de Havilland Herons
 

I came across the former Airlines of Tas herron VH CLV the other day in the back junk shed of the museum, got me thinking about what were they like to fly?

I only flew the originals with the Gypsy Queens and did about 1600 hours single pilot IFR with no autopilot (overseas operation where this was legal at the time). Also another few hundred hours two pilot where we used a sextant and a drift sight to find our way over vast bits of the watery stuff. Having four engines was a good feeling, even though I never had or knew anyone to have a bad moment with those crude pieces of Pommy engineering.
A bit of a trick to start them sometimes when hot, but when cool or cold they could even be hand swung.
Great range and payload for what they were and quite respectable field performance.
A bugger to keep all four engine RPMs in synch with the unusual single lever throttle/prop set-up.
Great handling - you could chuck it at windshear or just about any crosswind you could reasonably encounter, but the pneumatic braking system with free castoring nosewheel took finesse.
All round, a most enjoyable aeroplane which was only eclipsed by the appearance of the Twin Otter.

I was lucky enough to fly the first Heron built - now in a junk yard at Jandakot.
Fantastic aircraft - good load and range. Perhaps a little slow.
Broome to Jandakot nonstop - 7.2 hours.
Did a lot of joyrides at local airshows & the punters loved it as well - they actually had some leg room.

Ah the old pommy 4 engined job:-) I recall the Herons out at Tulla operated by Kendell's. Wonder whatever happened to them? Would love to have flown one but only ever got to drive the Heron's baby bro, The DH104 Dove. Typical pommy plane, looked, felt (as far as I could tell) & flew like yr typical Dehav 2WW plane:-) Ergonomic nightmare they where. Over the years switches & stuff where added ad-hoc. Pneumatics where more like hydraulics in the airframes I used to fly, more oil then air in the tanks:E.Still the old Dove flew well & can imagine the Heron was the same.

'DD' how's ya hearin' these days?:)


Here's too real Aeroplanes:ok:



Wmk2

Just wondering what sort of condition CLV was in? Is it just gathering dust in a storage area, or on display? Is it pretty much complete? Is it in the main museum in the city, or out at the old railyards site at Inveresk?

One also currently residing at the RAAFA Bull Creek museum Mr 'DD', in between the two buildings of the 'front' and 'rear' exhibition halls.

I think only the fuselage though, although the wings may be stacked up alongside as well......

Saad to see it thus...

Cheers:{

I flew VH-KAM & VH-CLW with Kendell Airlines in the late 70's.....A very different aircraft to operate on the ground, with the fully castering nosewheel, brakes operated by a lever on the control column with differential pressure applied by rudder pedal displacement, our A/C had The IO-540 Lycoming conversion 290 H.P...a fair bit of torque effect which required from memory leading with the left out board throttle to counteract the swing then gradually feeding in power on all as the rudder became effecitve, once airborne a stable airframe, easy to fly, extremely effective rudder, I think from memory a 30Kt. crosswind limit..final landing flap was 60 degrees, very draggy...with our engines cruise was at 2,200 rpm. @ 22"...gave about 165 Ktas @ 220 litres/Hr.....Ergonomics in cockpit were non existant, bits and pieces everywhere and a very high noise level, the emergency brake handle was hidden well under the left seat, caused me a heart-stopping moment landing in Merimbula when the primary brake bags had a leak and I was groping everywhere under the seat trying to find offending handle as the runway end was looming up!!
First flight of the day was always preceded by a lenghty engine run-up to build pneumatic pressure for brakes/flaps..once the run was complete it was the F/O's unenviable job to then drain the pumps water/oil seperators, this often meant getting sprayed with the frothy emulsion that was drained.
Ours had a fairly standard avionics fit for the day ILS/VOR, ADF & DME, our only ice protection was pitot-heat, not nearly enough for the heavy icing conditions often encountered over The Southern Alps on runs from MEL-MER-MCO & WGA-CBR...a few puckering memories there!!

Thanks 'zlin77' you pretty much expanded on what I said about the Doves.
One day after T/of @ EN I couldn't get the gear up do low air press (that was from extensive use of brakes taxiing too the rwy) & the twr guys said yr gear is still down, I guess I was dumb to get into the plane in the first place!:)

On the application of pwr the 2x IO720's (as was the Riley conversion of the Dove) the fuel flow gauges went off the scale!
Did you have any engine failures? With say 3 left to play with that's plenty of levers left to fondle:)

Wmk2

Wally - what was that you said?

Still have fond memories of a training day in the Heron - in the circuit, maintain 1000' until the piano keys disappear under the nose with full flap (60 deg) selected and land on the numbers.

Dove was a great aircraft as well - just a baby Heron

It is sitting in one of the back sheds at Inveresk, minus its wings & covered in dirt & dust. They intend on putting it back together & have it on display at a later date.

zlin77

VH-KAM is in the Queensland Air Museum

VH-CLW (DQ-FDY) is with a private collection at Mudgee.

Rgds

Fris-B...Thanks for the info

Wally Mk 2...Just one in-flight shutdown due to a severe oil leak, no failures as such, engine-out performance was quite reasonable with 4x290Hp. compared with 4x250 Hp of the original Gypsy Engines...
Zlin..

Can not find a copy of the paperwork, but I recall having an approval to ferry the Heron with one engine inoperative, & that was with the Gypsy Queen 30's.

Three engine ferry approval was with the prop removed. Forget now which side but the ops mannual went into detail about one of the outers being more dangerous as a ferry.

I think it works the same way as working out critical engine on a twin considering direction of props rotating. I stand corrected though....

was it jack Rudge that used to operate them years ago?? help me out here. I think he ditched one into botany bay???

Ex-TAA/AA Ted Rudge at Essendon I suspect you are thinking of although he operated Doves.

Had a problem one evening (Dec 1993) in DHD and the bird ended up parked against a wall in a front yard down towards North Essendon. None hurt and we all breathed a sigh of relief ...

Nice bloke and still out and about I gather, although I've not spoken with him for quite some time.

Fiji Airways (now Air Pacific) used to operate Herons with a three man crew out of Honiara to Nadi via one or two places. The Engineer was so obliging he used to find places to hang suit bags in the cabin... especially for ladies!!!

Great pix there 'exaviator':ok:

'PA39' as 'JT' mentioned it was 'Rudgy' (Ted) who parked a dove in someone's back/front yard out of EN late one arvo. I recall this very well as I was flying a dove (not his types) on the same night taking off the same rwy @ EN. I got dozens of Ph Calls on my Mob Ph that arvo when I landed after he went in as my family thought it was me, scared the hell out of my mum that day.
Would loved to have flown a Heron, 4 piston engines & props, that's becoming a rarity these days.

Just as an off shoot here I noticed a Dove looking rather sad up at YBMK the other day parked east of the main rwy. Looked like an ex RAF machine, anyone know of it's history? Forkie you get around a bit you must know:)


Wmk2