Tamiya TA32548

PIASECKI HRP-1/2 "RESCUER" (helicopter)By Tommy Thomason 56-pages, 127 b&w photos, 20-drawings, 4-color photos ABOUT THIS BOOK: The big U.S. Army CH-47 Chinook helicopter is the direct descendant of a Navy contract awarded during WW II to a young helicopter pioneer, Frank Piasecki, and his group of part-time engineers to design, build and fly what would be at the time the world's largest helicopter, the HRP-1 Rescuer. It would also be the first successful tandem-rotor helicopter. His experience?: A tiny single -eat, single-main-rotor helicopter built in a garage from junk and used hardware that he taught himself to fly. The degree of difficulty was clearly high. Neither of the two companies that the Army had first awarded helicopter development contracts to was able to qualify one for production. In the US, only the much better known now Igor Sikorsky also succeeded before the war ended. As it happened, like Frank he had begun his long career with the intention of flying a helicopter. Frank's initial success was not a fluke. In the next ten years, his nascent enterprise, not even a company at first, grew along with the size and success of his helicopter product line to a full-fledged aerospace company, competing head to head with Sikorsky for military contracts and civil helicopter sales. Its descendant is now part of the Boeing Company that produces the CH-47.

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