About that video... There is controversy about what caused that crash. If it was a tail rotor failure, the cabin appears to be rotating the wrong way. The tail rotor failure I had (in a 206) caused the nose to go to the right. In the video, the 1100 clearly yaws to the left.)
I still think the FH1100 is a better alternative than the R66.
Oh no. Ohhhhhhhhh no. No way.
As good a design as the FH1100 was/is, it has some real weaknesses that make it unsuitable in today's market. The R66 will be a better product.
Around 2000, before I joined the company that was trying to put the FH1100 back in production, the owner of the TC (Georges) took it to one of those helicopter conventions (I think it may have been Dallas). Frank came over and spent some time talking to him and examining the 1100. It was clear even then that he was considering a turbine version of the R44.
Perhaps the biggest drawback of the 1100 is that damn vertical mast. It is simply not suitable or comfortable for any kind of high speed cruise. Ten degrees nose-down at 110 knots, it's as bad as a Bolkow. Ugh. (I've got 2500 hours in Bolkows. My back and neck are permanently arched into that "Bolkow slouch.")
On a daily basis, we used to curse the original Hiller design engineers for not putting any forward tilt to the transmission. But they only envisioned it as a 100 knot helicopter, and in the early 1960's let's remember that no helicopter went very fast. Hiller set the 1100's VNE at 127 mph (110 knots). With a C20B engine installed, you could easily bump up against that even without pulling max power. We
thought about going through the certification process of increasing the VNE...but...why?
We looked at every way possible to get some tilt to the mast. But changing one thing then required so many other changes that it was just impractical. Plus, the trans already intruded on the center-rear passenger seat. Tilting the trans any further forward might have rendered that fifth seat as comfortable as the center-rear seat of a 500*.
Speaking of that seat... People were skinnier back in the 60's. The 1100 was originally meant as a four-seater, which is what the Army LOH specs called for. So it is not very wide. Georges used to say that it was "just as wide" as a 206 but it is not. Three in the back is
tight. In addition, there is a center tunnel (the fuselage structural box beam where the control pushrods, cables and electrical stuff are) that the center passenger must straddle. No "broom closet" like a 206 because it's on the floor between your legs.
The R66 is better in this respect. Frank made it bigger and wider than the R44. The center-rear seat of the R66 is also tight yes, but let's be honest, it's better than an 1100 - probably better than a 206 too.
Finally, let's talk about weight. Every C20B-equipped 1100 I ever saw weighed around 1700 pounds, some more than that. But the MGW was only 2750. Our useful load was around 1000 - 1050 pounds. One of our projects was a MGW increase, but that is not as simple as just asking the FAA to let you do that and then inserting a supplement into the RFM. So, put four adults in (800 pounds) and you can only carry 200 pounds of fuel (30 gallons) which is just one hour. Such a cabin load puts you at MGW and right at the forward c.g. limit. (Carrying women or lighter men would make a difference, obviously.)
There were some structural concerns with increasing the MGW of the 1100. There were some things we would have had to beef-up - which would have made
them heavier. Hmm, vicious cycle. Plus, what would a MGW increase have done to the component lives of the items in the powertrain? We know that Hiller tested the machine to some ungodly heavy weight just to see what it could do, but that doesn't mean the ship could have operated at that weight and it would be silly to assume so.
Frank says that the R66 will weigh around 1280 pounds empty vs. a MGW of 2700 pounds. *IF* he can keep the "completed" empty weight down to 1300 he'll have a useful load of 1400 pounds. That's a
useful useful load, given that the RR300 engine might have better fuel specifics than the 250-C20B which - no matter how you slice it or turn the fuel control down, it just GOING TO burn 25 or 26 gallons per hour...which is what my current 206B does...which is what the FH1100 I flew in Honduras did.
(Georges, God love him, used to say that the 1100 had much less fuel burn than a 206 - like down around 22 or 23 gph. That's because the Hobbs in an 1100 runs with the engine. And sure, measuring your fuel burn that way will always give you a good number. But out in the real world, skids-up to skids-down, the 1100 and 206 are just about the same.)
Don't get me wrong, I love the FH1100. I wish it could have survived and thrived. In its day, it was a great helicopter. It does certain things really well. It is tough, simple, reliable and easy to maintain. With the advantage of 40 years of product improvement like the 206 got, it might even be a great helicopter today. ...As long as you didn't need to go faster than about 100 knots or carry more than four adults including the pilot. But at the end of the day, the FH1100 is just no competition for a 206B-III.
People like
new. No matter what we did to the 1100, it was always going to be perceived as "ohhhhh, that helicopter they used to make back in the 70's." (Is the EC120 all
that much better than a 206? Nope. People buy it because it's new.)
As ugly as it is, the R66 will be a very good product -
in the role that most people are going to use it. Frank will undoubtedly sell every one of them that comes off the assembly line. His loyal customers will buy them. His service centers all over the world will take care of them. Plus, it is new.
People like new.
*I know, I know, the 500 doesn't have a center-rear seat. It was a joke.