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BENSEN
B-8M
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| Igor
Bensen, a Russian born US citizen, was employed as a research engineer with
General Electric and Kaman working on rotorcraft. In 1953 he branched out
on his own to develop a line of small rotorcraft that could be either factory
completed or home-built from factory supplied kits. The first successful
one of these was the B-5 Gyro Glider of 1954. This unpowered aircraft was
towed behind a motor vehicle and became airborne at approximately 30km/hr
(20mph) carrying one person. The B-6 and B-7 Gyro-Gliders followed with motorised forms, especially the more successful B-7M (M = motorised), being developed at the same time, the latter flying in December 1955. By July 1957 the main production version, the B-8M, prototype had flown with production machines available in the following October. The B-8 essentially substituted 2in x 2in extruded alloy for the round tubing being used in the main frame of the B-7. Many thousands of these have been sold over the ensuing years and they have been widely imitated or licence produced throughout the world. In Britain the Beagle-Wallis gyrocopters in particular have been a development of the basic Bensen. The basic gyro copter, or auto gyro, has a free spinning rotor and an engine driving a conventional pusher propeller for forward propulsion. The airframe is simply an open, often single beam, frame work to which are attached the engine, fuel tank, rotor head and rotor blade, pilot's seat, joystick, rudder and rudder bar with minimum instruments. This was the B-8M. It could climb steeply but not hover or descend vertically. While the gyro glider is only a recreational vehicle the small gyro copters also have been particularly useful for a number of purposes, especially in agriculture where they have been used for aerial spraying small acreage crops and on larger properties where they are a cheap and effective vehicle for routine inspection of fences and stock watering points. QAM has one Bensen B-8M Gyro-Copter. Presently its full provenance is not known but it was donated by John Rohde in 1999. It has been fully restored by Rick Wilkins and was initially displayed as the spurious "VH-QAM", subsequently removed. At the same time two incomplete gyro gliders, also believed to be Bensens, a B-7 and a B-8, were received. These are in store and have yet to be restored. (Source: 1) |
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