Unbelievable – Bell 429 Uses Rogerson Kratos - Don't Buy!!
 

I was considering upgrading my A109E to a Bell 429, one of the reasons being the complete rip-off and unethical costs of servicing just one small Rogerson Kratos display in the Agusta.

Rotorheads readers will probably remember the thread (see HERE) where I mentioned that the price quoted by Rogerson Kratos was up to USD53,400 (current AUD71,800) to repair one of these display and the quote I ended up with was USD44,500. And remember, the problem could be as simple as a faulty ¼-watt resistor. Rogerson Kratos is so lacking in ethics that it won’t provide service information to anyone else and so it knows that it will most likely get away with rip-off charges for servicing equipment.

I will point out once again that the exchange overhaul cost for a Garmin IFR-approved 600 display is USD 1,200 and for the larger Garmin 1000 it is USD 1,500.

How could Rogerson Kratos possibly justify USD53,400? Well, of course, it’s not possible that this could ever be a reasonable figure.

A week ago I went for a demo flight in the Bell 429. What a fantastic aircraft! But I was absolutely staggered to find that Bell are using Rogerson Kratos displays in the 429 – in this case, they are larger units so no doubt the rip-off service cost after the unit is out of warranty will probably be something like USD 100,000!

On discovering that Bell are using the Rogerson Kratos units in their 429s, I instantly decided not to buy the aircraft and I am now starting a campaign to advise everyone I can in the helicopter industry throughout the world not to buy a Bell 429 using Rogerson Kratos displays until Rogerson Kratos agree to give reasonable and ethical overhaul costs for equipment they have already sold.

Or course, this cannot be Bell’s fault as I have found Bell to be a totally ethical company but somehow they haven’t been told what Rogerson Kratos do to people who have aircraft that are out of warranty and, as a result, they have no power in being able to get a competitive quote.

I am going to start a major campaign including media releases – any help I can obtain from anyone else would be greatly appreciated.

What about the H145?
 

Hi Dick

Airbus have a H145 touring Australia at the moment.

It certainly looks like an impressive machine.

Maybe you could tee up a demo?

If you want I can point you in the right direction....

HPT

Can you get it fitted with Garmin equipment? If so could be interested.

Hi Dick

I'm not sure (I don't work for Airbus) but I can find out and ask the team to contact you discuss the options.

HPT

Hi,

Display prices in an AH helicopter are also not so low. For example a ND in an EC 135 costs also around 20.000 EUR.

Hello DS,

You're lucky because now the "new" EC145 (ex EC145) is fitted from the factory with Garmin 500H but it's only VFR (day and night).

The "new" H145 (ex EC145T2) is fitted with the Helionix suite from AH.

A picture of the "new" EC145 :

http://nsa38.casimages.com/img/2015/...4657659890.jpg
.

nice Gaffer taping...:)

Dick, you could upgrade to the 109SP. You'll get Chelton displays, 4-axis autopilot and a slightly longer cabin (more legroom) than your 109E, but still the same speed that you like. Plus a greatly simplified electrical system! There is a demonstrator available in Australia too. At least, there was last year when it did a tour round Oz and NZ.

Less training involved for you and you already know what to look out for with the 109 Series.

I take it the Genesys mod isn't looking too good?

If only Garmin would have an IFR certified alternative that could be installed, but they refuse to certify the 500 series to IFR and the 1000 is restricted to who can install it.

Don't throw away the baby with the bath water!
 

Dick's concern for the cost of some R-K displays on some helos should make him and us ask what the 429 repair/replace costs are. The economics of every type helicopter are different, and cost for repairs and replacement are driven by many factors, such as the number of helicopters, the number of displays, the specific design, the availability of the constituent parts, etc, etc.


Can I suggest (before you all pick out the drapes on the new replacement helicopters) that you ask someone who knows specifically what the 429 repair/replacement costs for its cockpit displays?

even asking for that information on what the cost for displays are might not cover the issue as I gather from the article in warrantly its one price but that goes into oprbit after warranty is over. Is there a way of getting guaranteed costs for such items and repairs post warranty?

Dick

If you buy new, get a nose to tail PBH or TAP and the screens will be covered by the OEM as well as all the other components.

So what is the cost of a 429 then Dick? $5 million?
And the display panel is what: $100,000 at its most expensive? 2% of the cost of the cab.

So I own a merc: cost me £80,000 and I need to replace one of my display panels and it's quoted at: £1600.

Dick - get a life buddy. Wake up and smell the coffee.

If you can't play in the big boys playground - go elsewhere.

My heart is pumping purple custard.

Looks to me like Dick has a life, and he gets to spend it tooling around in his private A109. Seems like most of us, Dick prefers not to hand over his $$$ to businesses who charge large amounts for a service or product that they cannot justify.

What is wrong with that?

I'm with Dick as well . I got rid of my AS350 due to Turbomeca and would never run one of their engines again ( other than on PBH on my 505 when it arrives )
I now run a 109 privately for less money than the 350 . I certainly wouldn't pay even $10k for his repairs !!! Have you ever paid for or owned a helicopter Thomas ???!!!!! ........... I thought not !!

I am fortunate. I can easily afford the rip off repair cost.

But to kowtow to such dishonest prices means I don't care about the industry I love.

Also why shouldn't potential buyers know what will likely happen the day warranty runs out?

I would not have purchased a 109e if Agusta had told me the repair cost of the displays. This is the second display that has failed. There are four in the aircraft.

Means a small operator could be up to pay $200,000 over a period if each display failed.

The display does not have any complex mechanical parts - so where does the staggering cost come from?

Bell should not be dealing with this company. How come the Garmin overhaul cost is less than one twentieth ?

I spent several years flying a Pilatus PC7, that had the "good fortune" of having RK EFIS installed. If that aircraft stayed around, the RK displays were coming out and being replaced with G500/600. My first reaction to seeing the avionics on the 429 was to wonder who made that decision.

It is a Garmin world now. Bell did a fantastic job with the 407 GX installation. Cessna is mostly Garmin now, despite Honeywell and Collins. Wonder what it would cost for Bell to go to Garmin in the 429 -- surely not more than Garmin in the Sovereign, X, CJ3+, etc?

Do you not see a potential danger there?
On a somewhat different level, many firms made vacuum cleaners, but Hoover became the dominant force to the extent that it became the generic term, IE-"do the hoovering"
James dyson hawked his revolutionary bit of kit around all and sundry....they all turned him down,
Dyson was lucky (and plucky!) raised finance, started production and is now the leader.
RK, somehow, are able to attract OE specifiers. (Price? Delivery? superb no-hassle warranty? )...Once the kit is in, they have a monopoly and squeeze 'till the pips squeak....In the motoring- world, some manufacturers charge obscene amounts for certain components....so-much so, that many vehicles are economic writeoffs ,whilst having another 10-20 years' potential life.

BUT with very few exceptions, these are isolated failures, not a fundamental design or quality-control failure.
The R-K scenario would appear to be a one-way ticket to trouble.
I am amazed that the regulatory authorities would approve a monopoly-fitment , where alternatives are available. Sensible legislation would make a choice mandatory.
As demonstrated, monopolies are wide open to abuse. I am with mr. smith all the way on this.
make sure bell understand just WHY their product is on the "don't buy" list! - they may just count the lost sales and reconsider.

About 10 years ago, Mercedes Benz were the subject of much comment in the press "Letter-pages"...the bean-counters had gouged the quality to the point where reliability, paint and durability were all being publically vilified.

Their reputation took a severe hammering and they have done a great deal of rethinking,-result? Quality restored, buyer-confidence recovering and though the margins may be down, the better product is selling more units, so the overall profit is bigger.......are you listening, Mr. Bell?

Best wishes Cockney Steve but the Dyson vacuum was a failure until he re-designed it over and over , I think they are still tweaking it

Cyclonic separation is an excellent way to separate dirt from air in manufacturing and industry but it requires a constant volume of fast moving air ..... and it initially worked fine for Dyson on his test bench.

But as soon as the housewife used it on her carpet or furniture the flow of air was restricted and most of the dust was sent back to the room.

It had to be modified so much to keep air flowing that it ended up with very little suction (vacuum) .... but hey , the housewife did not have to buy replacement bags , just spend all day dusting all her furniture , shelves , counters and ornaments ... stuff they didn't tell you in the sales brochure.

I credit him for high prices , pretty machines , convincing marketing , stubbornness and tenacity , but not for a good vacuum cleaner

The best vacuum cleaners are central vacs for the simple reason the dust laden exit air is all vented outside . They have some primary coarse filters in them that need occasional cleaning , but they are mainly there to protect the impeller turbine from particle erosion

In Australia it would be possible to purchase three brand new motor vehicles including air conditioning , power steering and lots more for less than the cost of the repair to this relatively simple instrument .

The display is just that- it doesn't include accelerometers or rate gyros

I know RK is a smaller company than Garmin so I would be prepared to pay up to ten times the Garmin overhaul price - say $15 k. I know you are reading this ,RK. , why not offer everyone a fee of $15k to help prevent further economic damage to our helicopter industry ?

Remember. It's not a good idea to kill the golden goose

TCDick Smith has smelled a lot of coffee in his long and very interesting life. ;)

When he was 24, he raised AU$610 to start a business by selling his boat & trailer for $600 and borrowing the other $10 from his wife. He gave up his job as a factory worker, rented a tiny workshop and started a business repairing and installing car radios.
He sold 'Dick Smith Electronics' 14 years later for AU$25 million which he invested in property and other ventures - some business and some philanthropic.
Like you, I pay Mercedes' exorbitant prices for spares, but I resent having to do so.

I'm not mean, nor is Dick Smith.
He started giving money to deserving causes when he was 27 - the first recipient was Nicole Kidman's father, when she was a young child.
When he sold his first company he vowed to donate AU$1 million a year to charitable causes and, as far as I know, still does.

.

Flying Lawyer is right, Dick is one of the really good guys, a genuine aviation great. Also, he posts in his own name, right out there for all of us. Take care when criticizing especially while hiding under a non de plume.


But back on the subject at hand, my only issue with Dick's impassioned point is that one might find the 429 in an entirely different kettle than the older, lesser models that R-K supported so poorly (as I recall, I supported Dick back a while ago on this, and Rogerson himself put us under withering fire here in the forum!)


Is there anyone from Bell who can shed light on this? How much is the spares cost for the 429 displays? and how much is repair/overhaul?

Not sure of all the facts, but this is the story I heard when considering the purchase of a 429. Was told that Bell elected to take on the role of avionics system integrator, selecting subsystems from a wide range of manufacturers and tying these together with their own interfaces, software, etc, rather than electing to purchase an integrated avionics suite from Garmin, Honeywell, Rockwell/Collins, etc (such as with the 407 GX, 505, 525). If true, this may be partly because no major suite was certified for this class of helicopters at the time. In any event, this choice would put Bell in the role of having to make all this stuff play together, and owners dependent on Bell for future feature development and support for a very long time - whether this is a good thing or not depends on one's point of view. (One downside of this approach is that Bell's efforts will apply to a very small number of airframes compared to, say, the G1000 or G3000, which may limit Bell's enthusiasm/investment for further development.) When I was looking at the 429, the avionics was a work in progress, with many features yet to be developed and delivered. This was a factor in my decision not to purchase a 429.

I will not be surprised to see Bell transition, at some point, to in integrated suite from one of the majors for the 429.

Good God - nothing would ever hit the market if this were the case. Maybe they should mandate alternate engines as well? If you notice the market reacts to these opportunities with enthusiasm and will create options if the demand exists.

Go to an aftermarket modification shop and they will design and certify whatever you want, and you will be able to get a lot of the investment back by selling the RK gear to someone else who needs spares.

No mod is cheap, fast or easy. But at least it gives you an affordable option for the managing the costs of managing your machine. Plus, if you made the right partnership agreement, you might be able to reclaim the investment through subsequent customer modifications.

I would suggest going and talking directly to Garmin and seek their advice.

dick, when you are prime minister of aussie land you can ban Rogerson Kratos.
Until then buy something you can afford old boy. :ugh:

I got the idea that he can afford it but simply isn't willing to be taken for a ride by an arrogant supplier. You can not seriously attack him for that? :confused:

+1 I don't blame Dick at all.

TC: TC, I think it is well established that Dick can afford the RK displays, but that that is not the point of the discussion.

Please stop embarrassing yourself.

Old Thomas has never been worried about embarrassing himself !!! Don't forget he is not an owner and has never had to pay for any parts and that's why he is so ignorant about these things . If he had won the lottery and bought a machine of his own he may understand!! Your ability to pay or not is completely irrelevant. I could afford to run a turbomeca .... But choose not to due to their crazy prices and attitude to service .
I'm right with you Dick !!!!

What do others believe would be an acceptable price? RK will say they don't have the Garmin efficiencies of scale

Personally I would be prepared to pay $15 k. That is about ten times the Garmin price.

I'm not prepared to pay 30 times the cost. Surely that is reasonable.

I think Dick is definitely doing the right thing, this is a man who is putting his money where his mouth is and taking a stand, Dick I applaud you.

Perhaps if the pressure comes from Bell as people were beginning to refuse to buy their product due to the RK fit they would be in a position to exert enough influence to create change. From this thread and the other regarding the problems that DS has experienced and the ridiculous costs charged for what could amount to simple/cheap fixes it is obvious that RK could care less about their customer experience. It's a pity that the Garmin equipment couldn't be retrofitted to the 109 in question as the layouts looked great, that coupled with the increased reliability and sensible repair pricing structure would have provided an ideal solution. To have reached such an impasse that you would consider selling an aircraft in order to replace it's avionics suite must demonstrate to anyone just what an exasperating situation this must have grown into.

I hope you find a solution, be great if that solution isn't too far in the future. Stick it to RK, they deserve it.

ET

Dick, I'm totally with you on this, judging from your humble roots you obviously know the true value of money, especially as you have been in the electronics repair business!

Having flown this type exclusively for some years I soon become aware of the horrendous expense of the A109 display units. The replacement prices are unreasonable and eye-watering. We've had a number of them go wrong and all I can say is, I'm glad I don't have to pay the bill but sympathise with those that do.

As I understand it, the displays are a type that is exclusively modified for use in the 109 series and there is only one company authorised to supply and repair them, as has already been stated.

Dick, since it's on here it is of course only a rumour. :rolleyes: When you write about a major campaign, out in the wider world, I wonder how easy it would be to run into trouble with this. I have always been advised that in cases like these one should restrict oneself to illustrating the point purely with one's own experience and not advising others on what they should do. Asking questions is alright of course and the questions can be quite pointed. Keeps you out of the courts.

Certainly in this jurisdiction, careful factual recall and carefully worded questions can go pretty close to the bone and still remain legally untouchable. :cool:

Based on the questions that I have asked crooked lawyers in the past I can be pretty confident in this. :E

jimf671


I suggest you find a better source of legal advice.

Perhaps to clear the air a bit RK could explain why their charges are 30 times that of Garmin.

Even though I paid $3500 for them to find out what was wrong with the unit they still refused to tell me what they found out. Also even though they had my display they refused to do the quote unless I sent them $3500 up front in cash.

It would appear they know they can exploit their position as the only service providers and that's what they are going to do.

Any legal action by them would get the whole issue out in the open - that would be great for our industry I believe.

What is the replacement / new cost of these RK units roughly?

Dick,

Did you fly MJI ? Very nice machine.

Will Bell fit the Garmin suite (I note some Garmin in MJI...mixed with RK) ? If so, that would seem to be the way forward. All the Garmin products I use work very well.

Arrrj

PS _ Thomas...I am pretty sure Dick can afford whatever he likes...in the order of 50 x 429 !:D

Morning chaps...

Thinking slightly out of the box here, but I assume in the certification process RK would have had to specify and demonstrate a Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF) in order for the displays to get certification. It would seem that these displays are not lasting anyway near that time...?

Maybe an approach would be to point this out to the appropriate certification body and let them investigate and publish why?

Cheers

Kev.

A further question in a similar vein to that above.

What has been the cost per hour of the RK units in the aircraft. If the frequent failure rate and eye watering repair cost are anything to go by I would image the hourly cost to be significant.

Dick is a man of principle and I admire and fully support his stance.
The problem is that corporations practice "captive customer" principles on a regular basis.
I worked in a different field to aviation - in earthmoving and mining - but the systems were exactly the same as Dick is experiencing.
As a manufacturer, fit a component to a machine that an owner of their product cannot buy or get repaired anywhere else - and if you're the customer, roll up with a large jar of Vaseline when it fails, and be prepared to get bent over.

Caterpillar were and probably still are masters at this technique. So much so, that many Caterpillar bearings were "proprietary lines".
That means you can get the number off the Cat bearing, present it to your regular bearing supplier - and once the parts person reads it, they shake their head, stating they are unable to supply, because the bearing is specifically not made to any SAE or regular bearing standard or size - it's built to Cat specifications, and to Cat dimensions.
Caterpillar will even produce a standard dimension bearing and then manufacture in .002" extra race-to-roller clearance, as compared to standard bearings - just to ensure the "captive customer" process continues.
Caterpillar take captive customer processes even further by arranging with a bearing manufacturer to provide them with the tooling/machines to manufacture Cat bearings.
This (Caterpillar-owned) tooling/machinery is then installed in the bearing manufacturers factory and operated by the bearing manufacturer.
Those machines or tooling are then not allowed to be used to produce Cat bearings for any aftermarket supplier - with the threat of loss of contract and punitive damages used by Cat, if the bearing manufacturer does so.

RK have obviously honed "captive customer" processes to an even sharper level than Cat.

One of the problems of course, is trying to determine just how much of the company/corporations regular overheads are being sheeted home to repairs/replacement parts, particularly when the repairs are small or infrequent.
The actual parts or repair cost can often be very low - but the company/corporation then tacks on a huge company/corporation overhead cost, as part of the repair/replacement cost of the smallish item - resulting in astronomical charges.

It's not unreasonable to expect that a portion of the company/corporations overheads are tacked on to every job or spare part it supplies - but when the repair or part is obviously a very low cost, and there's additional built-in charges that bear no resemblance to any level of fairness - then it's only right that loud protestations are made.
I spent a very large part of my working life trying to beat Caterpillar at their "captive customer" rorts - and aftermarket suppliers are crucial to the equation to provide robust competition and a level playing field.
It appears RK think they have no competition and can charge what they like. That definitely needs to change. They are practising a blatant "captive customer" rort, with obviously no ability or desire to justify their charges.

ET, that's a good point. BUT ......... KM's observations are, perhaps, not entirely valid though morally laudable. Here's a short, but true anecdote that illustrates my point.


20 years ago I was privileged to sit on a panel of Senior Technical Management for Bell. I made the point that it was rare for the aircraft, per se, to have a warranty problem, but the vendor items created all hell and mayhem with the customer, who, not unreasonably held us, the seller, responsible for fixing the problem. (This was when I was Ch Eng at Alan Mann)


The executive director of customer support was a great chap called Bruce Camp, and he picked up on the point that was simply if I complained such a comment it would be 'less-than-significant'. BUT.... if Bell complained about the total lack of meeting a reasonable MTBF then something would be done about it. Thus Terry Jeffcoat's responsibility for warranty was expanded to include monitoring of any vendor item's reliability. Result!


Thus the responsibility for such 'vendor items', particularly to include RK, lies with the TCH, not the certifying agency. And the TCH has tremendous clout (contracts and money talks). I've been away from the politics with OEMs for some time but I think the principle is valid. FWIW in another life I had exactly the same experience with Agusta, more pressure and Anglo-Italian relations at an all-time low for a while. However the end result was worth the pain :D


Just FWIW - VFR