On Wings of Imagination

The helicopter that a motorcycle mechanic from interior Maharashtra built

Pradip Shivaji Mohite’s fascination with helicopters started the day a politician landed in his village, Kodegaon, about 70 km from Sangli. Mohite, who earned a living repairing motorcycles, had only studied up to class 9.

He decided to make a helicopter nevertheless. He used the engine of a Maruti 800 to power the rotors, which are controlled by the car’s brake cables. A tractor battery was used to start the machine, while an automobile speedometer helped gauge the RPM and speed. Mohite understandably kept it simple. He designed a two-blade main rotor and a two-blade smaller tail rotor to stabilise the craft while in the air. He succeeded in getting the machine airborne in July 2012. A local television news crew recorded Mohite strapped inside the craft taking off about 10 feet into the air, listing to one side and falling to the ground, damaging its left side. For his effort, he was recently felicitated by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) at the recently concluded biennial air show Aero India in Bangalore. An HAL team zeroed in on him after hearing about his experiments. Congratulating the young innovator who was awarded the Dhruv award, HAL chairman RK Tyagi showered him with praise, saying it was a great achievement for a person who did not have a formal engineering degree. At the Aero India show, the young innovator, comfortable speaking only his mother tongue, Marathi, shared the limelight with top guns as he went around inspecting flying machines of all sizes and shapes.

The chopper is currently parked at a sugar factory run by a local politician who has also promised to fund the flying project. Mohite says, “It is repairable and will take to the air in about two months’ time.” Mohite says all its components were designed and manufactured by him, and his ultimate dream is to make some modifications to the machine and have it flown by qualified helicopter pilots. To do that, he says he has even set aside his marriage plans for the time being.

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Anil Budur Lulla