Design of the Scheme of High-Speed Helicopter RD15

Based on the review of existing schemes of high-speed rotorcraft, a new concept of RD15 scheme is presented in this paper. The lift system consists of circular disk-wing with four retractable blades, and the technology of individual blade control is adopted for flight control of the aircraft in hover and low speed flight. A vector thrust tail is used for direction control in hover and is also used as the multi-attitude control and propulsion device for the airplane mode in high-speed flight. The fundamental parameters of RD15 and the transfer process from the helicopter mode to the airplane mode are designed. The key point of this scheme is the shift smoothness of lift, power and control input in the mode transfer process. A test model of the disk-wing/rotor and the test rig were built up to verify the design concept and the calculation. The experiment results proved the transfer smoothness, and so the feasibility of the scheme.