This may seem strange coming from me but I would like to make a statement. About eight months ago I watched a Discovery show about mustering. I was absolutely amazed at the agility of the R-22. I saw no evidence of rough handling or abusing of the airframe or dynamic systems. What I did see was a lot of cyclic input in order to muster the cattle into the “Pen”. Cyclic input means blade flapping and blade flapping means lead and lag. Since the R-22 is incapable of leading and lagging due to the lack of a vertical hinge the lead lag action is reacted by the blade root, the cone hinges, the teeter hinge and then the mast. This lead lag action places the blades under a great deal of stress, which can lead to blade loss. Of course over running the allotted time will result in fatigue with the same results.
Some of the posters on these threads have stated that they knew of operators that put thousands of hours over the life limits on the blades without any major problems. So, who is right and who is wrong?
The CASA edict to change blades will cause a major impact on the mustering community as well as other operators in Australia but as they say, it is better to err on the side of safety.
I do agree about the comment about Frank Robinson saying that the R-22 was not designed for mustering. Hell, he says the same thing about training whenever there is a fatal accident.
