IP History

10Dec 1956

True Magazine, Zimmerman Article

Col. David Henderson testing the jetboard prototype in 1951

It is cold in February in a 6-8 knot wind with a hundred mile an hour air blast coming out under your feet.

There have been six occasions, over the last 172 years, when a decisive advance in man’s mastery of the air has been reported. Five of these have been reports of the free balloon, the directible balloon, the gliding airplane, the powered airplane and the helicopter. Today’s triumph is called thrust-vector flight.

True Magazine, December, 1956

Thrust vector flight. Thrust vectored flight using a fluid for propulsion. Sounds like our sport of jetpack/jetboard hydro flight. The quote is from 1956. Fifty eight years ago. True magazine, “The best selling men’s magazine” December 1956. We have a copy here in the Stratospheric office, it is great reading. Here is the backbone of the history as told in 1956, it goes like this..
Continue reading

20Sep 1956

True Magazine Scans

04May 1955

NACA Research Abstracts No. 82

NACA, which was the predecessor to NASA, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics ran from 1915 until 1958 when it transitioned into NASA with the dawn of the space age. These documents are important because they reinforce the first publication and availability to the public of the information. The prior art.

The grandfather document.

17Mar 1954

NACA Research Memorandum, RM L54B12a

What is cool about this document is that toward the end it references further tests outdoors of the jet-platform.

Since reference 1 was published (1953) flights on a jet-supported platform were made out-of-doors. Figure 10 shows a typical flight on the jet-supported platform. The riders of such a vehicle had practically no difficulty with the wind. In calm air the rotor-supported vehicle hovers more steadily than the jet-supported vehicle. In gusty air the rotor supported vehicle was more disturbed.

“Typical flight”, far from being a mere experiment, in the three years since the first trial, the platform had become almost a method of testing jet concepts.

Notice in Figure 10 below that the platform size has shrunk to foot width and the support legs are compact and protect the jet from the ground, naturally.

The notes in this document referencing the jet-platform:

Conclusions

3. By comparison with a low-inertia jet-supported platform previously tested, the teetering-rotor-supported platform flew steadier in calm air and with larger oscillations in gusty air.

4. Although a substantial inertia of the machine did not appear to be particularly critical, an arrangement in which the flyer’s body moved with the flyer’s feet was physically easier to fly in rough air.

15Jan 1953

NACA Research Memorandum, RM L52D10

This is the cool one, the uber mack daddy document of the thrust vectored sport. NACA Research Memorandum, RM L52D10, “Preliminary Experimental Investigation of the Flight of a Person Supported by a Jet Thrust Device Attached to His Feet”. Detailing Charley Zimmerman’s experiments with hooking up a firehose to a plywood board and kicking off (albiet slowly) the sport of vectored thrust flight.

Here is the first announcement in a publication to the world after it’s top secret classification was removed. As the record shows, the “apparatus” was first tested on February 2, 1951, the Research Memorandum published two years later on January 15, 1953, then stamped as “Classified” and then made public in 1955.
Continue reading