t'aint,
"Slowrotor announces that because of his knowledge of R22 accidents he refuses to fly them any more. What knowledge is that, mate?"
I said with my present knowledge of the R22 accident history I have no further plans to fly a R22. That could change if I receive enough information to explain what has been done to correct the problems that caused the rotorhead separations.
The knowledge I base my choice on is primarily the NTSB special report for the Robinson R22. Go to ntsb.gov and search for Robinson special report.
Specifically the report states that the R22 accident statistics are about 4 fatal crashes per 100,000 hrs. The other helos were more in the 1 fatal per 100,000 hrs as I recall, the 300 was much better than the R22 but I cant remember the exact data, look at the actual report if you have not already. This data is per 100,000 hrs so the fact that R22's are prolific is not relevent.
Further,I read through many of the non-fatal ntsb reports from 1970's to 2003. Again, as I recall something like 350 of the 800 USA R22's have had an accident.
I was about ready to buy a used R22, but my reseach has put that on hold.
The FAA issued an airworthiness directive to limit flight in moderate turbulence.
The FAA issued a special FAR 73 just for the R22 that requires special training.
A CFI told me to ask local R22 owners about these facts. I tried that, and the local owner became very abusive when I asked how to avoid the rotor separation, the cause of which is not all that clear to me at this time.
I asked an FAA engineer what is it with the R22 and he said go to
www.pprune. rotorheads.
Here I am.
slowrotor
P.S. Just checked the NTSB data base and it pulled up 297 R22 accident reports for USA. I get a different number depending on the particular search but in general the accident rate is very high. Sure, it's usually pilot error, I want to know about that as well so I can avoid the result.
Just reread the NTSB R22 special report and it lists 850 USA R22's in use instead of the 800 I listed above from memory. That was 1996.
Some accidents are not reported to the NTSB.