Koppen was the professor emeritus of aeronautical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The eventual production aircraft did have issues, and needed over 880 modifications before entering combat in WWII.
What started as the development of the Aircraft Stability and Control Analyzer (ASCA) for the Navy became "Project Whirlwind".
Headed by Captain Luis deFlorez, Otto Koppen, John R. Markham, and Joseph Bicknell put together the requirements for a simulator that factored in winds and aerodynamic forces.
[2] After a fire at the Stout Metal Airplane Division of the Ford Motor Company, which destroyed the Ford 3-AT Trimotor prototype, Tom Towle hired MIT graduate Otto Koppen, John Lee, and James Smith McDonnell (co-founder of what is now McDonnell Douglas).
[8] In 1943 Koppen was brought on as an engineer to help design larger cargo aircraft for the Franklin Institute for 20,000 dollars a year.
They developed a "helioplane" prototype for a cost of 6000 dollars that was built based on a modified Piper Vagabond with a short wing, with leading edge slats, with high lift and STOL capabilities.
Wiggins Airways converted the Piper PA-17 Vagabond with volunteer assistance to make the 2-place Helio No.1.
Following the death of his daughter in an airplane crash in November 1950, Koppen took a two year break in teaching.
The bang-bang, or discontinuous, control device featured an innovative use of a tilted gyroscope that sensed roll and yaw, to provide input to the autopilot.