Juan de la Cierva facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
The Most Illustrious
Juan de la Cierva
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Juan de la Cierva, inventor of the autogyro at the Lasarte Airfield in 1930
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Juan de la Cierva y Codorníu
21 September 1895 Murcia, Spain
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| Died | 9 December 1936 (aged 41) Croydon, United Kingdom
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| Resting place | La Almudena Cemetery, Madrid, Spain |
| Alma mater | Escuela Especial de Ingenieros de Caminos, Canales y Puertos |
| Occupation | Civil engineer, aviator, inventor |
| Known for | Inventor of the autogyro |
| Awards | Daniel Guggenheim Medal (1932) Elliott Cresson Medal (1933) |
Juan de la Cierva was a brilliant Spanish engineer and pilot. He was born in Murcia, Spain, on September 21, 1895. He sadly passed away in Croydon, United Kingdom, on December 9, 1936.
Juan de la Cierva is most famous for inventing the autogyro in 1920. This was a special type of aircraft that used a spinning rotor to create lift. In 1923, after four years of hard work, he made a big breakthrough. He developed a new rotor design that allowed for the first successful flight of a stable aircraft with spinning wings. His C.4 prototype showed the world what was possible!
Contents
Early Life & First Inventions
Juan de la Cierva came from a wealthy family in Spain. His father was even a government minister for a time. From a young age, Juan loved to experiment with flying.
When he was just eight years old, he and his friends used their pocket money to build gliders. They worked in one of his father's sheds, dreaming of flight. As teenagers, they even built an airplane using parts from a crashed French plane. They even used wood from a Spanish bar counter for the propeller!
Juan later earned a degree in civil engineering. After successfully building and testing his first autogyro, he moved to the United Kingdom in 1925. There, with help from a Scottish businessman named James George Weir, he started the Cierva Autogiro Company.
How the Autogyro Works
De la Cierva began building aircraft in 1912. By 1914, he designed a three-engine airplane that the Spanish government accepted. In 1919, he started thinking about a new way to fly. He wanted an aircraft that could generate lift even at slow speeds. This would help prevent the risk of the aircraft losing lift and falling, which is called a stall.
He realized that a spinning rotor could keep turning without an engine, a process called autorotation. This happens when air flowing through the rotor keeps it spinning. This idea was already known as a safety feature for helicopters. If a helicopter's engine failed, autorotation would allow it to descend safely.
In De la Cierva's autogyro, a regular propeller pulled the aircraft forward. This forward motion made the rotor spin, creating enough lift to fly level, climb, and descend.
Solving Flight Challenges
Before his success, De la Cierva faced many challenges. His early designs had problems with unbalanced movements during takeoff. This was due to differences in lift between the rotor blades moving forward and those moving backward.
He solved this big problem by inventing the "flapping hinge." This hinge allowed each rotor blade to move up and down independently. In 1923, De la Cierva's first successful autogyro flew at Getafe airfield in Spain. Lieutenant Gomez Spencer was the pilot.
Developing the Autogyro in the UK
De la Cierva's amazing work started in Spain. In 1925, he brought his C.6 autogyro to Britain. He showed it to the Air Ministry at Farnborough, Hampshire. This machine had a four-blade rotor with flapping hinges. It used regular airplane controls for moving up/down, side-to-side, and turning. To get the rotor spinning for takeoff, a rope was quickly unwound from around the blades.
The demonstration at Farnborough was a huge success! It led to an invitation for De la Cierva to continue his work in the UK. With help from Scottish businessman James George Weir, the Cierva Autogiro Company, Ltd., was formed the next year. De la Cierva focused on designing and making the rotor systems. Other companies, like the A.V. Roe Company, built the main aircraft bodies.
The C.8, built by Avro, was an improved version of the C.6. It had a more powerful engine. The C.8R also included "drag hinges" to reduce stress on the rotor blades.
Solving these basic rotor problems helped the autogyro develop quickly. People gained confidence in the aircraft. After several flights across the country, a C.8L4 was entered into the 1928 Kings Cup Air Race. Even though it had to withdraw, the C.8L4 later completed a 4,800 km (3,000 mi) tour of the British Isles. Later that year, it flew from London to Paris, becoming the first aircraft with spinning wings to cross the English Channel. The tour then went on to include Berlin, Brussels, and Amsterdam.
Improving Takeoff
A main challenge for autogyros was getting the rotor to spin fast enough before takeoff. Many methods were tried. The coiled rope system could get the rotor to about half the needed speed. Then, the aircraft had to move along the ground to gain flying speed, while tilting the rotor to start autorotation.
Another idea was to tilt the tail to direct engine air up through the rotor. The best solution came with the C.19 Mk.4. This model had a direct connection from the engine to the rotor. This allowed the rotor to spin up to speed before takeoff. Then, the connection was released, and the aircraft could take off.
New Innovations and Legacy
As De la Cierva's autogyros became successful, others joined in and brought new ideas. A very important improvement was direct rotor control. This allowed pilots to control the aircraft by changing the angle of the rotor blades. This was first done by tilting the entire rotor hub. Later, Raoul Hafner developed a "spider mechanism" that directly controlled each blade.
The first autogyro with this direct control was the C.30. Many of these were built by Avro, Liore et Olivier, and Focke-Wulf. This machine allowed for movement in any direction – up, down, or sideways – by tilting the main rotors. It also simplified some of the controls used in other aircraft of that time.
Another big improvement was the "jump takeoff." For this, the rotor would spin up very fast while not creating much lift. Once it reached the right speed, the engine connection was released. This caused the blades to swing forward and increase their angle, making the aircraft leap into the air. With all engine power now pushing the aircraft forward, it could continue flying with the rotor in autorotation. The C.40 was the first autogyro built for jump takeoff.
Autogyros were built in many countries under De la Cierva's licenses, including France, Germany, Japan, Russia, and the United States.
De la Cierva's main goal was to create an aircraft that would not stall. However, near the end of his life, he saw the benefits of the helicopter. He began working towards building a true helicopter. In 1936, the Cierva Autogiro Company, Ltd. started designing a helicopter for the British Royal Navy.
Death
On December 9, 1936, Juan de la Cierva boarded a Dutch DC-2 airplane at Croydon Airfield. He was going to Amsterdam. There was a delay because of heavy fog. The plane took off around 10:30 am but went slightly off course. It crashed into a house near the airport, killing 15 people, including De la Cierva.
Lasting Impact
Juan de la Cierva's work on how spinning wings move was crucial for the modern helicopter. Before him, people didn't fully understand these things, which stopped helicopters from being practical. The knowledge he gained applies to all aircraft with spinning wings. Even though autogyros can't fly straight up like helicopters, De la Cierva's work laid the foundation for understanding how helicopters work.
His death in 1936 stopped him from building a useful helicopter for the Royal Navy. However, his autogyro work was used to achieve this goal. The technology developed for the autogyro helped create the experimental Fw 61 helicopter, which flew in 1936. His pioneering work also led to a third type of aircraft with spinning wings, the gyrodyne. This idea came from his former assistant, Dr. James Allan Jamieson Bennett.
In 1966, Juan de la Cierva was honored in the International Aerospace Hall of Fame. This was for his amazing ideas in rotor blade technology. The Juan de la Cierva Scholarship from the Spanish Ministry of Science is named after him.
See also
- Cierva C.1
- Cierva C.2
- Cierva C.3
- Cierva C.4
- Cierva C.6
- Cierva C.8
- Cierva C.9
- Cierva C.12
- Cierva C.17
- Cierva C.19
- Cierva C.24
- Cierva Air Horse
- Cierva W.9
- Cierva CR Twin
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Juan de la Cierva para niños
