Originally Posted by
noooby
Don't blame the machine. Oil and Gas operators, who staff their bases properly, do get the inspections done quicker. We used to do the 300 hour in 3 days. A 4 year would be a couple weeks. As for "cost is high", a 139 is cheaper to purchase than a 76D and the DoC's are proven to be very close, if not better than a 76C++ (don't know DoC's for a 76D sorry). O&G operators proved that over and over again.
76's were perfect for mechanics though. They're job security because something always breaks. All the mechanics said I'd be first out of a job because I only worked on the 139 and there wasn't much to do compared to the 76.
I remember a shift supervisor (A.S.) at Air Hanson who said
" I won't hear a bad word said about the S76, the overtime is paying my mortgage."!!!!
As for heavy maintenance it depends exactly what you are doing. A heavy check on a 139 is about 2 weeks.
We did a G check on a 365 in twelve weeks. That included a full bare metal respray and a complete gut of the aircraft down to the fuselage on jacks tailboom off, with just the looms and long hydraulic lines in situ. Canopy structure replaced as well.
The S76's didn't have a heavy check all work was carried out as a continuous process. Can't say I agreed with that but it worked.
Each operator does it's own thing.