First Flight - New Production Series 400 Twin Otter
Thread Starter
Originally Posted by DHC6to8
...can the 400 also go on floats? Are all the mountings still present?
We're having a hard time convincing Honeywell that they should offer sonar depth indication and an optional fishfinder on the lower multifunction display when the aircraft is mounted on floats...
...they are not sure if we are serious or if we are kidding them (we're not sure either).Series 400 Technical Demonstrator, Fall 2008
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Thanks!
Thank you Michael, I am glad to see that she is on floats! Fish finder would have been great!! You can be very proud of the work you have done so far, she is looking just great!
6to8
.... all this dhc-6 talk makes me want to get flying in one again!
6to8
.... all this dhc-6 talk makes me want to get flying in one again!
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Twatter???
Cave Troll,
Its a Twotter, you ****.
Yes, it probably does still take that long for a circuit, but if you being paid per hour, WHO CARES?, and if you building hours all the better.
Michael, don't listen to the people "who live in the dark". The rest of us think you have done a great job and long may she fly
Sir O
PS: CT, Beauty is in the eye of the beholder
Its a Twotter, you ****.
Yes, it probably does still take that long for a circuit, but if you being paid per hour, WHO CARES?, and if you building hours all the better.
Michael, don't listen to the people "who live in the dark". The rest of us think you have done a great job and long may she fly
Sir O
PS: CT, Beauty is in the eye of the beholder
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Twin Otter Circuits
Cave Troll... did you want horizontal or vertical circuits? I've flown both with the Twin Otter before... just need a good wind for the vertical ones!
6to8
... of all the aluminum I have flown around in my career... nothing comes close to having fun with the Twin Otter... floats, wheels or skis... if you can learn this machine - you learn flying... I always remember 'wearing' the Twin Otter, not flying it!
6to8
... of all the aluminum I have flown around in my career... nothing comes close to having fun with the Twin Otter... floats, wheels or skis... if you can learn this machine - you learn flying... I always remember 'wearing' the Twin Otter, not flying it!
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Twatter , Twotter what is the diff. It is still slow as hell and ugly as sin. Sorry if I am stepping on toes but real aircraft fly faster than 150 Kts and higher than circuit alt. I left that stuff behind after my PPL. At least it has two engines though even if it still has the performance of your average trainer.
ct
ct
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Your ignorance of the Twotter's unique capabilities are disgusting.
I guess the only thing that would cut it for you would be a shiny B777 doing .84 from DXB to JNB.
Every airplane has unique characteristics that make it appropriate for certain missions. The Twin Otter is legendary for its short field performance, as well as working out of rough airfields. Its carrying capacity is solid, and it has a good safety record. What Viking and MM has done in updating the design for this century is outstanding.
Twotters are working across Africa, doing everything from helping out with oil exploration to humanitarian aid missions.
If you want to rip on the DHC-6 for only doing 150kts, well I can assure you that some of those guys flying the Twotter for Zimex and other oil companies are making similar salaries to folks flying those sparkling Airbus and Boeing widebodies in the Middle East.
GW
I guess the only thing that would cut it for you would be a shiny B777 doing .84 from DXB to JNB.
Every airplane has unique characteristics that make it appropriate for certain missions. The Twin Otter is legendary for its short field performance, as well as working out of rough airfields. Its carrying capacity is solid, and it has a good safety record. What Viking and MM has done in updating the design for this century is outstanding.
Twotters are working across Africa, doing everything from helping out with oil exploration to humanitarian aid missions.
If you want to rip on the DHC-6 for only doing 150kts, well I can assure you that some of those guys flying the Twotter for Zimex and other oil companies are making similar salaries to folks flying those sparkling Airbus and Boeing widebodies in the Middle East.
GW
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"Slow" is relative!
A Twotter is much faster than a speeding Toyota Land Cruiser, the only other option for reaching some of the places a Twotter can. You have Place A on one side of a steep mountain and Place B just 50 miles away on the other side, both with 800-metre dirt strips. Now, Genius, you tell me what use a Twotter might be?
CT, you might be surprised to find that you couldn't cut it, trying to fly one, ugly and slow as it is. Okay, instead of a stopwatch we use a calendar to time approaches but that doesn't mean it's as easy as you might think to look at it.
CT, you might be surprised to find that you couldn't cut it, trying to fly one, ugly and slow as it is. Okay, instead of a stopwatch we use a calendar to time approaches but that doesn't mean it's as easy as you might think to look at it.
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Okay I get it...
I get it... you are a troll that lives in a cave of ignorance! I can spot a jealous wannabe a mile away! The Twin Otter allows those with skill, intelligence and understanding of her limits and abilities, the opportunity to do things that are unimaginable with other aircraft...... it builds character, experience and pilots... she is beautiful in all configurations, short nose, long nose, CAP floats, Whiplines ... whatever... I learned more about flying from Twin Otters than I ever did on anything else.... the rest were just boring in comparison... and the real funny thing is that I earned some of my best coin flying special missions or contracts on this work horse... beauty is in the eye of the beholder... so until you have flown her keep your negative comments to yourself!
6to8
6to8
Thread Starter
For the benefit of Pprune forum members who are reading this discussion but may not be familiar with the DHC-6 aircraft, here’s a little bit of background about what the aircraft was designed to do, and what it can and cannot do – you could interpret this as “what it is good at, and what it is not good at”.
First, some history:
The Twin Otter design came about as a natural evolution of the DHC-3 single Otter, an aircraft that was first certified in 1952. In the early 1960s, Pratt and Whitney Canada developed the now legendary PT6A engine and offered it to de Havilland. Putting a PT6 on the well proven and by then legendary single Otter would not work, because at that time, the most powerful PT6 available was the 550 SHP -20 variant, and the single Otter was equipped with a 600 horsepower Wasp radial.
But – it was obvious to all that if the single Otter airframe could be fitted with TWO of these 550 SHP turboprop engines, the results would be spectacular. In 1964, the board of de Havilland gave the go-ahead for Twin Otter development, and in early 1965, the first Twin Otter flew. Several hundred were built over the next 3 years, all equipped with two 550 SHP engines.
In the late 1960s, Pratt & Whitney Canada offered de Havilland the newly developed 680 SHP PT6A-27 engine, and after some testing, this was fitted to the Twin Otter beginning at serial number 231. This marked the beginning of “Series 300” production. To avoid the need to enlarge the empennage of the aircraft, de Havilland flat-rated the power output of the -27 engine to 620 horsepower. A very pleasant side effect of this flat-rating was that the engines would produce the full 620 HP takeoff power up to ISA +18°.
With the introduction of the Series 300 in 1969, this aircraft – which had originally been designed with the Canadian bush market in mind – suddenly caught the interest of civil, military, and humanitarian operators all over the world. When the de Havilland board authorized Twin Otter production in 1964, their goal was to sell 100 of them in Canada. By 1970, one year after the Series 300 was certified, production rates reached 100 aircraft per year, and almost all of these were being exported.
-------------------------------------
The unique advantage of a Twin Otter is that it can lift a 5,000 pound payload out of a 1,000 foot long unimproved surface, and deliver that payload to a 700 foot long unimproved surface 75 miles away in about 30 minutes flying time. Compared to the 110 to 120 knot cruising speed of other single engine bush aircraft available at the time (the DHC-2 Beaver, the DHC-3 single Otter, and the Norseman), the 150 knot block speed of the Twin Otter was considered ‘seriously fast’. It’s obviously not fast compared to today’s offerings such as the Cessna Caravan or the Pilatus PC-12, but neither of these very fine aircraft can lift as much load, nor can they operate off of the type (or short length) of unimproved surfaces that the Twin Otter can. It's also noteworthy that both of these aircraft are singles.
The disadvantage of the Twin Otter, of course, is that compared to other twin engine turboprops such as the 19 seat B-1900, it flies low and slow. But really, this is a ‘horses for courses’ issue. If you have to move 3,000 pounds over a 500 mile distance and you have 3,000 feet or more of pavement at each end, for sure you are going to choose the B-1900 – it’s the best tool for the job. However, if you only have 1,000 feet of grass, soft mud, or sand, or snow, or fallow farm field at each end, your choices are limited to a Twin Otter or shipping by road.
In Canada, where we have over 1 million lakes in our country, water operations are common. When fitted with floats, the Twin Otter is the largest production floatplane available, and it has a shorter water takeoff and landing run than any other certified aircraft – shorter than even the little 4 seaters. It is a truly amazing floatplane. In some countries (notably the Maldives Islands), Twin Otters are the backbone of the domestic transportation system, in much the same way that the A320 or B737 series is the backbone of the air transportation system in countries that have well developed airport infrastructure.
Within African aviation – the focus of our discussion here, and the environment that I have spent most of my career working in – the Twin Otter is obviously not the first choice if you want to operate routes from (for example) Goma to Nairobi, or Goma to Kinshasa. But, it’s the ONLY choice if you want to operate from Goma to 90% of the domestic Congolese airports within a 300 miles range and you want to do this with the same level of safety as you enjoy on a Part 25 aircraft such as the previously mentioned A320 or B737. The singles, by definition, just don’t give you that level of safety, and legacy aircraft manufactured last century, including the legacy Series 300, don’t have the contemporary avionics and safety systems that the new Twin Otters have. If you tried to retrofit all the safety systems found on a Series 400 Twin Otter to a Series 300 Twin Otter, the retrofit bill would come to over half a million dollars, and the resulting aircraft would weigh well over 1,000 pounds more than the new production Series 400 aircraft do.
Although the instrument panel pictures above look nice, what you can’t see is the safety equipment that is standard fitment to all Series 400 Twin Otters built for commercial operation. This includes dual Mode S EHS transponders, TCAS I, Class A TAWS, weather radar, dual GPS certified to the latest TSO specs, an integral Central Maintenance Monitoring System, dual recorders (CVR and FDR), a top of the line ESIS (Emergency Standby Instrument System) normally found only on Part 25 aircraft, a Crew Alerting System (CAS) equal to that of any new Part 25 aircraft, and a FMS that is identical in operation and functionality to that found in a G-550, Falcon 7X, or an Embraer 170 / 190 series airliner. This is no surprise when you consider that the whole integrated avionics suite is a direct descendant of the same avionics suite installed in these aircraft - compare the Falcon 7X flight deck in the photo above to the new Series 400 flight deck photo. What IS a surprise is that the first new production Twin Otter rolled out of the factory this spring weighing less than 7,000 pounds with all this equipment installed (that was green, without final paint or passenger seats installed).
We don’t expect that the new Twin Otter will cause Airbus and Boeing salesmen to start worrying that we are going to encroach on their ultra long haul market, and as far as we have heard, our friends at Gulfstream and Dassault aren’t too worried about us either. Heck, we don’t even compete with the superb new PC12E or the well established Cessna Caravan, both of which are also unique and well thought out aircraft that are designed to do a certain type of job better than any other aircraft.
The Series 400 is sort of like a “Swiss Army Knife” of aviation. It’s a specialty tool, albeit a very versatile specialty tool. You probably wouldn’t use a Swiss Army Knife to eat a meal at a white-tablecloth restaurant (although you could if you wanted to...), but if you are stuck in an undeveloped area, or an area that doesn’t permit construction of a 3,000 or 4,000 foot paved runway – well, there’s just nothing else that will get you in and out of there with the same level of safety as this remarkable flying “Swiss Army Knife”.
Michael
First, some history:
The Twin Otter design came about as a natural evolution of the DHC-3 single Otter, an aircraft that was first certified in 1952. In the early 1960s, Pratt and Whitney Canada developed the now legendary PT6A engine and offered it to de Havilland. Putting a PT6 on the well proven and by then legendary single Otter would not work, because at that time, the most powerful PT6 available was the 550 SHP -20 variant, and the single Otter was equipped with a 600 horsepower Wasp radial.
But – it was obvious to all that if the single Otter airframe could be fitted with TWO of these 550 SHP turboprop engines, the results would be spectacular. In 1964, the board of de Havilland gave the go-ahead for Twin Otter development, and in early 1965, the first Twin Otter flew. Several hundred were built over the next 3 years, all equipped with two 550 SHP engines.
In the late 1960s, Pratt & Whitney Canada offered de Havilland the newly developed 680 SHP PT6A-27 engine, and after some testing, this was fitted to the Twin Otter beginning at serial number 231. This marked the beginning of “Series 300” production. To avoid the need to enlarge the empennage of the aircraft, de Havilland flat-rated the power output of the -27 engine to 620 horsepower. A very pleasant side effect of this flat-rating was that the engines would produce the full 620 HP takeoff power up to ISA +18°.
With the introduction of the Series 300 in 1969, this aircraft – which had originally been designed with the Canadian bush market in mind – suddenly caught the interest of civil, military, and humanitarian operators all over the world. When the de Havilland board authorized Twin Otter production in 1964, their goal was to sell 100 of them in Canada. By 1970, one year after the Series 300 was certified, production rates reached 100 aircraft per year, and almost all of these were being exported.
-------------------------------------
The unique advantage of a Twin Otter is that it can lift a 5,000 pound payload out of a 1,000 foot long unimproved surface, and deliver that payload to a 700 foot long unimproved surface 75 miles away in about 30 minutes flying time. Compared to the 110 to 120 knot cruising speed of other single engine bush aircraft available at the time (the DHC-2 Beaver, the DHC-3 single Otter, and the Norseman), the 150 knot block speed of the Twin Otter was considered ‘seriously fast’. It’s obviously not fast compared to today’s offerings such as the Cessna Caravan or the Pilatus PC-12, but neither of these very fine aircraft can lift as much load, nor can they operate off of the type (or short length) of unimproved surfaces that the Twin Otter can. It's also noteworthy that both of these aircraft are singles.
The disadvantage of the Twin Otter, of course, is that compared to other twin engine turboprops such as the 19 seat B-1900, it flies low and slow. But really, this is a ‘horses for courses’ issue. If you have to move 3,000 pounds over a 500 mile distance and you have 3,000 feet or more of pavement at each end, for sure you are going to choose the B-1900 – it’s the best tool for the job. However, if you only have 1,000 feet of grass, soft mud, or sand, or snow, or fallow farm field at each end, your choices are limited to a Twin Otter or shipping by road.
In Canada, where we have over 1 million lakes in our country, water operations are common. When fitted with floats, the Twin Otter is the largest production floatplane available, and it has a shorter water takeoff and landing run than any other certified aircraft – shorter than even the little 4 seaters. It is a truly amazing floatplane. In some countries (notably the Maldives Islands), Twin Otters are the backbone of the domestic transportation system, in much the same way that the A320 or B737 series is the backbone of the air transportation system in countries that have well developed airport infrastructure.
Within African aviation – the focus of our discussion here, and the environment that I have spent most of my career working in – the Twin Otter is obviously not the first choice if you want to operate routes from (for example) Goma to Nairobi, or Goma to Kinshasa. But, it’s the ONLY choice if you want to operate from Goma to 90% of the domestic Congolese airports within a 300 miles range and you want to do this with the same level of safety as you enjoy on a Part 25 aircraft such as the previously mentioned A320 or B737. The singles, by definition, just don’t give you that level of safety, and legacy aircraft manufactured last century, including the legacy Series 300, don’t have the contemporary avionics and safety systems that the new Twin Otters have. If you tried to retrofit all the safety systems found on a Series 400 Twin Otter to a Series 300 Twin Otter, the retrofit bill would come to over half a million dollars, and the resulting aircraft would weigh well over 1,000 pounds more than the new production Series 400 aircraft do.
Although the instrument panel pictures above look nice, what you can’t see is the safety equipment that is standard fitment to all Series 400 Twin Otters built for commercial operation. This includes dual Mode S EHS transponders, TCAS I, Class A TAWS, weather radar, dual GPS certified to the latest TSO specs, an integral Central Maintenance Monitoring System, dual recorders (CVR and FDR), a top of the line ESIS (Emergency Standby Instrument System) normally found only on Part 25 aircraft, a Crew Alerting System (CAS) equal to that of any new Part 25 aircraft, and a FMS that is identical in operation and functionality to that found in a G-550, Falcon 7X, or an Embraer 170 / 190 series airliner. This is no surprise when you consider that the whole integrated avionics suite is a direct descendant of the same avionics suite installed in these aircraft - compare the Falcon 7X flight deck in the photo above to the new Series 400 flight deck photo. What IS a surprise is that the first new production Twin Otter rolled out of the factory this spring weighing less than 7,000 pounds with all this equipment installed (that was green, without final paint or passenger seats installed).
We don’t expect that the new Twin Otter will cause Airbus and Boeing salesmen to start worrying that we are going to encroach on their ultra long haul market, and as far as we have heard, our friends at Gulfstream and Dassault aren’t too worried about us either. Heck, we don’t even compete with the superb new PC12E or the well established Cessna Caravan, both of which are also unique and well thought out aircraft that are designed to do a certain type of job better than any other aircraft.
The Series 400 is sort of like a “Swiss Army Knife” of aviation. It’s a specialty tool, albeit a very versatile specialty tool. You probably wouldn’t use a Swiss Army Knife to eat a meal at a white-tablecloth restaurant (although you could if you wanted to...), but if you are stuck in an undeveloped area, or an area that doesn’t permit construction of a 3,000 or 4,000 foot paved runway – well, there’s just nothing else that will get you in and out of there with the same level of safety as this remarkable flying “Swiss Army Knife”.
Michael
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Touchy touchy! All I said was that it was ugly as sin and slow. Two facts that you cannot change. As for me being ignorant with regard to the twotter I admit I am. I have never flown one. I have also never said it was a crap plane. I am sure it is good at what it does. As for Gaius W. no I don't fly a 777 at .84 or at any other speed and I don't want to. I also don't particularly want to fly a twotter so no I am not jealous or envious of you twotter crew. I am happy flying what I am flying right now {which also happens to be a "bush plane"}.
This all still does not change the fact that it is ugly and slow!
ct
V1...Ooops thanks. Now I am less ignorant!
This all still does not change the fact that it is ugly and slow!
ct
V1...Ooops thanks. Now I am less ignorant!
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Cave troll
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.Most of the folks on this thread are fond of this aircraft,do you really think they care what you think?
I actually find it quite gourgeous and "sexy" to say the least.
The beauty is in the "flying"
Trust me once you have flown one,you views will change.Its an iconic,practical,most forgiving,durable workhorse,who never lets you down.
I have flown at .78 for quite a while now,but for the right price............
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.Most of the folks on this thread are fond of this aircraft,do you really think they care what you think?
I actually find it quite gourgeous and "sexy" to say the least.
The beauty is in the "flying"
Trust me once you have flown one,you views will change.Its an iconic,practical,most forgiving,durable workhorse,who never lets you down.
I have flown at .78 for quite a while now,but for the right price............