Steve
Any idea when the Miri machine is going to get there? I'd like to know when I'm actually going to do some work :hmm: :ugh:

I'm sure there'll be plenty to do when you get there!

Mmm, Pina Colada or Tiger, Factor 10 or 25, decisions decisions.....;)

Stoey good luck to them doing the long trip wish I could do this one day.

The Antonov arrived, they loaded up yesterday and have now departed......

I'm sure the Miri machine will arrive to a slick paperwork process and will be airborne within days/weeks/months (delete as appropriate)......:E

Just looking at the photo of the Bristow S-92 in the UK, don't you love the logic of big operators..... CHC have 2 x S-92's operating in Miri and one in Australia all operating in over 30 Oc with blade de-ice fitted and Bristows operate S-92's in the North Sea with none!!

The first S92 did not have RIPS on delivery (for some reason eminating from Sikorsky) but it has now been retrofitted. As far as I know, the subsequent deliveries will have RIPS. Without the limited icing clearance enjoyed by the AS332L/L2/EC225 family, non-RIPS S92s would be stuck down in the weeds in winter, so its pretty much essential.

That said, its interesting to note that our de-iced S92 can barely fly on any more days than non-deiced French offerings. Yes the Super Puma family must have a positive temperature band starting 500' above the min operating height (500' over water) - ie it must be +0 deg C at 1000' above sea level.

But there are a number of RIPS failures on the S92 which require the pilot to "vacate icing conditions" straight away. The RFM omits to tell the pilot how he is supposed to do this. The only realistic way is if there is positive air into which he can descend. For this reason the BHL S92 fleet has very sensibly decided to require positive air temp at 500' above sea level.

So all the complexity, cost, maintenance penalty, weight etc of the RIPS just allows the S92 to depart on a day that is 1 deg C colder than the coldest day that the Super Puma family can depart (taking 500' = 1 deg C). Its only worth having RIPS because the limited icing clearance is a concept not invented by Sikorsky and so they are damned if they are going to certify for it on the S92!

HC

As usual, helofacomparison, you advocate NO equipment as being a better solution to operational safety issues....where do we get such men?

:ugh::ugh::ugh:

Heli Comparator

I don't think it was EC or their forebears Aerospatiale who pioneered the icing clearance. While Sikorsky may not have "invented" the icing clearance (and wouldn't claim to have done), the S61N had some sort of icing clearance before the 332L was in service.

I believe it could legally depart in "forecast light icing" conditions which in practical terms meant it could fly in light icing.......and did...very well.

The Russian did it also very well !!!!!....Mi 8s, 17s and so on are de-iced. Although I don't know to what level of icing they are certified, it seems to be very efficient and the anti-icing normal mode is automatic ( If I remember well there is a manual mode and an emergency mode in case of 1 alternator failure)

Nick - you just can't help yourself can you... Never mind, keep taking the tablets... I would say that RIPS represents a considerable safety hazard as it encourages flight into icing conditions with no requirement for an escape route, when there are a number of single-point failures that require icing conditions to be immediately vacated. Definitely a trap for the unwary.

Hippo - As you know I flew the S61 many years ago but to be honest I can't remember about the icing clearance. You are probably right though, and of course the limited icing clearance for the Super Puma family was a UK thing, not a manufacturer's thing. With the advent of EASA we had a bit of a struggle to explain to the Europeans what it was all about, but were sucessfull eventually.

My snipe at Sikorsky is due to their ongoing refusal to consider having a limited icing clearance for the S92, preferring instead the flaky RIPS that has to be rebooted regularly.
I suppose one can understand why - consider how much cash they get from a customer specifying RIPS versus how much they could get for a piece of paper allowing limited icing flight?

HC

Well, it is certainly true that there are single point failures that require vacating icing conditions "As soon as possible", but I wouldn't go so far as to say it was a flight safety hazard! There are single point failures that require a 225 (or any type) to ditch, but that doesn't stop you flying over the sea in 60 kt winds at night (definitely not the time to ditch!)

If you look at Cougar's operations you will see the true value of a de-icing system (T.R. and I were shown some interesting photos recently!) It makes Aberdeen look like the tropics :uhoh:

212 - I suggest it all depends on the probability of these sorts of failures. The probability of having to ditch a 225 (especially with its true 30 minute dry running time, unlike Brand X) is very low but of course not zero. Surely the probability of a RIPS failure that requires icing conditions to be vacated is several orders of magnitude higher than that.

I agree that RIPS does not represent an operational hazard in Brunei:}, nor much in the N Sea where there is almost always an escape route, but it could lead the unsuspecting into a flight over high ground in IMC / cumulo-granite where there is no escape route for several hours.

HC

Leave it to the mindless heliconfuser to declare rotor icing protection to be an "operational hazard"! What thoughtless, mindless drivel from EC's biggest salesman! Because the 225 does not offer RIPS, he must find it worthless, or worse, a hazard, else the 225 becomes less, and it is afterall his mistress! What is next HC, crashworthy helicopters might make pilots crash on purpose?

He is a Master at how to take a competing aircraft and take one of its strengths and declare it a weakness! HC must be on Blair's Iraq Cabinet, as chief strategist!

Never mind that the S-92's rotor icing protection system is entirely redundant, and protects in icing at blithering levels that would turn an EC-225 into a submarine, HC actually pontificates that a true icing protection kit is only a minor hazard! What Balls!

Still looking for the WMD, Minister of Strategy?

Nick - those were the wrong pills!

Just to correct your attempts to mislead

1) The EC225 does not come with RIPS. That is because RIPS is a Sikorsky registered name! Doh! It does of course come with its own rotor blade de-icing system, an option just as it is on the S92.

2) You say that the rotor de-icing system is entirely redundant but as you well know, that is a lie. Well that is unless you are using "redundant" to mean "superfluous, outmoded, disused, surplus, unneeded, unnecessary, uncalled-for" all of which are alternative words for redundant, according to my thesaurus.

HC

So where are those WMD's?

Wasn't it your (Bush's) lot that invented the WMD search?

HC

Good to see the banter is still flying around here!

A quick question for you learned gentlement concerning S92 hydraulic's...

In the event of of leak in one of the hydraulic systems the LDI system (with the reservoir at 50%) will close the tail rotor isolation valve. What happens if there is a leak in the other system? I had heard, and I'm happy to be corrected (very happy in fact!), that both systems isolation valves will open and close continually until both hydraulic systems are dry which happens in a very short period of time. So if you had a leak on the tail rotor side of the valves in both systems then you have no way of stopping it dumping the fluid.

Incidentally, one S92 had a RIPS failure halfway across the Scottish Mountains so I can see the argument for a positive temperature band but I'd still rather have RIPS than not.

The 225 can only do one flight...you then have to replace the tial boom for all the cracks, thats why there is a spare tail boom held in ABZ...I'm sticking to the 92...RIPS or not...

Don't mention frame 5295...:{