To Offshore
Great Subject, lots of experienced pilots "experiences" for novices to learn something from, however putting this into practice real time for us novices is another matter.
To Thomas Coupling
I think I fit in to the novice category very well (PPLH gained 10 months and some 200 hours ago in the UK)So here goes on my experiences/thoughts on the prospect of a TR failure.
When doing my PPL H experience of Simulated TR failure was limited to approximately 10 minutes of demonstration by my instructor, at this point the following thoughts sprung to mind.
1. Sh**
2. I hope that never happens to me.
3. How on earth can you Practic TR failure in its various forms.
4. I now know enough to make me think that if it happened to me I had NO chance.
Luckily after gaining my PPL H (which after all is only a licence to learn) I had to go to the US to do a conversion course onto a NOTAR helicopter(more of that later) but during the course we covered TR (fan) failures in all their various forms Fan failure and or fixed left pedal in the hover being my particular favourite. These failures proved very realistic (I guess) and only required flying the heli with your instructor working the pedals (the factory test pilots who have actually had the failures for real)This then gave me the following thoughts.
1.The PPL H course in the UK should either not cover it at all(ignorance is bliss!)or do it properely(maybe this was just my instructors and not the course ?)
2.I still have a lot to learn.
3.OK while it was only simulated, I now feel more comfortable with TR failures.
4.I would react better to the situation.
5.If it does happen I won't just be waiting for the crash , I will be trying to do something about it when I crash !!!!!!
6.BUT no one told life/situations to follow what it says in the book!
To Eden
You mentined the NOTAR system in one of your posts, and the fact it may be better with a failure. In my experience if the fan fails its jsut like any loss of TR, except for maybe above 35 Knots IAS when the steerable verticals are in effect, but then if you have a fixed pedal scenario they make it even worse in certain cases. The drive to the fan can fail just the same as a TR, the big bonus is that the fan is less likely to strike anything to cause the failurein the first place! Wether in flight or in the hover.
To All Novices like Me
Remember this in your quest for flying knowledge:
"In the life that is helicopter flying we start off with 2 Bags, One bag of LUCK which is FULL, the other bag is for EXPERIENCE and is EMPTY, Make sure you FILL the bag of EXPERIENCE BEFORE your bag of LUCK runs OUT"
Cant remember who told me this/wrote it but they are very wise.
Regards
hoverbover