Much appreciated... TAFF MISSED.

A quill is a narrowed neck to a drive shaft which is designed to fail before a more catastrophic point. So in the case of a generator it is merely the input drive shaft having a narrowed neck.

Bell 212 Question
 

I'm reading a book at the moment called "Hunting Warbirds" by Carl Hoffman

In it they are recovering a B17 with a 212...
After lifting a section and flying it out it starts to spin on the strop.
Anyway the book goes on to say that he had to rush back to pick up the salvors as one of the controls/linkages was severed to one engine....

How can something spinning on the hook severe engine linkages???

And has anyone seen Charlies Angels where they get under the Uh1 and pull out the "primary flight controls" (a bunch of wires) and the dude flying then has no cyclic control.. bizzare! :confused:

Wern't they flying in the "fly by wire" Huey? :D

Did any one see that Silvester Stallone movie (one of the Rambo ones I think) where he is shot down in the Huey he is flying by a Puma dressed up as a Hind? Sly (sitting in the front) pulls out an RPG-7, punches a hole in the windscreen, aims it , and to the encouragement of the two guys SITTING IN THE BACK BEHIND THE LAUNCHER :eek: :eek: :D :D , pulls the trigger and shoots the PumaHind down!!

Boys in the back climb out (unburnt, hair not smoking, eyebrows in tact of course) and worship Sly. :) :)

Literary licence. Wilbur Smith had one of his characters standing between the pilots watching Cape Town come into view. All fine and good but they were in an S58T! Painful or what?

Some other silly bu**er, the one that wrote 'Whirlwind', loosely based on Bristow exploits in Iran and whose name escapes me, had his crew chief find a bullet mark on the crankcase of his helicopter. That's fine, but it was a Jetranger! He, the crew chief, then went on to repair a leaking oil pipe with chewing gum. I stopped reading at that point.

Taff

Don't remember the name of the movie, but the hero pilot was in the water swimming towards his floating Jetranger, giant crocodile close behind and gaining fast. Our hero's love interest was inside the helicopter urging him on. As he splashed towards the helicopter he yelled out, "Start it up-it's got automatic ignition"!

One of my all time favourites was a newspaper reporting on flood relief. They printed that if the helicopter's engine failerd, the pilot put on the rotor brake and used the blades as small wings to glide safely back to earth!!

But what about dissymetry of lift??? :D :D

Watched a film called "Rat Race" on the flight over to LA on Tuesday.

Spirited bit of flying in a Squirrel spoilt when after a simulated engine failure the attempts at restart were indicated by the soundtrack of a car ignition !

Yes there are some winners out there but no one has answered my question, or is it just bollocks.
It was probably another problem not caused by the spinning load.

deathranger: Is that book fictional, or a true account?

"...the book goes on to say that he had to rush back to pick up the salvors as one of the controls/linkages was severed to one engine..."

Maybe it was one of the linkages (sling) to an engine from the B17. :D

OK. Serious now.

The 212 'throttle' controls do run across the floor of the hell-hole (where the cargo hook is suspended)and up the rear bulkhead although its difficult to see how anything on the hook would get in and damage them without also doing some fairly serious damage to the surrounding area.

Taff

[ 07 December 2001: Message edited by: Taff Missed ]

I do seem to remember an incident in the USA last year on the fires. A 212 was bucketing and on the lift off out of the tank, his bucket got snagged on something and actualy bent large parts of the airframe around the hell hole (cargo hook area) resulting in an engine failure, and subsequent landing. I cannot put my finger on the report at the moment, but I remember it contained the phrase "single engine autorotation" !! :D And this was on an accident report! :eek: As you say Taff, there was some serious airframe damage before the engine shutdown. If some one can search the NTSB, or I can next week.

I must admit though, I was confused as to which engine had been severed - the B17 or B212? Also, excuse my ignorance but what itis the salvors?

Taff Missed,

The book to which you referred, "Whirlwind" was written by James Clavell. You may recall a couple of his other popular novels, "Shogun" and "Tai Pan."

Ok, the book is a true account of hunting for warbirds, this B17 is being recovered for Erickson (Air Crane)
"THe b17 section started spinning wildly. Just as he was banking to drop the load, it cut the throttle linkage to one of the engines.He set the fuselage down gently and came back to get us. But for now, the four million dollar helicopter was shot."

Salvors are salvage team.
People who recover stuff!! :eek:

deathranger, I lie humbly at your feet for your amazing knowledge of "salvors" and appologise profusely for having never heard of them.

I would love to see a B212 "gentley" putting ANY external load on the ground after a single engine failure!! But then with all that airframe damage, he went back on a single engine and picked up passengers? :eek: :eek:
Old mate is lucky to be able to write the "true" account of it.
:D

helmet fire: I suspect the throttle linkage (guessing here) would have been severed in the full open position. He would have been still able to use the engine affected, as long as he did not need manual control.

Aah yes! James Clavell was the one. I quite enjoyed Tai Pan & Shogun. One has to wonder if people with a knowledge of the time/location around which the books were based had as much fun picking holes in them as I did with 'Whirlwind'?

sprocket: Unlikely the engine controls would be ripped out without affecting their position. Metal tubes throughout and the only friction is on the twistgrip end.

Literary licence methinks.

Never let the truth get in the way of a good story :-)

Taff

Taff Missed,The basic story behind Clavel's Whirlwind is true, and was performed by Bristow crews.

(I am quite sure all Brits know this, as it is so ballsy, I'd make sure it was repeated frequently if I were involved!). Alistair Gordon (Bristow #2 for many years) spun the tale for me about 20 tears ago at a dinner, and I have never forgotten.

Here is the accident summary from the B212 I referred to earlier. Sorry, but I don’t know how to set up a link.
Data Source: SB AVIATION ACCIDENT/INCIDENT DATABASE
Report Number: SEA98GA159
Local Date: 08/08/1998
Local Time: 15:05 MDT
State: OR
City: JUNTURA

Operations Information
Category of Operation: GENERAL AVIATION
Aircraft Damage: SUBSTANTIAL
Aircraft Make/Model: BELL BHT-212-XXX
Owner Name: AIR ONE HELICOPTERS, INC.

Narrative
THE PILOT-IN-COMMAND (PIC) HAD JUST MANEUVERED THE BELL 212 HELICOPTER INTO A 100 FOOT HOVER ABOVE A SMALL RESERVOIR TO FILL A "BAMBI" BUCKET FOR FIRE-FIGHTING OPERATIONS. THE ROTORCRAFT BEGAN TO SETTLE. THE PIC, PERCEIVING THAT HE HAD ENCOUNTERED ROTOR VORTEX CONDITIONS, SLIPPED THE HELICOPTER TO THE RIGHT WITH THE BUCKET STILL IN THE RESERVOIR. THIS, IN TURN, INCREASED THE ANGLE OF THE LONG LINE FROM THE VERTI CAL OR ZERO DEGREE REFERENCE. IMMEDIATELY THEREAFTER, THE PIC NOTED A LOSS OF POWER IN THE #1 ENGINE. HE THEN EXECUTED A
SINGLE-ENGINE AUTOROTATION, DURING WHICH A ROTOR BLADE IMPACTED A DEAD TREE. POST-CRASH EXAMINATION REVEALED THAT THE LONG LINE HAD PULLED AFT AND LEFT FROM ITS VERTICAL REFERENCE INTO THE AIRFRAME STRUCTURE (THE 7:30 POSITION OF THE HELL HOLE IN THE BELLY OF THE HELICOPTER) RESULTING IN 1) THE SEPARATION OF ONE OF THE #1 ENGINE PUSH/PULL RODS,
AND 2) THE DEFORMATION OF ENGINE CONTROL RODS ASSOCIATED WITH THE #1 ENGINE FLIGHT IDLE STOP (SOLENOID) WHICH THEN SHEARED. THE SHEARING OF THE FLIGHT IDLE STOP RESULTED IN A RESTRICTION/CESSATION OF FUEL FLOW TO THE #1 ENGINE FUEL CON TROL UNIT, AND SUBSEQUENT ENGINE SHUTDOWN.

Probable Cause
THE PILOT-IN-COMMAND'S FAILURE TO MAINTAIN PROPER CLEARANCE BETWEEN THE LONG LINE CABLE AND HELL HOLE STRUCTURE RESULTING IN AIRFRAME CONTACT AND BINDING OF THE CABLE. THIS RESULTED IN SEPARATION/DISABLING OF THE FUEL CONTROL SOLENOID AND A SUBSEQUENT RESTRICTION/CESSATION OF FUEL FLOWTO THE #1 ENGINE. CONTRIBUTING FACTORS WERE SEPARATION OF THE #1 ENGINE PUSH/PULL ROD AND A TREE.

I do love the "single engine autorotation" bit - but I cannot believe it made it into a NTSB accident report. :eek: Does this mean all single engine helicopters are in autorotation?? :D

Looks as though the book may have been sort of true, but I think perhaps the problem was discovered at the end of the flight when he tried to shut the engine down? Otherwise, I still think it is a big call to go and get passengers with a known throttle linkage problem and airframe damage. Maybe it was just lucky that he did not have to do a "single engine autorotation" as well!! :D :D