in Africa, but the pilot who landed there must have had some skills...talk about confined
:D:D:D

[VfrpilotPB/2]

Helirider,

I have only just realised the picture was taken inside the structures built by Barnes Wallace when he spent time in Ghana perfecting the idea for Geodetic Construction during the early War years to keep out of the way from the Jerry invader!:)

PeterR-B

[Nubian]

http://www.nextautos.com/etc/nigerian-boy-builds-helicopter-with-honda-civic-engine (http://www.thelinuxlink.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=3970)


I guess it's all about getting in the newspapers.


As for the Somalicopter, it looks as they would need a Chadwick, badly....