The Principle of the Helicopter

[boneh3ad]

Seeing as that explanation is as wrong as I now realize it to be, why is it so widely taught?

Well it is only partially wrong. It is true that there is a faster flow over the top and so a lower pressure and that you can directly calculate lift from those pressures. The part that is often taught incorrectly is why the air moves over the top faster. Usually it is either taught very superficially, incorrectly or just outright omitted. I can only imagine that to be due to the fact that it isn't a simple matter. Most sources you mentioned are simply catered to people who aren't at the level yet where the real reasons would make any sense.

 

[Low-Q]

I have not flown such helicopters but I seem to recall the stabiliser bar is sometimes dubbed a 'Chinaman's Hat'? Don't take that as a fact unless someone can corroborate it, maybe that was just a 'local' nick-name I over-heard, or mis-heard.

Do you mean the fly bars?

Vidar

 

[cmb]

I don't understand what you mean by 'fly bars'.

The horizontal stick with masses at the ends is a rotor stabiliser that rotates with the rotor. The cyclic loads of the blades are set to work against each other through the hub mechanisms, and the stabiliser bar damps those cyclic oscillations. The more blades you have, the more the rotor self-damps, but with just two blades the manufacturers have, clearly, found that to be useful.