Bell 505 Jet Ranger X
Bell Helicopter's second 505 first flight :
Bell 505's second flight test vehicle achieves first flight | Vertical Magazine - The Pulse of the Helicopter Industry
Bell 505's second flight test vehicle achieves first flight | Vertical Magazine - The Pulse of the Helicopter Industry
It appears to be flying over a great expanse of snow.
I forgot about the Bell plant in Canada, versus Forth Worth.
Thanks. *sheepish* (News story byline/locale got me looking at the news in DFW area and I didn't see recent blizzards and snow accumulation ... doh!)
Thanks. *sheepish* (News story byline/locale got me looking at the news in DFW area and I didn't see recent blizzards and snow accumulation ... doh!)
Vertical Magazine Update
Bell provides an update on 505 Jet Ranger X development | Vertical Magazine - The Pulse of the Helicopter Industry
https://player.vimeo.com/video/124513347
Since its announcement at the 2013 Paris Air Show, the Bell 505 Jet Ranger X has reached several milestones in its development. From achieving first flight with two flight test helicopters, to breaking ground on a new production facility for the aircraft, Bell’s short light single helicopter is well on its way to certification. Vertical caught up with David Smith, the Bell 505 Jet Ranger X program director, at Heli-Expo 2015 to get an update on the Bell 505’s development, and to review the aircraft’s accomplishments to date.
“We kicked the team off going down a very aggressive path of prototyping and developing versions of the product that we knew would be valuable for learning how to build it, [and] how not to build it,” Smith told Vertical. “We did that over the course of 20 months en route to a first flight last November . . . and subsequently we’ve flown the second aircraft in late February of this year, so we’ve got two aircraft flying in the air and we’ve reached roughly 80 hours of flight test.”
The Bell 505 Jet Ranger X will be assembled at a new facility in Lafayette, La. Construction of the 82,300-square-foot production plant began last August, and assembly operations are expected to begin in 2016.
For more information on the Bell 505 Jet Ranger X’s development, watch the video above.
Since its announcement at the 2013 Paris Air Show, the Bell 505 Jet Ranger X has reached several milestones in its development. From achieving first flight with two flight test helicopters, to breaking ground on a new production facility for the aircraft, Bell’s short light single helicopter is well on its way to certification. Vertical caught up with David Smith, the Bell 505 Jet Ranger X program director, at Heli-Expo 2015 to get an update on the Bell 505’s development, and to review the aircraft’s accomplishments to date.
“We kicked the team off going down a very aggressive path of prototyping and developing versions of the product that we knew would be valuable for learning how to build it, [and] how not to build it,” Smith told Vertical. “We did that over the course of 20 months en route to a first flight last November . . . and subsequently we’ve flown the second aircraft in late February of this year, so we’ve got two aircraft flying in the air and we’ve reached roughly 80 hours of flight test.”
The Bell 505 Jet Ranger X will be assembled at a new facility in Lafayette, La. Construction of the 82,300-square-foot production plant began last August, and assembly operations are expected to begin in 2016.
For more information on the Bell 505 Jet Ranger X’s development, watch the video above.
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A further update on the 505, we will have the mock up on display at Goodwood Festival of Speed this year and also at Helitech, please pm me if you need any further information.
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Bell says its 505 will get new type certificate
I/C
Bell Helicopter’s 505 light single will enter the market under a new type certificate, the company tells Rotor & Wing International, rather than piggybacking on the 206 JetRanger type certificate, which was first issued in 1964. The 505 will use the transmission, rotor hub and rotor blades from the 206L-4 LongRanger, it adds, but those components will be certified to the latest amendment of Federal Aviation Regulation Part 27. The L-4 was certificated in 1992.
Well i hear the 505 flew into Kentucky at 125kn easily 
It is fascinating to look back at the posts , especially FH1100 who i assume is now eating his hat ..as promised !! Best news is also that the PBH covers almost everything so the owner can know his costs . I am told that pretty much everything is covered by this so that i think kills the anti turbomeca argument , at least as far as high cost goes . I also hear useful load is right up there as well and range a good 3 hrs . Cant wait for mine to arrive now !!!
ps Longbox ....how about some more info just to piss off FH ??
It is fascinating to look back at the posts , especially FH1100 who i assume is now eating his hat ..as promised !! Best news is also that the PBH covers almost everything so the owner can know his costs . I am told that pretty much everything is covered by this so that i think kills the anti turbomeca argument , at least as far as high cost goes . I also hear useful load is right up there as well and range a good 3 hrs . Cant wait for mine to arrive now !!!ps Longbox ....how about some more info just to piss off FH ??
I think you will find that owners are more concerned with performance , operating costs , reliability etc than cosmetics !! Having said that i still think they look a bit short for toe in landings ...not that that is a big problem for me ,
landing the 109 on anything rough and slopey is always mighty tricky !!
Pilots who were at heli expo are telling me they believe its the dogs bollocks and they are people who have been operating for decades . So i am quietly confident that all the hugely negative stuff on here will be proved wrong and there will be a mass apology from all those self proclaimed experts on aircraft development !!
landing the 109 on anything rough and slopey is always mighty tricky !!
Pilots who were at heli expo are telling me they believe its the dogs bollocks and they are people who have been operating for decades . So i am quietly confident that all the hugely negative stuff on here will be proved wrong and there will be a mass apology from all those self proclaimed experts on aircraft development !!
Heli Expo 2016 my photos of Flight Test Vehicle 3
Hi guys I was at Heli Expo in the week and here are my photos of Flight Test Vehicle #3
cheers
cheers
cheers
cheers
Nigel, I'm sure you have a lot invested in the 505...financially maybe but emotionally for certain. But I'm not sure why you have to attack me personally for my views. Have I ever said anything nasty to or about you? I find your obsession with hurting me puzzling, and probably unhealthy. Then again, you are just another brave internet warrior hiding behind a keyboard. Hey, can you even hear your mother calling you for supper from down there in that basement?
Ah but seriously, Nigel, I'm sure you're probably the best R-22 or R-44 pilot in all of Europe...maybe Russia and Asia too. But your general knowledge of helicopters is lacking.
I know this is a rumor network and all, but taking somebody's word from somebody else that the 505 cruised all the way from Canada to Kentucky at an implied constant airspeed of 135 knots is naively foolish and silly. Son, have you ever flown a two-blade, underslung 206 rotor system at 135 knots? I'd guess knot, to make a bad pun.
First of all, you know why Bell put that cambered horizontal stabilizer on the tailboom of the 206? It's to keep the tail down in cruise. Otherwise the ship would have an extremely nose-down attitude. You think that little flat-plate horizontal stab on the 505 is going to do the trick? Nope. So what must the ride have been like at 135 knots? Pretty uncomfortable, I'd guess...pretty nose-low. Passengers don't want to fly like that. Trust me, I'm a Bo-105 pilot, I know
At at paltry 120 knots, the '105 assumed a 10-12 degree nose-down cabin attitude. Why? Well because the mast was not tilted forward and always had to stay perpendicular to the tip-path plane.
Flying long distances at 120 knots in a 105 is not fun. It's squirrelly up there. But keep it down to 105-110 knots and life is much better - *and* - added bonus, your fuel consumption is lower too! (100 knots was even better but no self-respecting pilot wants to fly that slow.) I do notice that the seats in the 505 are reclined at a pretty good angle - probably to try to make up for the nose-low cabin attitude in forward flight.
And then, Nigel, if you do manage to pull the 505 tail down far enough for a decent cabin attitude at high-speed cruise, you are getting REALLY close to the flapping limits of the rotor hub. A little turbulence thrown into the mix and a jiggity pilot who likes to fly with a no-friction, wet-noodle cyclic? Hoo-man, I don't even want to think about it. Neither does Bell, I'd imagine.
Okay, so now let's talk about engine failures at high speed. You know how fast the rotor rpm is going to bleed off? It's why the LongRangers have such problems with engine failures in high-speed cruise. You've *got* to get the nose up before getting the pitch down...or the rotor rpm will go away, a high rate of descent will build up and you'll get into "Nodamatic bounce" like you wouldn't believe. Just ask PHI what they teach in LongRangers.
But wait, the 505 doesn't even have a Nodamatic transmission mount! Sooooooo....hmm, this begs the question: What is the ride quality like at 135 knots? How are they dealing with the "one-per" that invariably comes with high cruise? Again, have you, Nigel ever flown a two-blade, underslung system that fast? It gets...interesting, Nigel.
135 knots in a 505 is beyond the VNE of the 206 with...wait for it...the same exact rotor system! It may very well *go* 135 knots (in a dive), but it's not going to cruise up there. ...Without endplates/fins on the horizontal stab? No way. No friggin' way. There's a lot of things Bell *can* do, but they cannot rewrite the laws of aerodynamics. You can expect that the tail configuration will change yet again before certification, probably to something that looks more like a 206L does now. And yes, that will slow it down. Expect a VNE of 130 knots just like now. Keep this in mind: Flying-wise, IT'S A LONGRANGER. Errr, a LongRanger without the Nodamatic trans mount.
Will Bell be able to bring the thing to market for around US$1.0 million? Sure...if you consider $1.3 or $1.4 million to be "around" $1.0 million. Frankie Robinson is probably laughing his ass off out there in California at the thought of Bell trying to compete with his R-66, price-wise. Because it's not going to happen. And the Bell fanboys like you, Nigel will say, "Well, $1.5 or $1.6 million with paint, radios, openable crew windows, a heater, a rotor brake and an interior is just fine by us!" And maybe it is.
Nigel, do you know what marketing hype is? Bell is laying it on pretty thick with this 505. And gullible people like you are just eating it up. Then there are those of us with some experience - not only in the cockpit but in this industry - who know better than to be wowed by a fancy, uncertified, experimental "flight test vehicle"...basically a mockup and some glossy brochures. We've seen it all before.
Bell ain't reinventing the wheel here. But they're trying to make you think they are.
Ah but seriously, Nigel, I'm sure you're probably the best R-22 or R-44 pilot in all of Europe...maybe Russia and Asia too. But your general knowledge of helicopters is lacking.
I know this is a rumor network and all, but taking somebody's word from somebody else that the 505 cruised all the way from Canada to Kentucky at an implied constant airspeed of 135 knots is naively foolish and silly. Son, have you ever flown a two-blade, underslung 206 rotor system at 135 knots? I'd guess knot, to make a bad pun.
First of all, you know why Bell put that cambered horizontal stabilizer on the tailboom of the 206? It's to keep the tail down in cruise. Otherwise the ship would have an extremely nose-down attitude. You think that little flat-plate horizontal stab on the 505 is going to do the trick? Nope. So what must the ride have been like at 135 knots? Pretty uncomfortable, I'd guess...pretty nose-low. Passengers don't want to fly like that. Trust me, I'm a Bo-105 pilot, I know
At at paltry 120 knots, the '105 assumed a 10-12 degree nose-down cabin attitude. Why? Well because the mast was not tilted forward and always had to stay perpendicular to the tip-path plane. Flying long distances at 120 knots in a 105 is not fun. It's squirrelly up there. But keep it down to 105-110 knots and life is much better - *and* - added bonus, your fuel consumption is lower too! (100 knots was even better but no self-respecting pilot wants to fly that slow.) I do notice that the seats in the 505 are reclined at a pretty good angle - probably to try to make up for the nose-low cabin attitude in forward flight.
And then, Nigel, if you do manage to pull the 505 tail down far enough for a decent cabin attitude at high-speed cruise, you are getting REALLY close to the flapping limits of the rotor hub. A little turbulence thrown into the mix and a jiggity pilot who likes to fly with a no-friction, wet-noodle cyclic? Hoo-man, I don't even want to think about it. Neither does Bell, I'd imagine.
Okay, so now let's talk about engine failures at high speed. You know how fast the rotor rpm is going to bleed off? It's why the LongRangers have such problems with engine failures in high-speed cruise. You've *got* to get the nose up before getting the pitch down...or the rotor rpm will go away, a high rate of descent will build up and you'll get into "Nodamatic bounce" like you wouldn't believe. Just ask PHI what they teach in LongRangers.
But wait, the 505 doesn't even have a Nodamatic transmission mount! Sooooooo....hmm, this begs the question: What is the ride quality like at 135 knots? How are they dealing with the "one-per" that invariably comes with high cruise? Again, have you, Nigel ever flown a two-blade, underslung system that fast? It gets...interesting, Nigel.
135 knots in a 505 is beyond the VNE of the 206 with...wait for it...the same exact rotor system! It may very well *go* 135 knots (in a dive), but it's not going to cruise up there. ...Without endplates/fins on the horizontal stab? No way. No friggin' way. There's a lot of things Bell *can* do, but they cannot rewrite the laws of aerodynamics. You can expect that the tail configuration will change yet again before certification, probably to something that looks more like a 206L does now. And yes, that will slow it down. Expect a VNE of 130 knots just like now. Keep this in mind: Flying-wise, IT'S A LONGRANGER. Errr, a LongRanger without the Nodamatic trans mount.
Will Bell be able to bring the thing to market for around US$1.0 million? Sure...if you consider $1.3 or $1.4 million to be "around" $1.0 million. Frankie Robinson is probably laughing his ass off out there in California at the thought of Bell trying to compete with his R-66, price-wise. Because it's not going to happen. And the Bell fanboys like you, Nigel will say, "Well, $1.5 or $1.6 million with paint, radios, openable crew windows, a heater, a rotor brake and an interior is just fine by us!" And maybe it is.
Nigel, do you know what marketing hype is? Bell is laying it on pretty thick with this 505. And gullible people like you are just eating it up. Then there are those of us with some experience - not only in the cockpit but in this industry - who know better than to be wowed by a fancy, uncertified, experimental "flight test vehicle"...basically a mockup and some glossy brochures. We've seen it all before.
Bell ain't reinventing the wheel here. But they're trying to make you think they are.
Not nearly as smart as you think you are.
That is such an interesting comment. You should do a little bit of research on the reasons why the long ranger is the way it is. It's limits for speed are only driven by drag and power. The long ranger and all jet ranger and 407 aircraft are draggy . This can be overpowered with more thrust. The 505 also reduces drag from the rotor that comes from advancing blade Mach effects at high speeds... The 505 NR is 3% slower than the L4. If you look at speed vs power curves on an L4, this 3% change would drive major improvements in speed capability.
I have sought out knowledge of the 505 flight testing and know for certain that the rotor has gone beyond 152kts TAS in a dive and has seen more than 130kts MCP in steady level. The engineers and sales folk at the shows will tell you a lot if you just ask them.
There was no flight attitude issue related to the Horizontal stabilizer... Your comment makes no sense. The old design had a much longer moment arm and would have been even better for nose down angle... Do the math. Talking to the Bell engineers directly, the stabilizer moved to increase stability in low speeds and transittions from high speed to low and vice versa.
looking forward to hearing people speak who have flown it. I met one guy who doesn't work for Bell who flew it. The guy loved it and has 2 on order and is working on a 3rd.
I have sought out knowledge of the 505 flight testing and know for certain that the rotor has gone beyond 152kts TAS in a dive and has seen more than 130kts MCP in steady level. The engineers and sales folk at the shows will tell you a lot if you just ask them.
There was no flight attitude issue related to the Horizontal stabilizer... Your comment makes no sense. The old design had a much longer moment arm and would have been even better for nose down angle... Do the math. Talking to the Bell engineers directly, the stabilizer moved to increase stability in low speeds and transittions from high speed to low and vice versa.
looking forward to hearing people speak who have flown it. I met one guy who doesn't work for Bell who flew it. The guy loved it and has 2 on order and is working on a 3rd.
Bell or airbus helicopter do not make the seats
They are third party components like this one by "zodiac aerospace"
certified:
FAA 14 CFR Part27: Airworthiness Standards. Transport Category Aircraft
EASA CS-27 : Certification Specifications and Acceptable Means of Compliance for Large Rotorcraft
ETSO/TSO-C127a : Technical Standard Order – Rotorcraft, transport airplane, and normal and utility airplane seating system,
ETSO/TSO-C114 : Technical Standard Order – Torso Restraint system
SAE AS8049 : Performance standard for seat in civil rotorcraft, transport aircraft, and general aviation aircraft
SAE AS8043 : Aircraft Torso Restraint system
DO-160G : Environmental Conditions and Test Procedures for Airborne Equipment
As an OEM would make sense not to bother with all that certification process, and buy it all made.
They are third party components like this one by "zodiac aerospace"
certified:
FAA 14 CFR Part27: Airworthiness Standards. Transport Category Aircraft
EASA CS-27 : Certification Specifications and Acceptable Means of Compliance for Large Rotorcraft
ETSO/TSO-C127a : Technical Standard Order – Rotorcraft, transport airplane, and normal and utility airplane seating system,
ETSO/TSO-C114 : Technical Standard Order – Torso Restraint system
SAE AS8049 : Performance standard for seat in civil rotorcraft, transport aircraft, and general aviation aircraft
SAE AS8043 : Aircraft Torso Restraint system
DO-160G : Environmental Conditions and Test Procedures for Airborne Equipment
As an OEM would make sense not to bother with all that certification process, and buy it all made.
bellblade2014 sez:
What? No, it's *your* comment that makes no sense, bub.
To achieve 135 knots in forward flight the rotor disk is going to have to be tilted forward at a pretty good angle. This is true of any helicopter. The fuselage is going to naturally want to follow along at that angle - we know this; it's not rocket science. It's why Bell put the cambered horizontal stabilizer on the 206: to pull the tail down in forward flight. To say that's not the case is just silly. A drastic nose-down attitude in cruise is uncomfortable (e.g. Bo-105, FH1100). You can ameliorate this to a degree by tilting the mast forward (206), reclining the seats, or both (505). But as Star Trek's Mr. Scott always used to admonish Captain Kirk, ya canna change the laws of physics! When I used to weigh 170 (thirty pounds ago, ugh), if I was in an L-3 and was empty and wanted to cruise at 80% torque I'd usually be right at the forward cyclic stop. Straight-arm the bitch!
To say that the 505 is "less draggy" than a 206 or 407 and therefore will scream along at 135 knots is, again, just silly. Bell *might* have cleaned up the nose, but there's a whole lot of...you know...helicopter aft of the bubble. All those sticking-out bits create drag. Bell probably couldn't get it to do a steady 135kts if they retracted the landing gear - no matter what the marketing geeks say. How much drag do we have to take away for every extra knot of airspeed increase? There's gotta be an aerodynamic formula for that...
Another thing: If slowing the L-4 rotor system down 3% did such great things, why didn't Bell just tell us to beep our L-4's down to 97% for cruise? Seems to me I could've been really hauling ass at 130+ knots instead of dogging along at 106 knots, no?
Oh, and anyone who thinks that the 505 won't spout winglets/endplates on the horizontal stab is just dreaming. Dreaming. Repeat after me: It. Will. Have. Them. Why? Simple, really. Moving the mast behind the cabin did a bad thing: It upset the proportions. It put more cabin area ahead of the mast. Not good, aerodynamically. Look at *every* helicopter that goes faster than 100 knots. See something in common? What's that you say? A huge fin (fenestron ships) or lots of fin area (conventional tail rotor ships)? Yup.
Okay, let's talk about that horizontal stab. Bell first put the 505 stabilizer back on the vertical fin, opposite of the t/r gearbox. Bad choice. That didn't work, so they moved it forward, under the rotor again where it's going to affect autorotation behavior just as it did with the 206. We shall see how this all works in flight testing. I suspect we'll eventually see a regular ol' 206-type cambered horizontal stab (with endplates!) before the thing gets certified. (Unless they install a helipilot with yaw damper as standard equipment.)
Speaking of certification... Do we remember Bell's initial projections...about how the 505 would be certified in early 2016? They probably wanted to piggyback it on 206's original TC, #H2SW like they did with the LongRanger...and 407. But at some point the FAA ACO must've said, "No friggin' way - get a new TC!" ...Which is why that particular detail didn't surface until, what, June of 2015? I'm sure that's why the certification date has...what term did Bell use?..."slightly slipped." Yeahhhhh, we're not going to see certification in 2016.
Look, I don't hate Bell. I've got six or seven-THOUSAND hours in 206's. It's my favorite aircraft of all time. A friend of mine just got on with a 206 operator after a stint flying big Sikorskys. When I admitted that I was envious he said, "Come on over! We still have room for a PIC with 206 experience." And I'm tempted, honestly. It'd be great flying the old girl again. But my days of flying full-time are over, thank you.
I'm just not impressed with this 505. I'm not awestruck by Bell's slick marketing scheme. Some of you fawn over this thing like teenage girls at a Justin Bieber concert. If Bell does produce the 505 (and I still think that's a big "if"), I don't see it doing the kind of things the 206 became famous for. It'll probably be a good personal helicopter to rival the R-66, but it doesn't seem like it'll be a good replacement for a 206B or 206L. Maybe LEA, or ENG (good God, does every TV station *need* a 407 or Astar??). And maybe those segments alone can justify certifying it and putting it in production. Then again...
The Bell fanboys on this site keep talking about how many *orders* Bell has for the 505. Yet all I ever see from Bell are numbers of "Letters of Intent"...which number about 240(?) at last press release. Letters of Intent are not orders, gang. A LOI is not binding. Maybe Bell will tell us how many actual orders-with-non-refundable deposits they've gotten? I doubt they'd release that info. I wouldn't.
As I've said before, Cessna was so sure that their 162 (the 150 replacement) would set the world on fire. It didn't. Beech was sure that the Starship was the wave of the future! It wasn't. Throughout history so many manufacturers have tried to re-invent the wheel with disastrous results. Will Bell succeed with the 505? We shall see. So far they've been hyping it up pretty good. Don't be fooled by the hype. The 505 probably has a long way to go before it gets certified, and a lot can and probably will change before then. And the final numbers will *not* be as impressive as the sales/marketing guys would like you to think now. Like I said, we've seen this all before.
Oh, and one last thing? Engineers don't go to trade shows to answer questions from the great unwashed. They stay home where they're busy doing engineer stuff and figuring out how they're going to get some more speed out of the pig since the sales guys are making promises that are hard to keep. Sales and marketing guys go to the shows. Keep it in perspective, folks.
There was no flight attitude issue related to the Horizontal stabilizer... Your comment makes no sense. The old design had a much longer moment arm and would have been even better for nose down angle... Do the math..
To achieve 135 knots in forward flight the rotor disk is going to have to be tilted forward at a pretty good angle. This is true of any helicopter. The fuselage is going to naturally want to follow along at that angle - we know this; it's not rocket science. It's why Bell put the cambered horizontal stabilizer on the 206: to pull the tail down in forward flight. To say that's not the case is just silly. A drastic nose-down attitude in cruise is uncomfortable (e.g. Bo-105, FH1100). You can ameliorate this to a degree by tilting the mast forward (206), reclining the seats, or both (505). But as Star Trek's Mr. Scott always used to admonish Captain Kirk, ya canna change the laws of physics! When I used to weigh 170 (thirty pounds ago, ugh), if I was in an L-3 and was empty and wanted to cruise at 80% torque I'd usually be right at the forward cyclic stop. Straight-arm the bitch!
To say that the 505 is "less draggy" than a 206 or 407 and therefore will scream along at 135 knots is, again, just silly. Bell *might* have cleaned up the nose, but there's a whole lot of...you know...helicopter aft of the bubble. All those sticking-out bits create drag. Bell probably couldn't get it to do a steady 135kts if they retracted the landing gear - no matter what the marketing geeks say. How much drag do we have to take away for every extra knot of airspeed increase? There's gotta be an aerodynamic formula for that...
Another thing: If slowing the L-4 rotor system down 3% did such great things, why didn't Bell just tell us to beep our L-4's down to 97% for cruise? Seems to me I could've been really hauling ass at 130+ knots instead of dogging along at 106 knots, no?
Oh, and anyone who thinks that the 505 won't spout winglets/endplates on the horizontal stab is just dreaming. Dreaming. Repeat after me: It. Will. Have. Them. Why? Simple, really. Moving the mast behind the cabin did a bad thing: It upset the proportions. It put more cabin area ahead of the mast. Not good, aerodynamically. Look at *every* helicopter that goes faster than 100 knots. See something in common? What's that you say? A huge fin (fenestron ships) or lots of fin area (conventional tail rotor ships)? Yup.
Okay, let's talk about that horizontal stab. Bell first put the 505 stabilizer back on the vertical fin, opposite of the t/r gearbox. Bad choice. That didn't work, so they moved it forward, under the rotor again where it's going to affect autorotation behavior just as it did with the 206. We shall see how this all works in flight testing. I suspect we'll eventually see a regular ol' 206-type cambered horizontal stab (with endplates!) before the thing gets certified. (Unless they install a helipilot with yaw damper as standard equipment.)
Speaking of certification... Do we remember Bell's initial projections...about how the 505 would be certified in early 2016? They probably wanted to piggyback it on 206's original TC, #H2SW like they did with the LongRanger...and 407. But at some point the FAA ACO must've said, "No friggin' way - get a new TC!" ...Which is why that particular detail didn't surface until, what, June of 2015? I'm sure that's why the certification date has...what term did Bell use?..."slightly slipped." Yeahhhhh, we're not going to see certification in 2016.
Look, I don't hate Bell. I've got six or seven-THOUSAND hours in 206's. It's my favorite aircraft of all time. A friend of mine just got on with a 206 operator after a stint flying big Sikorskys. When I admitted that I was envious he said, "Come on over! We still have room for a PIC with 206 experience." And I'm tempted, honestly. It'd be great flying the old girl again. But my days of flying full-time are over, thank you.
I'm just not impressed with this 505. I'm not awestruck by Bell's slick marketing scheme. Some of you fawn over this thing like teenage girls at a Justin Bieber concert. If Bell does produce the 505 (and I still think that's a big "if"), I don't see it doing the kind of things the 206 became famous for. It'll probably be a good personal helicopter to rival the R-66, but it doesn't seem like it'll be a good replacement for a 206B or 206L. Maybe LEA, or ENG (good God, does every TV station *need* a 407 or Astar??). And maybe those segments alone can justify certifying it and putting it in production. Then again...
The Bell fanboys on this site keep talking about how many *orders* Bell has for the 505. Yet all I ever see from Bell are numbers of "Letters of Intent"...which number about 240(?) at last press release. Letters of Intent are not orders, gang. A LOI is not binding. Maybe Bell will tell us how many actual orders-with-non-refundable deposits they've gotten? I doubt they'd release that info. I wouldn't.
As I've said before, Cessna was so sure that their 162 (the 150 replacement) would set the world on fire. It didn't. Beech was sure that the Starship was the wave of the future! It wasn't. Throughout history so many manufacturers have tried to re-invent the wheel with disastrous results. Will Bell succeed with the 505? We shall see. So far they've been hyping it up pretty good. Don't be fooled by the hype. The 505 probably has a long way to go before it gets certified, and a lot can and probably will change before then. And the final numbers will *not* be as impressive as the sales/marketing guys would like you to think now. Like I said, we've seen this all before.
Oh, and one last thing? Engineers don't go to trade shows to answer questions from the great unwashed. They stay home where they're busy doing engineer stuff and figuring out how they're going to get some more speed out of the pig since the sales guys are making promises that are hard to keep. Sales and marketing guys go to the shows. Keep it in perspective, folks.
Google Transport Canada Bell 505... To my knowledge always was the plan. Bell never could've got away with existing TC. New engine, avionics and fuselage triggers all the major change stuff in the rules.
At last two HAI's I've met a couple of engineers at both the 505 and 525 exhibits. From this year, Chief engineer is what the 505 Guy's business card says and supervisor of IPT engineering on the 525 guy. Seemed to know his stuff... The lead pilot they had for each program was very sharp as well and has lots of little details to share.
Probably best thing is to seek out non-Bell folks that have flown it... There's got to be more than just the guy I talked to.
At last two HAI's I've met a couple of engineers at both the 505 and 525 exhibits. From this year, Chief engineer is what the 505 Guy's business card says and supervisor of IPT engineering on the 525 guy. Seemed to know his stuff... The lead pilot they had for each program was very sharp as well and has lots of little details to share.
Probably best thing is to seek out non-Bell folks that have flown it... There's got to be more than just the guy I talked to.