The Helicopter Heaven
Helicopedia
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Eras

From the pioneers to these days.

WW2 Helicopters

From the earliest experiments to the Autogyro of the interwar and WW2 rotary wings.

Cold War Helicopters

The helicopters of the Korean and Vietnam War, and the cold war at large, from the Soviet block, NATO, US and Europe.

Modern helicopters

From Gulf war rotary wings to the most recent developments of attack and transport helicopters.

Helicopter Manufacturers

East to West, Manufacturer Companies of rotary wings from yesterday to nowadays.

French helicopters

France

French Helicopters

UK

British Helicopters

German helicopters

Germany & Italy

Other NATO Helicopters

American helicopters

USA

American helicopters

Soviet & Warsaw pact helicopters

USSR

Soviet & Warsaw pact helicopters

Other helicopters

The World

China and the rest of the world

History

Timeline of rotary wings.

They are all around us, a familiar sight in the sky since nearly 100 years, the age of the first pioneers. Now the rotary wing family stand strong of hundreds of models, in the civilian and military alike. They shaped history as the first way to land and get up the ground vertically, opening a brave new world of possibilities.


  • pioneers from Da Vinci to Cornu

    1901-1923

    Early pioneers. From Da Vinci's sketches to 1861 Gustave de Ponton d'Amécourt, Enrico Forlanini, Gustave Trouvé, Hermann Ganswindt, Thomas Edison, Ján Bahýľ, the Breguet brothers, Paul Cornu, Jacob Ellehammer, Raúl Pateras-Pescara de Castelluccio... They were all part of the adventure.

  • autogyro and early ww2 helicopters

    1923-1945

    Interwar Autogyro and WW2

    They were called autogyro and appeared in Europe in Spain, Germany and other countries simultaneously. They mixed characteristics of traditional helicopters with a rotary wing (yet crude and slow, driven by the main engine). During WW2 the Axis and allies operated the first helicopters.

  • first generation piston engine helicopters

    1950s

    The 1st generation

    From the Sikorski Vs-300 to the 1st gen 1950 models. Korean, Indochina war, the era of piston-driven twin rotors pioneers. The cold war was a powerful incentive to develop helicopters, which also made their way on the civilian market for many uses.

  • early cold war helicopters

    1960s

    Combat proven & widespread

    This second generation with turboshaft engines matured well enough to spread in all manners, size, types and uses both in the civilian markets and the military. For the latter, the Vietnam War was the great proving ground for "helicopter warfare".

  • late cold war helicopters

    1970-1980s

    Second generation helicopters

    The Reagan years and new cold war saw the development of the first antitank attack helicopters, new cold war tactics from the Warsaw pact and NATO, while the civilian market never stopped flourishing and blossoming.

  • modern & future helicopters

    The modern years

    From the Gulf War to these days, third generation helicopters, new developments, convertibles such as the V22 Osprey, stealthy, superfast models and drones. Welcome to the digital age, of IA, 3D printing and augmented reality.

  • To be
    Continued !

An Amazing Team

Discover who is behind helicopedia.com

David Buckley

Webdesigner & Author

Tom Cooper

Illustrator & Author

Rita Helix

Author & Pilot

Helicopedia is coming from a project of 2019 by David Bocquelet, Creator of Tank Encyclopedia, Naval Encyclopedia, and advisor for Planes encyclopedia. He is also the creator of WW1-planes.com. The long term goal is to cover the whole of rotary wings history and models since 1900.

Paul Cornu hélicoptère 1907
The term came from the Greek combination of helix (ἕλιξ) "spiral, whirl" and pteron "wing". It was coined in the West by Gustave Ponton d'Amécourt in 1861 as "hélicoptère" and was anglicized. The first mention in the East dated back from China in the fourth century A.D. in a book called "Pao Phu Tau" describing such contraption. Leonardo Da Vinci designed an "aerial screw" in the 1480s.

The first "practical" helicopters had a different name: They were called autogyro and appeared in Europe in Spain, Germany and other countries simultaneously. They mixed characteristics of traditional helicopters with a rotary wing (yet crude and slow, driven by the main engine) and a plane rotary engine at the front, driving a conventional propeller. They also had conventional surfaces and tail, albeit their main wings were quite reduced. Also appeared the Gyrodyne and the cruder Rotor kite.

The autogyro made they way into WW2 although in small quantities and always operational status. However this war saw the apparition of the first operational helicopters: German Flettner models are the best known. From 1941 a Russian Emigré named Igo Sikorsky created the first practical true helicopter in the USA with the VS300 in 1939. His S1 entered service in limited numbers in 1944 for various liaison, transport, evacuation and reconnaissance missions.

Noisy and slow it was a heavy prey but that was the start of US rotary wing saga. Another Russian, Mikhail Mil, created in USSR the first modern Russian helicopter in 1946. That was the start of an amazing lineage which goes on today, alongside the products of Nikolai Kamov.


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