JimmyO/ anyone else -
Do you have any performance data for your Mi-17 that you can share? I'm interested to see what the "russian workhorse" is capable of and I'm also working on an educational project that some sample data might help me with.

Have a look through the TCDS (https://www.favt.ru/public/ododoc/%D...rev08_eng1.pdf)

It's no manual but maybe you'll find what you're looking for in there.

Thanks, a lot of useful data, but not "usable performance" if that makes sense - how much the aircraft can move in payload and fuel, or what it's performance is given a weight.

I flew the Mi8 MTV-1 (Mi17) and it had an empty weight of around 7100kgs and a gross weight of 13000kgs so that should give you a pretty good idea. There were 2 different hooks, one for 3000kgs and one for 5000kgs. It could easily hover OGE at 13,000kgs and probably 14,000. I picked up a long line load one day and thought it felt pretty heavy, so had it weight. It was 5,400kgs. Probably had 45mins of fuel and we didn't need full power but close. They are very impressive beasts.

Trying to attach the performance section of the FM.

Edit: I seem to have difficulty in attaching a 2,9 mb file.

Performance section can be found here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cH8...ew?usp=sharing

Ace, thanks for all the above - out of interest anyone flow both the 17 and the 171? Or other variants with different perf? How much difference is there between a "classic" and a modern variant? I'd imagine most of the difference is at the hot/high end of the performance range?

I got he chance to spend about 700 hrs in them, 50% in the MI-8MTV-1 (also known as the MI-17) and 50% the MI-8AMT (known as the MI-171), local and export naming of the same aircraft add to the confusion of what is what. Generally speaking, performance was almost the same as they are more or less the same aircraft, same engines, same transmission... They differed in that the 171 has a wider left side passenger door, added a right side sliding door (moving the burner for the heating system above that door), hydraulic ramp instead of the manual clamps shell doors (adding weight and complexity), a slightly improved electrical system, and another APU (ditching the AI-9 with a 30 min run limitation for the Saphire, with no max run time). I preferred the MTV for the heavy and bulky loads as it was a slightly lighter aircraft and those doors were very useful in creating a big gab for the forklift, the AMT for troop movement as they were in and out in less time.

The big difference was with the older and "Classic" MI-8 (the one with the tail rotor on the right side) underpowered and very limited with its tail rotor authority, specially in Hot and High.

Hope this helps a bit.

Cheers.

Thanks for taking the time to answer!

Any other news/civilian pilots currently operating these with some up to date inputs on how to get into one ?