Hill Helicopters HX50
Bellringer
I am afraid you are caught up in the big con from manufacturers . Give you an example of a pressure switch, i know it is made by a local company that sells it to a well known OEM, It is a switch that has no aviation certification until it is given a piece of paper by OEM. Switch sold to OEM for 2000 euros, cost to you and me with a piece of paper 20000 euros ! My next door neighbour used to make RR 250 compressor wheels, cost £ 180 to make I will let you tell me what RR charge for them . I wouldnt mind what goes on in aviation but really ....... one of my pilots used to be a chief auditor for Jaguar Landrover, he was horrified when he came to aviation, his comment was what a joke , no manufacturer would last 10 minutes in the quality of the product compared to automotive ( and that is from Jag Landrover !!!!) here is an example he pulled out. HTC main rotor blades, an issue on debonding of blade from the grip, aviation cure AD check the blade every 200 tq events. Automotive would recall every blade and replace and then immediately, change and improve the process otherwise sued for millions and customers would go else where.
I am afraid you are caught up in the big con from manufacturers . Give you an example of a pressure switch, i know it is made by a local company that sells it to a well known OEM, It is a switch that has no aviation certification until it is given a piece of paper by OEM. Switch sold to OEM for 2000 euros, cost to you and me with a piece of paper 20000 euros ! My next door neighbour used to make RR 250 compressor wheels, cost £ 180 to make I will let you tell me what RR charge for them . I wouldnt mind what goes on in aviation but really ....... one of my pilots used to be a chief auditor for Jaguar Landrover, he was horrified when he came to aviation, his comment was what a joke , no manufacturer would last 10 minutes in the quality of the product compared to automotive ( and that is from Jag Landrover !!!!) here is an example he pulled out. HTC main rotor blades, an issue on debonding of blade from the grip, aviation cure AD check the blade every 200 tq events. Automotive would recall every blade and replace and then immediately, change and improve the process otherwise sued for millions and customers would go else where.
The simple truth is that certifying anything in aviation (parts, software, whole aeroplanes) costs a sh*t ton of money as non-recurring engineering cost. So your 2000 buck part that needs a piece of paper legitimately becomes a 20,000 buck part because it probably cost a million bucks worth of engineering to certify a new supplier, and they'll only ever sell 100 of them before the supplier goes under or they change part number or some other ridiculous trivia.
As an example in the app world: coding to aviation safety standards (DO-178) is required for something like a moving map. A VFR aeroplane you'd probably get away with DAL D (the simplest burden). It takes something like 8 - 12 hours of additional testing for every hour spent coding. Compare that to your apps like ForeFlight that have no such burden (because they live in the unregulated commodity space with pretty low average disclaimers saying "don't crash because of us) and it's clear that you've just increased your costs by somewhere between 5 and 10-fold, so a 200 dollar app just became a 2000 dollar one.
Add to that the point of the poster above about small production runs being woefully inefficient (roll on mass 3d printing) and you have your cost. This last part is why a Morgan plus four costs 3 times the price of an Mazda which is undoubtedly superior in every way apart from arguably style.
The following users liked this post:
Hughes - that's a great comparison except that you're comparing two entirely different industries with entirely different outputs. The volume/commodity industry that is automotive a) has volume of scale and b) doesn't have anywhere near the level of regulation that aviation has (and yes, automotive has regulation but they don't even know they're born compared to aviation regulations!)
I want my wind shield surrounded with aerospace screws that I can see and I don’t care about the dotted gradient to phase out the windshield black around band, (whatever that is called). Like some sort of flying Lexus.
I want my door handles made of super-premium high strength plastic in the non-pleasing but sturdy design, and I want them from the 3rd party maker that has been making them for all this time and has refined them across multiple markets, aerospace, military, space. Because of that I pay more that it seem to be worth as I see the indirect value to my system.
Another point:
Using 3rd party makers really multiplies your power to fix things, because that is all those partners are doing, and they have the staff to solve the problems. I can see a situation where Hill's vertical supply chain completely falls apart because his staff can only solve one problem at a time. Ball bearing can come up with pretty crazy problems (AW169 Leicester City Football Club) that would take a staff of 30 to solve.
when you have 10 supliers and 10 problems you can have 300 people working for you with a few phone calls.
Bellringer
I am afraid you are caught up in the big con from manufacturers . Give you an example of a pressure switch, i know it is made by a local company that sells it to a well known OEM, It is a switch that has no aviation certification until it is given a piece of paper by OEM. Switch sold to OEM for 2000 euros, cost to you and me with a piece of paper 20000 euros ! My next door neighbour used to make RR 250 compressor wheels, cost £ 180 to make I will let you tell me what RR charge for them . I wouldnt mind what goes on in aviation but really ....... one of my pilots used to be a chief auditor for Jaguar Landrover, he was horrified when he came to aviation, his comment was what a joke , no manufacturer would last 10 minutes in the quality of the product compared to automotive ( and that is from Jag Landrover !!!!) here is an example he pulled out. HTC main rotor blades, an issue on debonding of blade from the grip, aviation cure AD check the blade every 200 tq events. Automotive would recall every blade and replace and then immediately, change and improve the process otherwise sued for millions and customers would go else where.
I am afraid you are caught up in the big con from manufacturers . Give you an example of a pressure switch, i know it is made by a local company that sells it to a well known OEM, It is a switch that has no aviation certification until it is given a piece of paper by OEM. Switch sold to OEM for 2000 euros, cost to you and me with a piece of paper 20000 euros ! My next door neighbour used to make RR 250 compressor wheels, cost £ 180 to make I will let you tell me what RR charge for them . I wouldnt mind what goes on in aviation but really ....... one of my pilots used to be a chief auditor for Jaguar Landrover, he was horrified when he came to aviation, his comment was what a joke , no manufacturer would last 10 minutes in the quality of the product compared to automotive ( and that is from Jag Landrover !!!!) here is an example he pulled out. HTC main rotor blades, an issue on debonding of blade from the grip, aviation cure AD check the blade every 200 tq events. Automotive would recall every blade and replace and then immediately, change and improve the process otherwise sued for millions and customers would go else where.
Last time I checked automotive did not have components of the same severity and complexity of your example main rotor blade, or the same stringent qualification & certification requirements to satisfy.
Said qualification & certification for the above mentioned main rotor blade can and will consume many millions in engineering costs over several years, a cost to be fronted by the business and recovered from subsequent sales (sales likely being in the range of hundreds at best, compared to the vast quantity of automotive orders). To be blunt the costs you repeatedly quote would not cover the raw material or its treatments.
To "recall immediately, change and improve the process" potentially voiding any current qualification & certification activity, or at best initiating a partial repeat is not as simple as you suggest, remind me how long did Boeing park the Max whilst they changed some code in the software? I'm not saying manufacturers couldn't do better, but simply trying to justify some of the reluctance or delay to make improvements.
Slight thread drift but while on the subject of the much more efficient automotive industry I genuinely only received in 2022 a recall notice for an airbag fault discovered in 2014, I have had the car since new in 2012. Under no stretch of the definition can this either be considered "immediate".
Edit: Apologies, in the time I took to compile several others beat me to it.
Regards
Even Musk knew he had to rely on externals for his supply chain...for his proof of concept he even re-engineered a Lotus Elise. Hill's oddball commodities in one end/helicopter out the other is fanciful.
https://www.flightglobal.com/helicop...154622.article
"A fully certified version called the HC50 will arrive by the end of 2026."
"Timelines for the first flight of the HX50 were not disclosed during the event, but Hill Helicopters says it plans on “starting ground running of the first prototypes by Q2 of next year (2024), with flight tests happening shortly after that”."
Despite the relatively short period allocated for flight testing, Hill Helicopters insists this will not be an issue: “There will be sufficient time to do all the required flight testing on the three prototype aircraft,” it says."
"A fully certified version called the HC50 will arrive by the end of 2026."
"Timelines for the first flight of the HX50 were not disclosed during the event, but Hill Helicopters says it plans on “starting ground running of the first prototypes by Q2 of next year (2024), with flight tests happening shortly after that”."
Despite the relatively short period allocated for flight testing, Hill Helicopters insists this will not be an issue: “There will be sufficient time to do all the required flight testing on the three prototype aircraft,” it says."
https://www.flightglobal.com/helicop...154622.article
"A fully certified version called the HC50 will arrive by the end of 2026."
"Timelines for the first flight of the HX50 were not disclosed during the event, but Hill Helicopters says it plans on “starting ground running of the first prototypes by Q2 of next year (2024), with flight tests happening shortly after that”."
Despite the relatively short period allocated for flight testing, Hill Helicopters insists this will not be an issue: “There will be sufficient time to do all the required flight testing on the three prototype aircraft,” it says."
"A fully certified version called the HC50 will arrive by the end of 2026."
"Timelines for the first flight of the HX50 were not disclosed during the event, but Hill Helicopters says it plans on “starting ground running of the first prototypes by Q2 of next year (2024), with flight tests happening shortly after that”."
Despite the relatively short period allocated for flight testing, Hill Helicopters insists this will not be an issue: “There will be sufficient time to do all the required flight testing on the three prototype aircraft,” it says."
N
Gotta give credit for the pace of progress on development
No negative posts for 10 days!! Don’t tell me you’re all getting tired of hx50 bashing!!
Regardless of whether you’re a “hilliever” or a sceptic, one must at least give credit for the amazing pace of development and shear amount of work that team accomplishes each month.
Just watched the latest update. The pace is truly staggering.
Regardless of whether you’re a “hilliever” or a sceptic, one must at least give credit for the amazing pace of development and shear amount of work that team accomplishes each month.
Just watched the latest update. The pace is truly staggering.
Is this 'staggering pace' referring to the helicopter that should have been flying by now? Asking for a friend.
No negative posts for 10 days!! Don’t tell me you’re all getting tired of hx50 bashing!!
Regardless of whether you’re a “hilliever” or a sceptic, one must at least give credit for the amazing pace of development and shear amount of work that team accomplishes each month.
Just watched the latest update. The pace is truly staggering.
Regardless of whether you’re a “hilliever” or a sceptic, one must at least give credit for the amazing pace of development and shear amount of work that team accomplishes each month.
Just watched the latest update. The pace is truly staggering.
sure he has missed the mark big time with his date forecasts. No way will there be flying prototypes by early 2024. And definitely won’t be any mass production commencing by end 2024.
but fit a complete fresh sheet ground up design he’s making good progress and I have no doubt at all that he will get something flying over the next year or two.
It will be 4 years in December since this project started and it was even then claimed to be advanced - yet here we are still without a flying prototype........
I'll need to buy a new freezer soon.....maybe my humble pie should have been cryogenically preserved
I'll need to buy a new freezer soon.....maybe my humble pie should have been cryogenically preserved