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| About GBA | Corporate Statements | Management Profile | Consultants |
| About GBA "It
is the mission of Groen Brothers Aviation to design and build gyroplanes
that The Company Groen Brothers Aviation, Inc. (GBA) is engaged in the business of designing and developing new high performance gyroplanes and gyrodynes using advanced technology and modern aerospace design methods. GBA was founded in 1986 by David Groen and his brother, the late Jay Groen. David, Chairman, President & CEO, is supported by highly experienced aviation executives in key roles. GBA's Corporate Headquarters are located in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, with its current manufacturing facility on the same site. GBA also operates a flight test and R&D facility in Buckeye, Arizona, near Phoenix. Since its inception twenty years ago, GBA has been involved in an extensive research program in the design, engineering, development, testing and marketing of gyroplane and gyrodyne aircraft. As a result GBA has successfully developed innovative technology that has brought autorotative flight into the modern age.
GBA
announced in December, 2006 that a Memorandum of Understanding has
been Groen Brothers Aviation, Inc. is a fully-reporting publicly held corporation, registered in the State of Utah. It has been traded over-the-counter on the OTC Bulletin Board since 1990 under the stock symbol "GNBA." The GBA's web site is www.groenbros.com. The Origins of the Gyroplane A gyroplane flies by using a rotorwing similar to a helicopter and a propeller typical of a light airplane, providing certain characteristics of both aircraft types. Unlike a helicopter, a gyroplane’s rotor system is not driven by the engine, which only powers the propeller for forward thrust. Air forced through the rotor blades by the forward movement of the aircraft causes the rotor to turn in autorotation and thereby provide lift. Since the gyroplane in flight is always in autorotation, it is inherently safer, simpler and quieter than a helicopter. Autorotative flight was conceived in 1919 by the Spanish aviator and airplane designer, Juan de la Cierva, as a means of achieving slow flight without the risk of stalling the aircraft. Cierva flew his first autogiro (gyroplane) in the early twenties and continued to develop increasingly sophisticated gyroplanes over the following fifteen years. Under license from Cierva in the 1920's and 1930's, the Pitcairn & Kellett companies made further innovations leading to gyroplanes capable of vertical takeoff and landing.
The complexity of the helicopter both to design and to operate meant that its promise was not fully realized until the Vietnam War, when the versatility of vertical flight proved very valuable. For widespread civilian use, however, the helicopter has become too expensive and too difficult to fly, providing an opportunity for the much less complex and much more manageable gyroplane to reemerge. GBA Gyroplane Development The Groen brothers, well aware of the technological advances made since the 1940s that could be applied to the basic gyroplane design, recognized the opportunity that a modern gyroplane presented. In particular they realized that the collective pitch controlled rotor system developed for helicopters could be applied to a gyroplane. This innovation would substantially improve a gyroplane’s ability to achieve vertical takeoff and landing, as well as dramatically improve performance in both high speed flight and safe low and slow flight. GBA has three U.S. Patents and several International Patents relating to the variable pitch rotor system they developed. With such improvements the gyroplane could become a safe, economical and versatile aircraft with appeal to a broad range of markets. Based on this insight, the Groens decided in 1986 to enter the market and to design their first gyroplane. Following the successful flight of a proof-of-concept aircraft in 1987, the Groens designed, manufactured and flew several prototype test gyroplanes of increasing size and sophistication during the 1990s. Each of these gyroplanes were typically ultra-short take-off and landing (USTOL) aircraft that demonstrated that gyroplanes could be significantly easier to fly and maintain than a helicopter, would have significantly less maintenance down time and therefore much higher mission readiness, and would be safer than either airplanes or helicopters. By 1999 Groen Brothers Aviation had designed and manufactured their first piston-engine version of the four-seat Hawk 4 Gyroplane. This aircraft flew in September 1999, followed by the turbine-engine version in July 2000. This latter aircraft, powered by a Rolls-Royce Model 250 420shp turboprop engine, was the world’s first turbine powered gyroplane. The Hawk 4 has flown in several hundred incident-free sorties, over hundreds of hours of flight time in its flight-test program. GBA is the first company to analyze and optimize gyroplane rotor blade airfoil performance. A technique designed (and performed) by three leading experts in rotor blade and airfoil design was utilized to complete this study, resulting in a family of natural laminar-flow airfoils for the rotor blades of the Hawk 4 and successor gyroplanes. The airfoil design optimizes the lift/drag relationship for the Hawk rotor system. Initial Hawk models will use aluminum rotor blades with GBA's proprietary airfoil design, and subsequent models are anticipated to use composite blades with an enhanced GBA proprietary airfoil design that will permit increased operating speeds.
The Hawk 5 (five place) Gyroplane brings to aviation a unique aircraft with many utilitarian qualities. The Hawk’s performance and exceptional versatility also offer a safe and affordable alternative to helicopters and airplanes in many applications. The aircraft’s simple, robust, design translates into lower operating costs than any comparable turbine powered helicopter. The wide operating speed range, from 46 - 162 mph, of this highly maneuverable gyroplane also ensures the Hawk 5 a new niche in the aviation marketplace. Easy to fly and always in autorotation, the Hawk 5 offers uncompromising safety in the realm of flight.
GBA is now placing its gyroplane emphasis on its five-place turbine-powered gyroplane, the Hawk 5, and its two-place piston-powered SparrowHawk Gyroplane. Both of these aircraft answer a well defined need within the aviation world for safe, effective, reliable and exceptionally economical aircraft that do not need runways. Both aircraft can serve the needs of public agencies for low cost aerial patrol for law enforcement, border control, environmental protection and similar roles. Each also has important commercial uses that cover a wide range of activities including air taxi, private transportation, news gathering and crop spraying. Since GBA's patented rotor technology is fully scalable, its combination with the inherent stability, reliability and maneuverability of the gyroplane make an excellent surveillance or weapons platform for both manned and unmanned aircraft. GBA perceives applications of its technology to a wide range of future large, medium and small gyroplanes.
As previously noted, GBA is under contract with US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to design a proof of concept high speed, long range, vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) aircraft, named by DARPA as the “Heliplane.” In a recent article headlined “Heliplane Design Gathers Speed” from the weekly aerospace news magazine Flight International, GBA/DARPA Heliplane Project Manager Don Woodbury has reported on the progress thus far. “We did not realize how much of a challenge 400mph was, but we have a design that converges, and we have got some margin,” said Woodbury. GBA and DARPA recently completed a system requirements review on the rotor and are now involved in meeting the Milestone 5 objectives in Phase One of the project. GBA’s contract, a fifteen month $6.4 million award to develop the preliminary design and perform key technology demonstrations, is Phase One of the potential multi-year $40 million four phase program. The Heliplane is designed to exploit GBA’s gyrodyne technology, offering the VTOL capability of a helicopter, the fast forward flight of an airplane, and the safety, simplicity and reliability of a GBA gyroplane. The GBA team includes Georgia Tech, Adam Aircraft, Williams International and a highly renowned team of aerospace consultants. On the Government Team under DARPA, the GBA team is receiving important support from NASA Ames and the Army’s AFDD team at NASA Ames Research Center in addition to leading Rotorcraft Technologists who for decades led much of this nation’s advanced rotor-wing aircraft development efforts.
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In
November, 2005, the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
(DARPA) selected a GBA-led team to design a proof of concept high
speed, long range, vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) aircraft
designed for use in Combat Search and Rescue roles. This modern
rotorcraft, named the “Heliplane” by DARPA, could be
the next generation rotor wing aircraft, meeting economy and performance
goals not considered achievable by any other type of VTOL aircraft.
signed
with the government of Aragón, Spain to form a joint venture
(JV) to complete FAA certification, production, marketing, and delivery
of GBA’s Hawk 5 Gyroplane. The intent of the parties is that
the JV will acquire from GBA for an as yet undisclosed sum, the
Hawk 5 program including its derivative gyroplane aircraft designs
and technologies. It will fund GBA to complete FAA certification
of the Hawk 5 Gyroplane in the United States, commence setting up
new as well as re-establishing existing Hawk Gyroplane dealerships
throughout the world, while taking advance orders, and build and
operate a factory in Aragón, Spain for world wide deliveries.
The
gyroplane concept demonstrated itself as a proven technology in
the 1930's and 1940's when the U.S. Post Office used these aircraft
for nearly ten years for mail delivery from the roofs of post offices.
In the runup to WWII, however, the helicopter with its ability to
hover appeared to the government and military to be the next logical
step in the evolution of rotorcraft. With the economy in depression,
investment was directed to the helicopter and further development
of the gyroplane was curtailed.
In 2002, GBA contracted with the Utah Olympic
Public Safety Command (UOPSC) to provide perimeter patrol around
the Salt Lake City International Airport during the 2002 Winter
Olympics and Paralympics. The Hawk 4, as an integral part of security,
was available 24-7, completing 67 missions and accumulating 75 hours
of maintenance free flight time during its operational period.
In
February, 2003, GBA formed American Autogyro, to produce gyroplanes
for the “kit-built” market. American Autogyro’s
two-place Sparrow Hawk Gyroplane is also offered as a complete,
turn-key aircraft in an Airborne Patrol Vehicle (APV) model. The
SparrowHawk APV is an excellent entry-level airborne surveillance
vehicle for many law enforcement agencies. American Autogyro also
sells a Stabilization Augmentation Kit, designed to dramatically
improve in-flight stability and safety for what has been the most
popular competing kit gyroplane in that market. More than 120 SparrowHawk
Gyroplanes and Sparrow-Hawk/P modification kits have been sold.
Additional information is available at 
GBA
has also developed conceptual designs for much larger gyroplanes
modified to enable pure vertical take-off and landing, and provide
the hover capability of a helicopter. A gyroplane, so modified is
called a gyrodyne and obtains this capability by using small tip
jets to power the rotor during takeoff and landing and while hovering.
During cruise, with tipjets turned off, the gyrodyne flies as a
gyroplane in sustained autorotative flight. 
For
a number of important commercial applications, GBA believes the
gyrodyne will have significant advantages over any other aircraft
type, including helicopters and tilt rotor aircraft. GBA has had
extensive discussions with major aerospace companies on the application
of its technology for both short range vertical take-off and landing
(VTOL) airliners and package delivery aircraft, fire fighting air
tankers and military freighters with range, payload and speed well
in excess of the capabilities of any existing VTOL aircraft. 
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