Two years later, Dr Frederick Gerhardt, head
of the Aeronautical Engineering Department
and the University of Michigan, successfully
flew one of the weirdest-looking aeroplanes
ever seen. The Gerhardt Cycleplane had seven
wings, stacked one on top of the other, like
a biplane or triplane but with seven layers,
making it nearly 15 feet tall. It didn’t look like
the sort of thing you could knock together in
your tea break. It was a delicate machine, but
the flimsy construction that was intended
to make it as light as possible was also its
downfall. In some comical footage, which you
can find online, you can see it having a bit of a
wobble as it’s being pushed along the ground
before the stacked wings all collapse inwards
on to the fuselage.
of the Aeronautical Engineering Department
and the University of Michigan, successfully
flew one of the weirdest-looking aeroplanes
ever seen. The Gerhardt Cycleplane had seven
wings, stacked one on top of the other, like
a biplane or triplane but with seven layers,
making it nearly 15 feet tall. It didn’t look like
the sort of thing you could knock together in
your tea break. It was a delicate machine, but
the flimsy construction that was intended
to make it as light as possible was also its
downfall. In some comical footage, which you
can find online, you can see it having a bit of a
wobble as it’s being pushed along the ground
before the stacked wings all collapse inwards
on to the fuselage.
It might have looked like something out of
a Laurel and Hardy movie, but Gerhardt’s
aeroplane had actually flown. Pedal power
turned a two-blade propeller in the aircraft’s
nose that pulled it along fast enough for it to
make several short flights, but to get going fast
enough for those flights it needed to be towed
by a car. The only time that a human-powered
take-off was attempted, they managed just a
short hop of 20 feet at a height of only two feet.
The next real landmark event came in the 1930s
when German inventor Engelbert Zaschka
built a massive monoplane with a wingspan
of around 66 feet (20 metres). It had a huge
propeller and the pilot sat high off the ground,
behind the propeller. The machine reportedly
managed a brief flight of about 20 metres and is
believed to have done so taking off under pedal
power at Berlin’s Tempelhof airport in 1934.
During that decade far longer flights were made
by other aircraft, such as the German HV-1
Mufli or the Italian Pedaliante, which stayed
airborne for a full kilometre, but both the Mufli
and the Pedaliante needed help from catapults
Top: Hopeful avietteflyer
Paul Didier managed to
glide about 5 metres on
his flying bike in 1912.
Middle: The Gerhardt
Cycleplane at McCook
Field air base in Ohio in
1923, shortly before it all
collapsed in a heap.
Cycleplane at McCook
Field air base in Ohio in
1923, shortly before it all
collapsed in a heap.
Bottom: German inventor
Engelbert Zaschka’s
monoplane in 1934
without any fabric
covering on the wings
or tail. He reportedly
made an unauthenticated
human-powered take-off
and short flight at Berlin’s
Templehof airport.
DISCOVERING THE WORLD OF HUMAN POWERED FLIGHT 83