Hot air balloons have a long history in China, known as sky lanterns or Kongming lanterns, and noted scholar Joseph Lee also pointed out that the Mongols had used dragon shaped sky lanterns to send signals at the Battle of Ligonides in 1241 CE.
Helicopters are mainly composed of a fuselage and lift (including rotor blades and tail rotor), power, transmission of the three major systems, as well as airborne flight equipment. The rotor is generally driven by a turboshaft engine or piston engine through a mechanical transmission system consisting of a drive shaft and reducer, and can also be driven by the reaction force generated by the propeller tip jet. At present, the actual application is mechanically driven single-rotor helicopters and dual-rotor helicopters, of which the number of single-rotor helicopters is the largest.
The maximum speed of the helicopter can be up to 300km/h or more, the dive limit speed of nearly 400km/h, the use of the ceiling up to 6000m (the world record for 12450m), the general range of up to 600 ~ 800km or so. The general range can be 600-800km. The range can be more than 2000km by carrying inboard and outboard fuel tanks. According to different needs helicopters have different takeoff weight. Currently the world's largest heavy helicopter in use is the Russian Mi-26 (maximum takeoff weight of 56t, payload 20t).
The outstanding feature of the helicopter is that it can do maneuvering flight with low altitude (several meters from the ground), low speed (from hovering) and constant nose direction, especially vertical takeoff and landing in a small area. Because of these characteristics, it has a wide range of uses and development prospects. In the military aspect, it has been widely used in ground attack, airborne landing, weapon transportation, logistic support, battlefield rescue, reconnaissance patrol, command and control, communication, anti-submarine minesweeping, electronic countermeasures and so on. In civilian use, it has been applied to short-distance transportation, medical care, disaster relief, emergency rescue, lifting equipment, geological exploration, forest protection and fire-fighting, and aerial photography. Maritime oil wells and base between the transportation of personnel and materials is an important aspect of civil.
At present, the helicopter relative to the aircraft, vibration and noise level is higher, maintenance and repair workload is larger, the use of higher costs, lower speed, shorter range. The future direction of helicopter development is to improve in these areas.
The airship is a lighter-than-air aircraft, which is the biggest difference with the balloon is that it has a propulsion and control of the flight status of the device. The airship consists of a huge streamlined hull, located under the hull of the pod, play a stabilizing role in the control of the tail surface and propulsion device. The air sacs of the hull are filled with a buoyant gas (hydrogen or helium), which is less dense than air, to generate buoyancy to lift the airship into the air. Pods are used for personnel and cargo. The tail surfaces are used to control and stabilize the heading and pitch.
Fighter aircraft is mainly used to protect our use of air power and destroy the enemy's ability to use air power of military aircraft. Characterized by excellent flight performance, maneuverability, firepower; modern advanced fighter aircraft are equipped with a variety of search, targeting fire control equipment, all-weather attack on all air targets.
The Space Shuttle is a vertical takeoff, horizontal landing manned spacecraft, which is launched into space with a rocket engine as the driving force, can run on the orbit, and can go back and forth between the Earth's surface and the near-Earth orbit, and can be partially reused spacecraft. Its orbiter, solid fuel booster rockets and external storage tanks are composed of three major components.