Beaded helicopter delights onlookers at AAD 2024

The Africa Aerospace and Defence (AAD) Expo at Waterkloof Air Force Base outside Pretoria never fails to produce eye-catching and innovative displays.

This year, aviation enthusiasts, including school children, saw what promises to be the world’s largest helicopter made from beads.

A novel Guinness World Record Challenge has seen Denel and several other defence companies come together to build the world’s largest beaded helicopter.

It is a full-sized replica of Denel’s new rotary wing unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), created with around 150 000 coloured glass beads.

The beads are slightly larger than the ones usually used to manufacture beaded artworks.

Inspiration behind the artwork

Chairperson of the AMD Marketing Committee and the inspiration behind the beaded artwork, Colin Singarum, says the idea was to combine a real product from Denel and get the engineers with their drawings, working with people who usually create beaded animals.

“That was the exciting part. It started with Denel engineers creating the framework, the structure. Then they brought in the artists and started to work with them. The partners started coming on as the build happened. At first, we didn’t have a place for it to be built. We have one company, RCS, who gave us a full helicopter hanger to put the helicopter in for about a month.”

Explaining their choice of colours, Singarum says as Hercules was the main sponsor, they made sure there was a lot of orange and black.

“We started off with a draped flag over the top part, so it looks like the South African flag is lying on top, from the nose the tail, and after that we used the orange and black.”

Shamendran Pillay, CEO of Hercules Dynamics, says it began with an idea to do something unique – to make the stand different, something distinctively South African and bring in all the collaboration partners.

Pillay adds that the project was also aimed at inspiring South African youth to explore the creative aspects of science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics (STEM).

He says he hopes this would show young people that, regardless of their background, this was a possible career path.

“You need to have something that’s accessible, unique and not intimidating. You cannot be intimidated by a beaded helicopter.”

Time frame

From the construction of the frame to the final version it took about three months.

The initiative was launched at the beginning of August and includes Hercules Dynamics, AMD, Denel, Aselsan South Africa, RCS and Hensoldt.

Hercules Dynamics provided the bulk of the funds for the project and covered the licence fees for the Guinness World Record. The completed item will now be sent for adjudication.

The project aims to officially set the world record in February next year.

Speaking about the actual UAV, Pillay said: “The aim is for this product to become the spearhead of our Hermes (airborne systems) platform. And why each company contributed to the project, it wasn’t just to give a sub-system or component, this meant something that was greater than just contributing to a project”.

The UAV’s intended applications include border patrol, wildlife monitoring, disaster management search and rescue.

Africa Aerospace and Defence Trade and Exhibition concludes: