EC350/550 Airframe Problems

[Eurocrapter]

Hey guys, posted this in Rumours first-any info would be greatly appreciated-

We just had a major inspection at our company of our fleet of 20 aircraft. On just over 1/3 of the fleet we found major cracks and debonding of fiberglass/kevlar and aluminum all over the forward portions of the fuselage, mainly upper door runners and door posts, one aircraft had one door post top completely severed in half due to a major cracks attaching to the roof. The oldest aircraft has just over 1000 hours, while some of the others have just over 100 hours. Does anyone have any prior knowledge or experience with this? This was addressed to Eurocopter a year ago with no feedback from them.

[widgeon]

If i am not mistaken the canopy is polycarbonate , at my last place of employment all aircraft in for G inspections required major reworks in the door post area . I am surprised at this happening such low hours though. Is there any optional equipment that might by putting extra load on this area ?.

[TukTuk BoomBoom]

flying around with the doors open at high speed will do that...

[dvclama]

Weird Info, I have been flying 350 and 355 for 25 years, in many remote places doing hard jobs and I never heard about such big problemon those, even few machines can be damaged sometimes with few cracks on cabin nose.
The machines you talk about were built in Grand Prairie or Marignane?
I am not Eurocopter enginer but what kind of flight do you do with those machines?
Do you fly often with open or removed doors? Wich speeds or powers do you fly?
Do your maintenance or even your pilots, respect the vibrations limitations??
Check the speed for open/removed doors use.
Also, it is defenitely not usefull to fly at full continous power (pmc)on cruse all the time, because you get into little vibrations with only 2/3 knots gain.Those vibrations may not be that uncomfortable for former Bell pilots for exemple, but you better down the pitch a little bit to have a smoother flight. The 350 is the smoothest machine I know, and when it is vibrating, it means that balance (maintenance) or simply inflight pilot use is not suitable.
Peace
Philippe