11 ms·

The Winnebago Heli-Home Was a Real Flying RV

109 points by cpncrunch 6y ago

ForHackernews 6y ago
See also, the seaplane-yacht: http://www.vintagewings.ca/VintageNews/Stories/tabid/116/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/424/language/fr-FR/Sweet-Dreams-and-Nightmares.aspx http://www.vintagewings.ca/VintageNews/Stories/tabid/116/art...
- microcolonel 6y ago
  > Part of the dream presented to the potential wealthy industrialists, who were the demographic for the sale of the Landseaire, was that a successful man could fly anywhere and still have a pretty girl prepare his meals for him or serve him drinks. While today this would be considered downright sexist, in 1950 it was considered the dream of every man. Idunno, still sounds like living the dream to me. I do wonder though, what the death/injury rates would be in this sector of general aviation, it seems extremely fraught.
  - Hide-Republican 6y ago
    You cant say that out loud anymore. The world we built eh?
- EamonnMR 6y ago
  Great article, worthy of a post itself
- satori99 6y ago
  This reminds me of another interesting flying boat story; https://medium.com/s/story/the-long-way-round-the-plane-that-accidentally-circumnavigated-the-world-c04ca734c6bb https://medium.com/s/story/the-long-way-round-the-plane-that...
  - coverband 6y ago
    Another great story, thanks for sharing!
- FabHK 6y ago
  Wow, what an awesome insane story. Reminds me of when I did a pleasure flight with a US missionary in a Cessna 150 in Nicaragua, and when I wandered into Managua airport afterwards I was hauled in by police and questioned, apparently thought to be a drug smuggler or so, until the good missionary showed up again (having parked the plane) and cleared everything up. (Not nearly as glamorous and dramatic as the attack on that Catalina Landaeaire of the coast of Saudi Arabia, though.)
  - 082349872349872 6y ago
    I wondered why Jamaica had snowplow poles on the side of the road, and was told they're to keep smugglers' Cessnas away.
adingus 6y ago
It's funny that they thought a $10,000 a week rental made it any more affordable than the $800,000 price tag. The Venn diagram of people who can afford those is a circle.
- throwaway0a5e 6y ago
  >The Venn diagram of people who can afford those is a circle. The Venn diagram of people who can justify each option to their spouse is not a circle though. They're probably almost doubling the number of potential customers by offering it both ways.
  - FabHK 6y ago
    That reminds me of the time my colleague came to work with a nice shiny new Apple laptop (it was a Titanium PowerBook, long time ago), and said "12,000 bucks". We couldn't believe it, until he added "well, I had to buy my wife a new kitchen to get permission to buy it..."
- Jestar342 6y ago
  $10k to rent for one week in a novelty once-in-a-lifetime Heli-Home? I've seen people spend more on their bachelor party weekends in vegas and they can't even remember what they did. Those same people don't even spend $800k on their house.
  - yodon 6y ago
    Those are 1975 dollars they are talking about so roughly $50,000/week or $4M purchase price today.
    - Jestar342 6y ago
      In league with the price to rent/hire a private jet, and the price to own a private jet. There is a big market of people hiring private jets.
    - stronglikedan 6y ago
yummypaint 6y ago
In the few helicopters ive flown in, the flight crew meticulously accounts for the mass and location of every person and large item on board before taking off. It seems like it would be really inconvenient to do that on the scale of an rv, especially if there are water and sewage tanks etc to think about.
- wtracy 6y ago
  Yeah, my first thought was that retaining someone qualified to fly one of these things is going to be significantly harder than affording the vehicle itself. There's such a thing as weekend airplane pilots, but no such thing as weekend helicopter pilots. Developing the skills to fly a helicopter takes a very serious time investment. (And that's before you have a family of vacationers shoving stuff willy-nilly into the helicopter!)
  - dkdk8283 6y ago
    There absolutely are weekend helicopter pilots. I have my PPL and at my airfield there are quite a few hobbyists and interesting jobs that don’t demand many oncall or flight hours.
    - FabHK 6y ago
      Don't you think, at least, that flying heli is more like flying fixed wing IFR (really need to fly regularly) than flying fixed wing VFR (do a few hours and a checkout after 5 years and you're good to go)? So we're talking committed weekend pilots...
  - jacquesm 6y ago
    There are definitely weekend helicopter pilots. There is a whole slew of them that will seat just the pilot: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ultralight_helicopters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ultralight_helicopters Accident rates are nothing to be happy about though, flying a helicopter is a lot harder than flying a light plane and flying into an obstacle or having something fail resulting in a crash are all too common. Helicopters are quite delicate compared to planes as well and even though they can usually auto-rotate that's better described as a controlled crash than an emergency landing. Personally I'd never ever want to be in one of these but compared to a wingsuit they're probably safer.
stelliosk 6y ago
Lonestarrrr (From Spaceballs the movie)
rob74 6y ago
I see the submitter omitted the end of the original title: "...That Needs to Make a Comeback in 2020". I guess they agree with my sentiment that no, it does not. Even if you ignore the most obvious environmental aspects (the fuel consumption and noise pollution), there is still one other I can think of: even if somebody invented a noiseless anti-gravity drive and the "Mr. Fusion" required to power it, it still wouldn't be a good idea for everyone to be able to simply fly and land anywhere they want... > All in all, the company would go on to sell only 8 Heli-Homes to customers, none of which survive today. This, on the other hand, is regrettable from a curiosity perspective...
- meddlepal 6y ago
  If I had enough money I'd buy one.
- cpncrunch 6y ago
  No, I did actually submit the full title, but it was truncated to "that needs to make a comeback" (I just omitted "in 2020" as it wouldn't fit). I see one of the admins has changed the title to remove the "needs to make a comeback" bit entirely.
- 082349872349872 6y ago
  > everyone to be able to simply fly and land anywhere they want... One big difference between the old money and new money neighbourhoods in a former city of mine is that the latter was the only one which allowed helicopter landings.
Asad445 6y ago
Wow
gmueckl 6y ago
This was likely a conversion of Sikorski S-55 helicopters that were retired from the US military around 1969/1970. The look of this helicopter reminds me of the outwardly similar Sikorski S-58 that was used in the TV series "Riptide". I saw a few episodes of that as a child and I guess I'll never be able to forget that particular association.
secfirstmd 6y ago
This reminds me of Spaceballs: The Movie :) https://www.syfy.com/sites/syfy/files/styles/1400xauto/public/wire/legacy/Screen_Shot_2017-06-09_at_7.19.18_PM.png https://www.syfy.com/sites/syfy/files/styles/1400xauto/publi...
mothsonasloth 6y ago
I wonder if you could buy something big like an ex-Military Chinook or a Russian Mi-26, then kit it out and customize it like the van converters do?
- dfxm12 6y ago
  I don't see why not, as that's pretty much what Winnebago did: Instead, beginning in 1975 [Winnebago] worked with a company called Orlando Helicopter Airways to acquire a fleet of ex-military Siksorky S-55 transport helicopters (also known as the H-19) and convert these surplus machines into something a little more homey.
Wistar 6y ago
"The thing is, helicopters are different from planes. An airplane by its very nature wants to fly and, if not interfered with too strongly by unusual events or by a deliberately incompetent pilot, it will fly. A helicopter does not want to fly. It is maintained in the air by a variety of forces and controls working in opposition to each other and, if there is any disturbance in this delicate balance, the helicopter stops flying; immediately and disastrously. There is no such thing as a gliding helicopter."* "This is why being a helicopter pilot is so different from being an airplane pilot, and why in generality, airplane pilots are open, clear-eyed, buoyant extroverts, and helicopter pilots are brooding introspective anticipators of trouble. They know if something bad has not happened it is about to." Harry Reasoner February 16, 1971 * Helicopters do autorotate which is a glide, sort of, at least with sufficient translational lift and rotor speed.
- kogus 6y ago
  This is a fun quote, but I don't think it's accurate. Source: http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2012/05/helicopters-wont-just-fall-like-a-rock-if-the-engine-dies-they-usually-can-be-landed-safely-this-way/ http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2012/05/helicopters-...
  - Wistar 6y ago
    It is not accurate, hence my footnote. If one has sufficient skill, altitude and/or forward speed an autorotation can be made to a forced landing, and arguably more safely than a fixed-wing forced landing. Of course, this depends on the main rotor and flight controls still working well enough to perform an autorotation.
    - davidjade 6y ago
      Years ago I spent a lot of time in helicopters in remote Alaskan mountain ranges with pretty high-end helicopter pilots and got to know some them pretty well. I think the "brooding introspective anticipators of trouble" is a good description. I know that many of them practiced autorotation nearly every time they left a mountain peak to descend back down to the glacier floor. I also once got to fly a 400+ mile trip over rugged wilderness and the pilot was always thinking about the next possible emergency landing spot. The flight altitude was often adjusted for this as well if over terrain where options would be limited (such as water). Well maintained helicopters - nothing wrong with them - just always being aware of your options when in the middle of nowhere.
spaetzleesser 6y ago
For wildlife watching in places like Siberia or Alaska this would be pretty cool. Fly to the middle of nowhere and camp in comfort. I wonder how often such a thing needs maintenance.
simonh 6y ago
I showed the magazine cover to my daughter. “I want a boat helicopter... er.. house!”
mips_avatar 6y ago
I wish personal aviation was a little more accessible. The only innovation I can think of that would really change the math on flying would be very high density batteries, and electric planes. Otherwise flying costs are going to continue to be dominated by expensive engine maintenance.
- cpncrunch 6y ago
  Light sport aircraft (in USA) or advanced ultralights (Canada) are a lot more affordable than certified aircraft.
  - mips_avatar 6y ago
    The hope with light sport aircraft was that prices would drop. But it’s minor, a Cessna 172 is still cheaper than what you can get in light sport
    - cpncrunch 6y ago
      Well, a 1970s 172 is cheaper than a new light sport aircraft, so it's not really a fair comparison. I was hoping with the part 23 rewrite we might get cheaper new aircraft, but that hasn't happened.

109 points by cpncrunch 6y ago

See also, the seaplane-yacht: http://www.vintagewings.ca/VintageNews/Stories/tabid/116/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/424/language/fr-FR/Sweet-Dreams-and-Nightmares.aspx http://www.vintagewings.ca/VintageNews/Stories/tabid/116/art...

microcolonel 6y ago
> Part of the dream presented to the potential wealthy industrialists, who were the demographic for the sale of the Landseaire, was that a successful man could fly anywhere and still have a pretty girl prepare his meals for him or serve him drinks. While today this would be considered downright sexist, in 1950 it was considered the dream of every man. Idunno, still sounds like living the dream to me. I do wonder though, what the death/injury rates would be in this sector of general aviation, it seems extremely fraught.
- Hide-Republican 6y ago
  You cant say that out loud anymore. The world we built eh?
EamonnMR 6y ago
Great article, worthy of a post itself
satori99 6y ago
This reminds me of another interesting flying boat story; https://medium.com/s/story/the-long-way-round-the-plane-that-accidentally-circumnavigated-the-world-c04ca734c6bb https://medium.com/s/story/the-long-way-round-the-plane-that...
- coverband 6y ago
  Another great story, thanks for sharing!
FabHK 6y ago
Wow, what an awesome insane story. Reminds me of when I did a pleasure flight with a US missionary in a Cessna 150 in Nicaragua, and when I wandered into Managua airport afterwards I was hauled in by police and questioned, apparently thought to be a drug smuggler or so, until the good missionary showed up again (having parked the plane) and cleared everything up. (Not nearly as glamorous and dramatic as the attack on that Catalina Landaeaire of the coast of Saudi Arabia, though.)
- 082349872349872 6y ago
  I wondered why Jamaica had snowplow poles on the side of the road, and was told they're to keep smugglers' Cessnas away.

adingus 6y ago

It's funny that they thought a $10,000 a week rental made it any more affordable than the $800,000 price tag. The Venn diagram of people who can afford those is a circle.

throwaway0a5e 6y ago
>The Venn diagram of people who can afford those is a circle. The Venn diagram of people who can justify each option to their spouse is not a circle though. They're probably almost doubling the number of potential customers by offering it both ways.
- FabHK 6y ago
  That reminds me of the time my colleague came to work with a nice shiny new Apple laptop (it was a Titanium PowerBook, long time ago), and said "12,000 bucks". We couldn't believe it, until he added "well, I had to buy my wife a new kitchen to get permission to buy it..."
Jestar342 6y ago
$10k to rent for one week in a novelty once-in-a-lifetime Heli-Home? I've seen people spend more on their bachelor party weekends in vegas and they can't even remember what they did. Those same people don't even spend $800k on their house.
- yodon 6y ago
  Those are 1975 dollars they are talking about so roughly $50,000/week or $4M purchase price today.
  - Jestar342 6y ago
    In league with the price to rent/hire a private jet, and the price to own a private jet. There is a big market of people hiring private jets.
  - stronglikedan 6y ago

yummypaint 6y ago

In the few helicopters ive flown in, the flight crew meticulously accounts for the mass and location of every person and large item on board before taking off. It seems like it would be really inconvenient to do that on the scale of an rv, especially if there are water and sewage tanks etc to think about.

wtracy 6y ago
Yeah, my first thought was that retaining someone qualified to fly one of these things is going to be significantly harder than affording the vehicle itself. There's such a thing as weekend airplane pilots, but no such thing as weekend helicopter pilots. Developing the skills to fly a helicopter takes a very serious time investment. (And that's before you have a family of vacationers shoving stuff willy-nilly into the helicopter!)
- dkdk8283 6y ago
  There absolutely are weekend helicopter pilots. I have my PPL and at my airfield there are quite a few hobbyists and interesting jobs that don’t demand many oncall or flight hours.
  - FabHK 6y ago
    Don't you think, at least, that flying heli is more like flying fixed wing IFR (really need to fly regularly) than flying fixed wing VFR (do a few hours and a checkout after 5 years and you're good to go)? So we're talking committed weekend pilots...
- jacquesm 6y ago
  There are definitely weekend helicopter pilots. There is a whole slew of them that will seat just the pilot: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ultralight_helicopters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ultralight_helicopters Accident rates are nothing to be happy about though, flying a helicopter is a lot harder than flying a light plane and flying into an obstacle or having something fail resulting in a crash are all too common. Helicopters are quite delicate compared to planes as well and even though they can usually auto-rotate that's better described as a controlled crash than an emergency landing. Personally I'd never ever want to be in one of these but compared to a wingsuit they're probably safer.

stelliosk 6y ago

Lonestarrrr (From Spaceballs the movie)

rob74 6y ago

I see the submitter omitted the end of the original title: "...That Needs to Make a Comeback in 2020". I guess they agree with my sentiment that no, it does not. Even if you ignore the most obvious environmental aspects (the fuel consumption and noise pollution), there is still one other I can think of: even if somebody invented a noiseless anti-gravity drive and the "Mr. Fusion" required to power it, it still wouldn't be a good idea for everyone to be able to simply fly and land anywhere they want... > All in all, the company would go on to sell only 8 Heli-Homes to customers, none of which survive today. This, on the other hand, is regrettable from a curiosity perspective...

meddlepal 6y ago
If I had enough money I'd buy one.
cpncrunch 6y ago
No, I did actually submit the full title, but it was truncated to "that needs to make a comeback" (I just omitted "in 2020" as it wouldn't fit). I see one of the admins has changed the title to remove the "needs to make a comeback" bit entirely.
082349872349872 6y ago
> everyone to be able to simply fly and land anywhere they want... One big difference between the old money and new money neighbourhoods in a former city of mine is that the latter was the only one which allowed helicopter landings.

Asad445 6y ago

Wow

gmueckl 6y ago

This was likely a conversion of Sikorski S-55 helicopters that were retired from the US military around 1969/1970. The look of this helicopter reminds me of the outwardly similar Sikorski S-58 that was used in the TV series "Riptide". I saw a few episodes of that as a child and I guess I'll never be able to forget that particular association.

secfirstmd 6y ago

This reminds me of Spaceballs: The Movie :) https://www.syfy.com/sites/syfy/files/styles/1400xauto/public/wire/legacy/Screen_Shot_2017-06-09_at_7.19.18_PM.png https://www.syfy.com/sites/syfy/files/styles/1400xauto/publi...

mothsonasloth 6y ago

I wonder if you could buy something big like an ex-Military Chinook or a Russian Mi-26, then kit it out and customize it like the van converters do?

dfxm12 6y ago
I don't see why not, as that's pretty much what Winnebago did: Instead, beginning in 1975 [Winnebago] worked with a company called Orlando Helicopter Airways to acquire a fleet of ex-military Siksorky S-55 transport helicopters (also known as the H-19) and convert these surplus machines into something a little more homey.

Wistar 6y ago

"The thing is, helicopters are different from planes. An airplane by its very nature wants to fly and, if not interfered with too strongly by unusual events or by a deliberately incompetent pilot, it will fly. A helicopter does not want to fly. It is maintained in the air by a variety of forces and controls working in opposition to each other and, if there is any disturbance in this delicate balance, the helicopter stops flying; immediately and disastrously. There is no such thing as a gliding helicopter."* "This is why being a helicopter pilot is so different from being an airplane pilot, and why in generality, airplane pilots are open, clear-eyed, buoyant extroverts, and helicopter pilots are brooding introspective anticipators of trouble. They know if something bad has not happened it is about to." Harry Reasoner February 16, 1971 * Helicopters do autorotate which is a glide, sort of, at least with sufficient translational lift and rotor speed.

kogus 6y ago
This is a fun quote, but I don't think it's accurate. Source: http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2012/05/helicopters-wont-just-fall-like-a-rock-if-the-engine-dies-they-usually-can-be-landed-safely-this-way/ http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2012/05/helicopters-...
- Wistar 6y ago
  It is not accurate, hence my footnote. If one has sufficient skill, altitude and/or forward speed an autorotation can be made to a forced landing, and arguably more safely than a fixed-wing forced landing. Of course, this depends on the main rotor and flight controls still working well enough to perform an autorotation.
  - davidjade 6y ago
    Years ago I spent a lot of time in helicopters in remote Alaskan mountain ranges with pretty high-end helicopter pilots and got to know some them pretty well. I think the "brooding introspective anticipators of trouble" is a good description. I know that many of them practiced autorotation nearly every time they left a mountain peak to descend back down to the glacier floor. I also once got to fly a 400+ mile trip over rugged wilderness and the pilot was always thinking about the next possible emergency landing spot. The flight altitude was often adjusted for this as well if over terrain where options would be limited (such as water). Well maintained helicopters - nothing wrong with them - just always being aware of your options when in the middle of nowhere.

spaetzleesser 6y ago

For wildlife watching in places like Siberia or Alaska this would be pretty cool. Fly to the middle of nowhere and camp in comfort. I wonder how often such a thing needs maintenance.

simonh 6y ago

I showed the magazine cover to my daughter. “I want a boat helicopter... er.. house!”

mips_avatar 6y ago

I wish personal aviation was a little more accessible. The only innovation I can think of that would really change the math on flying would be very high density batteries, and electric planes. Otherwise flying costs are going to continue to be dominated by expensive engine maintenance.

cpncrunch 6y ago
Light sport aircraft (in USA) or advanced ultralights (Canada) are a lot more affordable than certified aircraft.
- mips_avatar 6y ago
  The hope with light sport aircraft was that prices would drop. But it’s minor, a Cessna 172 is still cheaper than what you can get in light sport
  - cpncrunch 6y ago
    Well, a 1970s 172 is cheaper than a new light sport aircraft, so it's not really a fair comparison. I was hoping with the part 23 rewrite we might get cheaper new aircraft, but that hasn't happened.