BBQ/Fly-in 2nd August, South East UK

[toptobottom]

parasite drag

Good on you for taking the initiative; would liked to have come along, but sadly I'm otherwise engaged.

Looking forward to the date for next year though

TTB

[tonge]

Iain, We had a great time at you "Pre" Fly-in today!! Typical me to get the days wrong!!

You've got a great little strip, hope we didn't blow too much straw about when we left??

Can't wait to take you up on your offer of coming in again, enjoy tomorrow (shame I can't make the right day!!)

Tonge

[jellycopter]

Iain, Karen and all

Thanks so much for the invitation. We had a great day and it was good to see a strong turn out for your first fly-in.

Had an interesting flight (then drive!) home.

See you soon

JJ

[Hoopmeister]

Perfect day - thank you

A big thanks to Iain and Karen for laying on a great day and another thanks to Kev for being a driving force to get this socialised so well. Hats off to you all.

Perfect wx, good people, fantastic selection of different aircraft, sausages well cooked. Couldn't ask for more and nice to see so many people make the effort, hopefully this will be one of many, although the angry resident may not share the love - whoever had the 'fat helicopter' and flew over his house has a new fan.

JJ and the Enstrom guys, I hope the gearbox turns out to be something simple (and cheap). Glad you guys landed safely.

Carl, very decent of you to take the girls up in the EC120, that made their weekend.

Thanks again and happy landings to all.

Brian

[ekardj]

Iain, Karen, Kev and all

We would also like to add our thanks for an excellent day. It was great to meet a lot of very friendly people at such a nice venue on a sunny day. Thanks for the barbeque and here's hoping you can repeat this fly-in again next year. Thanks once again for your hospitality.

John, Lynne

[Mike Bathurst]

Thanks

Thanks to everyone involved with the arrangements at the fly-in, it was great fun and good to meet some like-minded people. Didn't imagine I would end up leaving the heli in a field and driving home, but I guess that's aviation!

See you next time.

[JTobias]

Hi Chaps,

Sorry I couldn't be there but I was in Barcelona (although I'm home now).
I'll be at the next one if there is one.

Steve, Mike, JJ - obviously I know all about the incident on the way home.
Happy that all 3 of you are here to tell the tale after what I'm sure was a scary moment.

Naffed off though for two reasons :-

1) coz I hear that you were left a bit stranded by others who might have been able to assist you with your low fuel predicament (which turned out not to be a low fuel predicament - but that's not the point.) I thought us heli types were supposed to stick together. Maybe I'm being overly critical!?

2) Coz I would have been local, and able to bring you guys home after your precautionary landing instead of you getting a rental car. I hear that the local's where you landed bent over backwards to help you guys out of your sticky spot.

Speak soon,


Joel

[Mike Bathurst]

Thanks Joel and thanks for the 'back in the saddle ride' this afternoon.

Just to clarify. Our original fuel calculations were proved to be absolutely spot on when we refuelled at Lydd - we were initially caused concern at the fly-in due to conflicting indications from the fuel flow meter, the fuel guage and the trusty dipstick. Again for the sake of clarity, Iain and Karen very kindly offered to help us get some alternative fuel but help from a few other quarters wasn't exactly forthcoming.

The locals near our emergency landing site were absolutely fantastic - with particular thanks from all of us to Mack (who ended up driving us to Gatwick) and Lance (the farmer). I can strongly recommend the area for auto's to anyone.

Finally and perhaps needless to say, ATC were absolutely spot on and the Police Heli, who was overhead within three minutes of us touching down.

All in all - quite a day.

[007helicopter]

Mike

Sorry to here you had a problem on the way back, have you recovered the Heli now? and what was the problem?

Pete, if you are passing by Rochester you are welcome for a go in the Hiller anytime.

Iain & Karen thanks for the invite and a pleasant few hours.

Duncan

[Heliboater]

Iain & Karen

Thanks for a great day, everyone was so freindly and the weather stayed dry.

Now have to get your mud of my car. Look forward to next years.

Glad to hear that the Enstrom landed safely and they all got home OK

Richard

Pics to follow.

[Mike Bathurst]

Duncan

I believe the heli is nearly back at our engineers in Chester - it was recovered at lunchtime for its very unglamorous trip home on the back of a lorry.

We are obviously waiting for a full mechanical investigation but favourite at the moment is a major gearbox issue. No doubt we will be posting further on the subject when we know some more. It manifested itself with some very loud grinding sounds and airframe vibration.

The whole situation was handled extremely calmly by the two front-seaters but I am sure it is not a noise any of us would ever want to hear again.

Will keep you posted.

By the way - love the Hiller!!

Mike

[Clitheroe Kid]

Looks like the Enstrom problem is the gearbox. There was a loud bang followed by smaller bangs and grinding, along with severe vibration through the airframe. It was recovered today and will be with our engineer tomorrow morning. I suspect it's thrown a tooth from the main gearwheel which was then trapped between the wheel and pinion, and fragmented. There was no loss of rotor speed or yaw, and symptoms stopped after entering autorotation. It could have been worse, minutes later we would have been in the heli lanes routing through central London.

Otherwise a great day. See you next year.

I'll post again when i get the engineering report.

Stephen

[JTobias]

Boys and Girls,

I've put the details of the G-LADZ "incident' on my blog here

Joel

[007helicopter]

Guys, just a couple anarok question's, and having had the difficulty of transporting a few Hillers myself on low loader's.

a) How was it lifted on, assume seperate crane or Hiab?
b) Did you have to remove the main Rotor Blades?
c) Was it an experinced Heli moving crew who did the job?
d) Was there security when it was left overnight?

Good job as stated in the Blog it happened with a decent field in reach as I am sure would have been pretty nasty 5 minutes later.



Duncan

[toptobottom]

Steve, Mike and JJ

Deo gratis - glad you chaps are still in one piece; any mechanical failure in flight is obviously undesirable, but gearboxes going bang always touch a nerve with me. I lost a good friend who wasn't as fortunate as you when his squirrel's gearbox went to heaven, taking him and a couple of his colleagues a few moments later.

TTB

[Mike Bathurst]

Duncan

To respond:-

a) I believe a HIAB was used.
b) I believe the blades were removed.
c) Our engineer went straight to site on Monday morning to remove the blades and supervise the move. Thanks Jason.
d) The heli was left unattended overnight and was not touched. The farmer and Mack both very kindly offered to 'keep an eye on it' and obviously they did a great job.

5 minutes later and it would certainly have made the news in one form or other!!

I would stress again that we don't know for certain the actual cause of the problem although gearbox seems to be favourite. Obviously, we will post further.

Mike

[biggles99]

JJ and driving home

JJ,

reminds me of our trip in the Rotorway.

what is it with you and non-Bell or non-Robinson helicopters?

fly with JJ on the way there, drive with JJ on the way back.

(mind you, it's a privilege even to be in a rental car with JJ)

Yours

in very good humour lest I get mis-understood,

Big Ls

[jellycopter]

Biggles

You're too kind..........

JJ

[ShyTorque]

Biggles, Thank goodness JJ was taught well....

Probably when I was on leave...

[007helicopter]

A few pics here taken on the day

A few pics here taken on the day

Duncan MacBain's Photos - Helicopter BBQ & Flyout | Facebook