Value chain · CLM-1136
In plain terms
The famous 1964 helicopter hung fifteen metres up for ten hours on beamed microwaves, rectified by four and a half thousand diodes; then the Air Force lost interest and the idea went to NASA.
The claim as recorded
On 28 October 1964 Raytheon's microwave-powered helicopter "was flown for 10 hr at an altitude of 15.2 m" on a microwave beam, its propeller driven by DC "obtained using 4,480 semiconductor diodes" on dipole antennas, a demonstration carried on CBS news, after which "the U.S. Air Force elected to discontinue their power beaming endeavors" and Brown turned to NASA Marshall in 1967; the review's chart places the Brown 1980 history point [17] near 200 W at about 18 m.
Evidence behind this: T2-review restatement of Brown's RADC report [64] and 1980 history [17], neither held.
Scope and limits
NO POWER, FREQUENCY OR EFFICIENCY IN THE TEXT FOR THIS FLIGHT; the 200 W is a chart reading of a point whose identity is inferred. [64] (RADC-TR-65-188, December 1965) not held.
What it assumes
The Fig. 2 point [17] (Brown 1980) is this flight; the chart does not say so.
Where it comes from
PDF 7 / printed 235: "One of the most well-known power beaming demonstrations to the public occurred on October 28, 1964" (normalised); "was flown for 10 hr at an altitude of 15.2 m [64] while powered by a microwave beam" (R1); "Dipole antennas were used to collect the incoming microwave energy, and the DC energy that powered the propeller was obtained using 4,480 semiconductor diodes" (normalised); "After the helicopter flight, the U.S. Air Force elected to discontinue their power beaming endeavors" (R1). Same page: "The presentation was covered by Walter Cronkite's CBS news program" (normalised); "Thus in 1967, W. Brown began to court von Braun and his staff at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) on the possibilities of power beaming in space" (normalised). PDF 2, Fig. 2 (crop reading): point [17] at about 200 W and about 18 m.
Basis: hours; m altitude; diode count
Cite this
energyaperture.com/c/clm-1136
CLM-1136, Energy Aperture, as of 2021-01.
Connected records
Other published records linked to this one. A list, not a judgement.
- Also from SRC-269
- CLM-1134The field's own 2021 scorecard: the two records were both set in 1975 (30-35 kW across about a mile, and 54 per cent DC in to DC out at...CLM-1135Modern power beaming, by the review's dating, starts in 1963 with a radar tube, a horn five and a half metres away and a single vacuum-tube...CLM-1137In 1987 a Canadian model plane with a four-and-a-half-metre wingspan flew for twenty minutes at 150 metres on nothing but a microwave beam...CLM-1138A 1994 Japanese test sent five kilowatts from a three-metre dish to an eleven-square-metre rectenna 42 metres away and caught about...CLM-1139A 1995 Japanese blimp carrying a three-by-three-metre rectenna flew for four minutes at fifty metres on ten kilowatts of microwaves from...CLM-1141In 2002 a metre-wide rectenna moved along an exhibition floor in Houston, tracked by a self-steering 5.8 GHz beam, converting 82 per cent...CLM-1142In 2015 Mitsubishi Heavy sent ten kilowatts of microwaves half a kilometre along a Kobe pier to an eight-by-eight-metre receiver, enough to...CLM-1143Japan's flagship 2015 ground test: a solid-state GaN array of about one and a half square metres sent 1.8 kilowatts 55 metres and 335 watts...More on the source page.