Piasecki Helicopter Corporation

Industry	Aerospace
Founded	1940 (1940)
Founders	Frank Piasecki
Defunct	1960
Fate	acquired byBoeing
Successor	Boeing Vertol
Headquarters	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, US

ThePiasecki Helicopter Corporation was an American designer and manufacturer ofhelicopters inPhiladelphia and nearbyMorton, Pennsylvania, in the late 1940s and the 1950s.^[1] Its founder,Frank Piasecki, was ousted in 1956 and started a new company,Piasecki Aircraft. Piasecki Helicopter was renamedVertol Corporation in early 1956.^{[2]: 257–8} Vertol was acquired byBoeing in 1960 and renamedBoeing Vertol.

The Piasecki Helicopter Corporation was founded in1940 byFrank Piasecki and fellow aeronautics studentHarold Venzie as theP-V Engineering Forum (shortened from Piasecki-Venzie);^[3][4] the other partners were F.J. Kosloski, Donald N. Meyers, Elliott Daland, and Walter Swartz.^[5] The first design from P-V Engineering was the PV-1, arotorless-tail design that used a tapering tail cone and pressurized air to suppress main rotor torque.^[6] Venzie left the firm in 1943.^[7]: 143

ThePV-2 (NX-37061) was a more conventional design and became the third helicopter flown in theUnited States (followingIgor Sikorsky'sVS-300 andSikorsky R-4). It was designed and flown by Frank Piasecki on April 11,1943. Piasecki had limited pilot experience; the PV-2 was tethered to the ground as a safety measure, but the clothesline he used broke. He towed the helicopter behind his car in October 1943 to Washington, DC to demonstrate it to federal government officials; because the wheels had no bearings, he had to stop every 10 to 15 minutes to cool them.^[3] When asked to show his pilot's license following the demonstration in Washington, Piasecki admitted he did not have one and he was issued the first helicopter pilot's license on October 20, 1943, by theCivil Aeronautics Administration.^[3][4]

With the successful demonstration of the PV-2, Piasecki convinced theUnited States Navy to fund the development of a follow-on prototype, signing a contract on January 1, 1944;^[6] this marked the start of the design and sale of a series oftandem rotor helicopters to the Navy. The resultingPV-3 became the world's first successful tandem rotor design. The PV-3 first flew on March 7, 1945 and bore the Navy designation XHRP-X; it was larger and capable of lifting more than the contemporary Sikorsky designs.^[3][4]

Because P-V Engineering lacked the capital to fund production, the company was reorganized and renamed to thePiasecki Helicopter Corporation in1946,^[3] withLaurance Rockefeller andA. Felix du Pont Jr. taking a controlling interest of 51% in exchange for $500,000.^[6] After constructing two more prototypes (designated XHRP-1),^[6] the PV-3 would go into production as theHRP-1 in1947.^[4] The HRP-1 was commonly nicknamed the "flying banana" because of the upward angle of the aft fuselage which ensured the large rotors did not hit each other in flight. The nickname would later be applied to other Piasecki tandem-rotor helicopters of similar design.

An evolutionary follow-on design to the HRP-1, designated HRP-2, used an all-metal skin and switched crew seating to side-by-side instead of tandem; however, the limited power meant only five were built, all for the Coast Guard.^[6] In 1949, Piasecki provided theH-21 Workhorse to theUnited States Air Force, an improved version of the HRP-2 with a more powerfulWright R-1820 Cyclone radial engine.^[6] Piasecki's tandem-rotor helicopters flew higher than competing single rotor designs, and offered a smoother ride.

At approximately the same time the HRP-1 and HRP-2 were being developed, the Navy commissioned Piasecki to design a smaller tandem-rotor utility helicopter; the resulting prototype, which Piasecki called the PV-14, was designated XHJP-1.^[6] These went into production as theHUP-1 (PV-18), with the first variants delivered to both the Navy and theUnited States Army (as the H-25) in 1949; in total, 339 were delivered to the militaries of the United States, Canada, and France by 1954.^[6] The HUP was designed with overlapping main rotor blades, which reduced the size so they could be carried on aircraft carrier elevators.^[8]

Don R. Berlin was brought in as president and director of Piasecki Helicopters in 1953,^[9] while Frank Piasecki was chairman of the board. Under Piasecki, the company began the PV-15 large transport tandem helicopter project (designatedH-16). The prototype PV-15 was first flown in 1953, but a fatal crash in January 1956 led to the cancellation of the project.^[6]

The majority owners eventually lost faith in Frank Piasecki's leadership and by May 1956 he was forced out of the company. He had formed a new company,Piasecki Aircraft Corporation to pursue the development of compound helicopters and other rotorcraft. In two successive special stockholders' meetings the board then changed the name of Piasecki Helicopter toVertol (forvertical take-off and landing) Aircraft Corporation and amended the bylaws to bar Piasecki's re-election as a director, on the grounds that he was running a rival company.^{[2]: 257–8}

In 1956, Vertol began developing a successor to the HUP with improved lift capacity by usingturboshaft engines. The project was designatedVertol Model 107 (V-107), and a prototype first flew on April 22, 1958. Impressed, the Army awarded a contract for ten production aircraft (then designated YHC-1A) in June and later asked Vertol in March 1959 to produce a larger version, which was designatedV-114. With the pressure to produce two relatively new designs, Vertol again ran into financial pressure^[10] and was acquired byBoeing on March 30, 1960,^[11] who renamed itBoeing Vertol.^[1] It became theBoeing Helicopter Division in 1987.

• Piasecki Aircraft

• Spenser, Jay P. (1998).Whirlybirds, A History of the U.S. Helicopter Pioneers. Seattle, Washington: University of Washington Press.ISBN 0-295-97699-3.
• Trimble, William F. (1982).High Frontier: A History of Aeronautics in Pennsylvania. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: University of Pittsburgh Press.ISBN 978-0-82295-340-1.

• Defunct helicopter manufacturers of the United States
• Boeing mergers and acquisitions
• Manufacturing companies based in Philadelphia
• Manufacturing companies established in 1940
• Defunct companies based in Pennsylvania

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