pressings. It never went into production. A larger car, the Ascot Gold Cup Six with a 2423 cc six-cylinder engine possibly made by Continental, three-speed gearbox and servo brakes did become a reality and a few production cars were made. It was advertised as being available as a two-seat sports, coupé or fabric saloon. Rotary wing aircraft In 1932 Pullin joined G & J Weir Ltd's aircraft department, in Glasgow, Scotland, as chief designer to develop single-place autogyros. Pullin and his team designed a series of Autogiros before moving on to a small helicopter using two rotors mounted atop outriggers each side of the fuselage. The Weir W.5 was a single-seat helicopter powered by an air-cooled engine, and established a maximum airspeed of 70 mph. Its two two-blade, fixed-pitch rotors had swashplate-actuated cyclic control. The W.5 made its first flight at Dalrymple, Ayrshire, on 7 June 1938, when it was piloted by Raymond Pullin and it became the first British helicopter to fly successfully. By World War II the W.5 had logged eighty hours' flying time and was followed by a scaled-up version, the W.6, which was the first two-seater helicopter in the world, powered by a much more powerful DH Gipsy aero engine. Further progress on this model was prevented by World War II. Pullin designed the 1500 cc "Flat Twin" and the "4-Cylinder"(later called Pixie when licensed to Aero Engines Ltd of Bristol) engines which followed it. These were used in the Weir W2, W3 and W4 autogiros. The "Four Cylinder" was adapted to power the twin-rotor W5 Helicopter. After the war development at the Cierva Autogiro Company of the W.9 "Drainpipe" and the 24-passenger-carrying W.11 Air Horse helicopters continued under the direction of Cyril Pullin. A fatal crash of the W11 Air Horse, due to a small component fatigue failure, put an end to this very promising heavy-lift helicopter project. The remnants of the Cierva Autogiro Company were taken over by Saunders Roe, who continued the development of the small Skeeter helicopter and put it into production. See also Ascot (1928 automobile) Fairey FB-1 Gyrodyne References Sources Douglas Light Aero Engines from Kingswood to Cathcart. 2010. Author Brian Thorby. Redcliffe Press, Bristol External links 1914 picture of 21-year-old Cyril Pullin on his winning motorcycle. It was an earlier model which he had designed. This site is about the TT race, and tells the story of the race