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Hot new helicopter/rotorcraft news

phrogdriver said:
Like what?

They briefly owned Schweitzer and unloaded them because light helos are just a tough place to make money.

There’s a reason that Robinson builds everything around the same basic airframe. Both the 505 and the 407 leverage the original 206 certification. Designing a clean sheet small helo is unlikely to ever make its development cost back.

They’ve got to make the 60 pay off longer by offering things like the U-Hawk and installing MOSA. They’ve also got to get people to buy their X2 tech.

The second one is hopeless—everyone knows X2 sucks. So they are leaning even more into the 60.
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I recall reading something about a Sikorsky design (not the 333) that was never acted upon. I’ll see if I can find it.
 
phrogdriver said:
There’s a reason that Robinson builds everything around the same basic airframe. Both the 505 and the 407 leverage the original 206 certification. Designing a clean sheet small helo is unlikely to ever make its development cost back....
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Especially since after the 737 MAX debacle, getting anything certified became a much more difficult and costly ordeal. That's one of the reasons the 525 took so long to become operational.

Fun fact I guess I can share since I no longer work for Bell: Apparently there's a rumored Bell 529. I have no idea what it is because literally the only time I ever heard anything about it was during meetings when they were telling us not to talk about the 529.
 
FlyNavy03 said:
Especially since after the 737 MAX debacle, getting anything certified became a much more difficult and costly ordeal. That's one of the reasons the 525 took so long to become operational.

Fun fact I guess I can share since I no longer work for Bell: Apparently there's a rumored Bell 529. I have no idea what it is because literally the only time I ever heard anything about it was during meetings when they were telling us not to talk about the 529.
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You mean besides crashing and repeatedly failing FAA cert flights?

The 429 has been a disappointment since its inception. Because of the way they certificated it, it often has a lower useful load than a 407. It costs as much as a 145 but carries a third fewer people in a club config that's nice for VIPs, but horrible for utility and military.
 
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Lawman said:
Because it’s the drive system that has failed on me repeatedly in my career and not the electrical….
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Point taken, though if it’s a permanent magnet generator driving it, it’s unlikely to fail, and you can have four of these, vice just one tail rotor.

I think there was a noise benefit with this as well.
 
hscs said:
Seems you might have 4 x chip lights / other bad things happen.
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Just thinking about this is a sandy/dusty operational environment.
Electric motors tend not do well with long and repeated exposure to sand/dust.
And blade erosion on a smaller blade compared to a larger blade.
What happens with total electrical failure?
Just questioning because I had never seen this configuration before.
 
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