Video: Human-Powered Gamera II Helicopter Hovers for a World-Record 50 Seconds

Time to give up on this idea. It is totally ground effect lift.

@jefro
Yes that was ground effect, but overcoming that isn't nearly as hard as just getting off the ground. Now it's a matter of efficiency improvements and iteration. One step closer!

Any biker will tell you that you want your leg almost fully extended at the maximum pedal length. He's practically hitting himself in the chest with his knees...he's wasting a ton of potential pedaling power!

Shift the seat upwards or backwards to get full extension and I bet the human power could be increased 30%. Imagine what another 30% power could do for lift.

they should put a simple transmission onto it, just like a gear shifter connected to a lever, that way halfway through it when you actually get the wings going you can shift over and get more energy out of your strokes and such.

to mars or bust!

Just by looking at the cyclist it's obvious the design is not as ergonomic as it could be. Would be interesting to see the mathematics behind human powered flight and why they seem to think it's possible.

They can play with this all they want but they need to get past two parts. One is having a human that can create enough power or a machine that can be used by a human. Either way it is still considered impossible at this time.

This is not even one step in the right direction. I'd be more impressed if they can get 10 feet off the ground for 1 second rather that use ground effect lift for an hour. True flight was not achieved here at all. The entire machine was constructed to use ground effects alone. It is going to take a lot more power to get 5 feet then even a lot more 10 feet.

Waste of time and money. Keep thinking, you might get it, but not with this.

Making oneself and the flying vehicle as light in weight is important, so would it be cheating, if they attach some helium filled balloons to reduce the weight of the helicopter. Then the human would have less energy to to gain lift for the flight.

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Every day is a new day!

Interesting comments regard ergonomics and efficiency of the "pilot". I wonder if they'll be able to take advantage of the recommendations and see gains.

Jefro can't seem to see the forest for the trees. In Ground Effect (IGE) flight is STILL flight. The ground isn't magically pushing the aircraft upwards, its breaking up wing tip vortices and allowing the wings to operate efficiently.

In theory, if the rotor diameter was 6m, they could reach the 3m altitude mark and still be IGE. It would still count.

No one wonders if commecial jets should remove their winglets because breaking up wingtip vortices is somehow cheating. Efficient design is a good thing! Perhaps these folks will develop some technique of breaking up the vortices OGE and everyone will benefit.

I wish them luck!