Corradino D'Ascanio

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Corradino D'Ascanio
Birthplace in Popoli
D'AT3
D'Ascanios Vespa Mod. 125, 1949
the family grave in Popoli

Corradino D'Ascanio (born February 1, 1891 in Popoli , † August 6, 1981 in Pisa ) was an Italian engineer . He first became known as a helicopter designer . After the Second World War he developed the Vespa scooter for Piaggio .

Life

Even in his youth, D'Ascanio was interested in pioneering aviation. In 1906 he made his first flight attempts with a self-made glider on hills in the vicinity of his hometown . In 1909 he obtained the university entrance qualification at the Regio Istituto Tecnico “ Ferdinando Galiani ” in Chieti , in 1914 he completed an engineering degree at the Polytechnic in Turin . In the same year he joined the air force of the Italian Army as a volunteer in Turin , where he was employed as a sub-lieutenant and engineer, mainly in the field of development, modification, testing and maintenance of aircraft engines. In 1916, D'Ascanio was assigned to the design office of the aircraft manufacturer Pomilio . In January 1918, with the permission of the military, he went with the Pomilio brothers to the United States , where the subsidiary Pomilio Brothers Corporation was founded in Indianapolis . Due to differences of opinion, D'Ascanio left the consulting firm in March 1919 and worked with Ugo Veniero D'Annunzio, a developer of Caproni Airplanes in Detroit and son of the writer Gabriele D'Annunzio . However, their joint venture was unsuccessful, also because the war-related demand had collapsed.

In 1920 D'Ascanio returned to Italy. In his hometown of Popoli he opened an engineering office that received numerous orders from private companies and public authorities in the 1920s. In these financially very successful years, he applied for a number of patents for a wide variety of inventions. His interest in aviation remained unbroken, and so he invested considerable sums in the development and construction of a helicopter. With Baron Pietro Trojani di Pescosansonesco he founded another aircraft construction company in 1925, which built the two helicopter prototypes D'AT 1 and 2 (D'Ascanio-Trojani) in collaboration with the Compione plant in Pescara . Although these flew only a few seconds each, they formed the basis for the third prototype D'AT3, which was commissioned and financed by the Italian Ministry of Aviation. This helicopter with counter-rotating coaxial rotors was built at a facility of the Italian Air Force in Rome and first flew from Ciampino-Nord military airfield in 1930 . The major and test pilot Marinello Nelli set three flying records with the D'AT3 in October 1930: an 8-minute and 45-second sightseeing flight, a 1078.60 meter long distance flight (limited only because of the airfield site) and a vertical height of 18 meters above the take-off point. These internationally acclaimed records remained unbroken for several years. Despite the interest of the Italian Navy, there was no further financial support for the helicopter project, which meant financial ruin for D'Ascanio. His helicopter was parked in an airship hangar in Ciampino.

Thanks to his development work, D'Ascanio was considered the leading Italian expert on controllable pitch propellers . The aircraft construction company Piaggio , for which D'Ascanio advised in 1932, was interested in these propellers . D'Ascanio's propellers were mounted on the best Italian aircraft of the time, including the Caproni Ca.161bis, with which the test pilot Mario Pezzi set the record for airplanes with piston engines of 17,083 meters, which is still unbroken today. At Piaggio, too, D'Ascanio's passion for helicopters continued. He was only slowly able to convince his employer of his ideas. After the prototype PD1 (Piaggio-D'Ascanio 1), the PD2 was developed in 1935 for the Italian Ministry of Aviation, but it did not go into series production due to delays. In 1939 the PD3 followed with its single main rotor and one tail rotor . In contrast to Igor Sikorsky , whose projects were implemented in the United States by United Aircraft , D'Ascanio did not receive sufficient support from Piaggio and the Italian Ministry of Aviation because of World War II. The PD3 therefore only flew in 1942 and was then, like the D'AT3, parked in a hangar. D'Ascanio worked at Piaggio mostly on the development of military aircraft and then also as a part-time lecturer at the University of Pisa .

In April 1948, at the invitation of the American Helicopter Society , D'Ascanio took part in the IV Helicopter Congress, where he was considered one of the pioneers in helicopter development. Back in Italy, he managed to convince Piaggio to resume the abandoned helicopter project. After the PD3 crashed in February 1951, the PD4 project, a helicopter with a tandem rotor, began . This prototype was lost in an accident on August 5, 1952. Despite the promising project, Piaggio was not ready to continue investing in helicopters. The company focused entirely on the exceptionally successful Vespa scooter .

Immediately after the end of the war, the Italian economy and Piaggio faced major problems. Enrico Piaggio thought of building a simple and cheap moped that would get his company back on its feet and offer the population a simple means of transport. This is how the MP5, called Piaggio Paperino, was born. Since Enrico Piaggio did not like it, he commissioned D'Ascanio to develop a new model in 1945. D'Ascanio was never interested in motorcycles, either privately or professionally. So he thought of a construction that would accommodate people who had never ridden a motorcycle and who basically didn't like using it. This was the premise for the Vespa, which was presented to the public for the first time at a motorcycle show in Milan in 1946 and immediately became a sales success.

D'Ascanio retired in 1961, but remained connected to Piaggio as a consultant for Vespa production. From 1964 he also advised the helicopter manufacturer Agusta . In his private life he worked on the development of a small helicopter for agricultural purposes, a kind of "flying Vespa". This innovative helicopter had rotor blades made of glass fiber reinforced plastic ; it flew for the first time on July 20, 1970, but had no sales success. In 1975 the Italian Air Force commissioned the replica of the D'AT3, which was built under the direction of D'Ascanios at Pisa Airport according to the original plans. This D'AT3 is exhibited together with the agricultural helicopter built in 1970 in the Vigna di Valle Aviation Museum near Rome.

Corradino D'Ascanio married Paola Paolini in 1917, with whom he had two sons Giacomo and Giorgio. His wife died in 1939. In 1961 he married Amalia Manetti. D'Ascanio died on August 5, 1981 in Pisa and was buried next to his first wife Paola in the family grave he designed in Popoli. The fact that he was mainly seen as the father of the Vespa in the last years of his life did not make him particularly happy, as he saw himself more as a helicopter designer.

Honors

In his hometown of Popoli, Corradino D'Ascanio has a museum and a street dedicated to it. In Montesilvano near Pescara a scientific high school (Liceo scientifico “C. D'Ascanio”) was named after him, at Pisa airport the place in front of the passenger terminal. D'Ascanio has received numerous awards and prizes. The most important are:

literature

  • Engelbert Zaschka : rotary wing aircraft. Gyroscopes and helicopters. CJE Volckmann Nachf. E. Wette, Berlin-Charlottenburg 1936, OCLC 20483709 .
  • Enea Grossi: Eroi e pionieri dell'ala. Dizionario biografico dell'aeronautica italiana . Magnani, Milano 1934

Web links

Commons : Corradino D'Ascanio  - collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME D'Ascanio, Corradino
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian engineer
DATE OF BIRTH February 1, 1891
PLACE OF BIRTH Popoli
DATE OF DEATH August 6, 1981
Place of death Pisa