So what's the craic? Has Enstrom gone bust or is it for sale?

I am so pleased with my 280C that I would be interested in buying the company, well a bit of it anyway!

FS If you are interested in buying it, send me a PM, I may be interested in doing something.

I hope it can be kept going as it is IMHO a good product.

RB, I can't for several reasons, not the least of which is the cash requirement that I think is needed to really get the company going. My wife and I don't borrow money for any reason, and I think a much greater cash requirement would be needed AFTER purchasing the company. I think a new owner needs to invest heavily in the company for 2 plus years, then he has to wait a while for a good return, while steady investing in it after the initial heavy cash period. Unfortunately I just can't do this right now, even though I see the potential in the company. Besides, I'm more than a little uncomfortable with my present knowledge of the industry. I'd like to know a lot more.

There are 2 nice technical innovations I heard about recently. One is Enstrom seems to have finally come upon the right bearing combination in the bearing stack for the tail rotor blades. The change greatly reduces the maintenance requirement in that area. The second is they came up with a thick wall main rotor drive shaft, that seems to have eliminated all of the touchy tracking problems that Enstroms are known for. Unfortunately the thin wall drive shafts will remain in circulation for a quite while. Additional cash could change that.

I think more product innovations of the reduced maintenance type need to be made, in addition to product development that would make the helicopters more competitive against you know who.

If Enstrom do go bust, what is the implication for C of A? Someone told me that if an aircraft is no longer 'supported' by the manufacturer it cannot have a C of A here in the UK. Would it have to go onto a permit to fly?.

I love my F28A, one of the ones Dennis first sold. I learnt in Robbos but prefer my F28A to an R22 for its fuel injection, safety, looks, luggage space, cheap and available secondhand parts and extra (childs) seat. Yes it is slow, underpowered and heavy but it gets me and my family around just fine and is cheap to insure, and so far reliable and cheap to run. Its performance 2 up is about the same as an R22. The 280FX is no competition to R44 and too expensive to compete with R22. If Enstrom survive they need to go upmarket to compete with the R44 or bring back a simple 2 seat updated version of the 28A as a trainer to compete with the R22.

R22 pilots who have been in my 28year old Enstrom have been without exception impressed with the way it flies.


I have read a lot of negative stuff about Enstroms on this and other sites over the years - mostly not true. It will be a shame if the company fails.

Enstrom Situation
 

Those of us at Enstrom certainly suffered a shock when Steve Daniels was let go!. It seems that he got crossways with the ownership over Enstrom's needs for extra financing to support the expansion that we are presently going through. It was an unfortunate communications problem between him and the owners that got out of control and led to his downfall.

The good news is that owners are solidly behind the program and Enstrom is on firm footing financially.

Peter Parsinen is replacing Steve at the helm at Enstrom. He was Senior VP at Bell during their expansin several years ago and was the guy who recruted Steve originally; he had been advising Steve on the Sales and Marketing initiatives that we had recently undertaken.

The upshot of all this is that the expansion and improvements are moving forward just as they were. The increased orders have allowed Enstrom to add engineers to the staff so that we can go ahead with developing some of the product improvements that have fallen behind in recent years.

I think that you will see Enstrom emerging as a major player in the helicopter world, we will probably always be the smallest, but that will allow us to provide the individual customer support that we have been somewhat haphazard about in the past.

DR, I'm very glad to hear this, as I hope to be a customer sometime in the future.

BTW, how is the product support (for the 280FX) here in the Dallas/Fort Worth area? I apologize that I haven't had time to research this very much.

Enstrom on the rocks?
 

I am orginally a fixed winger and recieved my private add-on for helicopters 2 years ago. I learned in the R-22 and loved it's attributes but never felt real confident with only about 40 hours in make and model. Plus, I never felt safe doing autos with my Instructor , let alone solo.

Then I purchased a 1980 Enstrom F-28C-2 and received the commercial add-on and also plan on getting the CFI add-on this summer. I now have about 100 hours in the Enstrom and 40 in the R-22.

The Enstrom has really improved my confidence because of it's "hands off stability" in forward flight and it's fantastic autorotation characteristics. The only issue of transitioning from the R-22 to the Enstrom was leanring how to manage the manual throttle, since there is no governor or mechanical correlator. After a few hours of dual instruction, I was able to proceed on my own solo. Soon, I was able to do all types of autos, even full touch downs with confidence and without an Instructor.

Then, I was able to manage the throttle by using my ears and not just the tachometer, as well as by the feel. That enabled me to practice loss of tail rotor to a full touch down landing, since I am comfortable using the throttle all the time. When I take other helicopter pilots up in my Enstrom, they are so impressed because the stigma becomes a myth.

I don't want to become over-confident, especially since I am still a low time rotorhead, but I do feel that the Enstrom has made me a better and safer pilot. I am also an A&P Mechanic, have been to the factory school for training and am highly impressed with the personnel at Enstrom!

Enstrom Support in Dallas
 

For Ensrom support in the Dallas area I would try Sky Helicopters in Garland, Ken Pratt is a Dealer for Brand R but I believe he has supported an Enstrom in the past and was great to us when we were at his facility during the helicopter show this year and in the past. Our president Peter Parsinen lives in Dallas so we could probably do some leg work for you if you need it.

Finally got the opportunity to get down to some serious work towards that helo rating, and on the Enstrom 280C at that!

My assessment of it - for what a helo novice's opinion is worth - is that it's a solid-feeling machine, but a bit on the expensive-to-rent side for a two-seat training helo.

Gotta travel much further than practical if I'm to get cheaper time on a Robbie or a Schweizer, so I've bitten the bullet to pay the extra money for the Enstrom time. I linked up with an aerial applicator who operates a 280C and happened to have an instructor ticket.

He's essentially the "only game in town", but to get my time on a larger aircraft - fitted with all the usual spraying kit to boot! - actually makes it seem worth the extra money. Well.... SOMETIMES!

Thanks DR, I know right where Sky Helicopters is. I'll try to get the time to go by and visit with Ken. I knew they were a dealer for Brand R and I've seen some Schweizers there, but had no idea they were also involved with Enstroms.

Enstrom boost from police order for 18 480Bs
 

Enstrom's management and ownership changes have been debated on Rotorheads a lot recently, so I'm sure it's a boost to the company to have this order!

http://www.enstromhelicopter.com/pro..._indexpage.jpg

I dunnno....but if I was out buying Aircraft for a Law Enforcement mission, I think there are better ones out there. Based on the Amount of Money, Location of Purchaser, and the Politics, it appears to me that Bell, MD and Eurocopter got caught asleep at the wheel..... or maybe there is now another rich Indonesian.......

I dunno either...the San Antonio police bought several Schweizer 333s not long ago. When you travel to the city, you see them buzzing around all the time.

If memory serves, both of these machines have seriously derated Allison's. Does this level of derating extend the TBO, or otherwise lower the maintenance cost? Would this be an advantage to some poilice departments with smaller budgets?

Back in May it was announced that the Indonesian police were evaluating three proposals for small turboprops as part of a $31 million procurement of rotary and fixed-wing patrol aircraft.
The fixed wing pitch is yet to be decided but the competitors are the Casa 235, Beechcraft 1900D and PZL M-28 Skytruck.

On the helicopter side, the Eurocopter EC120, Enstrom 480B and Schweizer 333 were shortlisted. The Robinson R44 Raven II, Bell 206B, Kamov Ka-226 and Changhe Z-11 had been eliminated from the competition [by May].

The force have $14M in fixed-wing money and $17M in helicopter order money.

Manufacturers were to provide as many aircraft as they could for the money, plus training, maintenance, hangars and heliports. They anticipated the budget will allow two turboprops and 10 to 17 helicopters.

Well they got 18 turbine powered 480B helicopters.

The current fleet is 20 years old BO105s. As these are twins it looks like the Enstrom's will supplement rather than replace them.

Has anybody experience an Enstrom Tail Rotor Drive Shaft Bearing Failure
 

Recently I Know of a pilot operating an F-28F who experienced a drive shaft bearing failure.
Has anybody experienced a similar problem, as in the the UK it is unheard of.
The pilot safely landed the aircraft.
After the failure, the pilot was unable to unable to identify the problem using the recommeded checks but visually was able to identify the failure of the rubber around the bearing.
The AAIB have inspected the aircraft.
It would be good to know if this was start of a new issue or a known problem
JJ

see your private messages

Enstrom 480
 

Hey guys just after a bit of info on the 480. Anyone operated, flown, seen or been near one of these.
Anyone with rough DOCs?
Anyone know if they usually get through to service?
Thanx.

480
 

Spent some time flying one...about 350hrs in it.
Typical C-20 operation, torque gauge appears lifted right from a 206, 'cept its redlined at 72%!! as the transmission may have been lifted right out of a Festiva! We actually had a tranny give out on us in low hover...customer support left a little to be desired, but maybe thats improved.
It looks heaps faster than it is, 90kts on a good cool night but had some interesting quirks. As you approached Max Q in flight, you knew that you were approaching 90kts because the airframe twisted in such a way that the passenger door would 'pop' open with a distracting change of pressure! and you knew that 90kts had been reached when the pilots door would 'pop' open as well!
Its a machine that could get you stuck into a confined area as it really couldn't pull the skim off a rice pudding.
The handling, despite being unboosted, was very good and predictable but there was one 'gotchya' in the collective. While at flight idle, it would tend to creep upwards, sometimes rather abruptly.....never forget to friction it down should you need to take your hand off it!!!...I don't know whether it was particular to our machine, or characteristic of the type but was a dangerous quirk.
The auto rotative characteristics were wonderful. Very forgiving, lots of inertia...really no excuse for not keeping the greasy side down!
Great visibilty in all flight regimes, plenty of tail rotor authority, very good adverse wind characteristics.

Hightlights - easy to handle, fairly smooth and quiet
Great autorotative handling
Lots of tailrotor ( but could really be just lack of Q!)
Reliable powerplant....the C-20 is topped to about
240? hp....should easily run to TBO
Fairly inexpensive to operate and purchase

Downsides - Needs more ummmmphh (a better tranny, which I
believe has been addressed in newer models to a
certain extent)
Relatively unimpressive cruise speed
Airframe weakness
Customer support
Exhaust is under the belly....extreme fire hazard
during off-site landings and is prone to cracks
Heater was weak for Canadian winters.

Hope this helps!....insofar as DOC's go....well i jusat flew 'er and fueled 'er.....but I think you could count on about 60% of a 206

overtorqued - was that a standard 480, or the later 480B model. One would assume that the B model may be higher spec than the original, but you never know!

Enstom 480
 

After reading the earlier post, I would like to add a few facts in defence of the EN480. I have flown just about every 480 in the UK, including the earliest one as well as all the latests 480B'S.
Just like every other product in the world,you will occasionally have a fault that needs attention. However I can catagorically state that all of the 480's are the EASIEST, MOST FORGIVING, EASIEST TO LAND, and least likely to "BITE YOU BACK" than any of the other twenty or so types that I fly!!!
480: MTOW 2850LBS, TORQUE 66.5PSI MAX 125 Knots
48OB :3000 LBS.VNE TORQUE 74.5 PSI MAX 125 KNOTS, Passengers total 4 adults, or 5 smaller ones. USUAL CRUISE 100 KNOTS, Light load 110 knots.
ALWAYS lands LEVEL(B206 DOESN'T!)
Brilliant spot turns on windy days 35 knots!!! B206 17 knots!!
Will land on STEEPER sloping ground than any other heli!
SLOWER ROD in auto than anything else!!
Cheapest turbine to operate!!
22 gallons per hour average.
Last 3 yrs I have flown them approxiametley 500 hrs., major breakdowns:NONE, minor breakdowns: tail rotor gearbox oilseal leaking, faulty engine oil pressure gauge, radio interference on 480B caused by maingear box electric cooler pump motor.

FAULTS:
Very early ones have poor door fasteners
Very early one have cyclic shake about 95-100knots
Collective can "want to rise" if not adjusted properly.

Manufacture reserves rights to make changes!
 

I was flying a very early model. As mentioned above, I believe the transmission was uprated and maybe some other improvements. Lets hope they solved the frame-flexing!

E 480
 

Glad to hear about other operator experiences....they're a pretty rare bird in Canda.
As stated, I'll concure on the flying characteristics, they are very nice and forgiving. The machine is very stable in the hover and has heaps of tailrotor authority. I would agree that it's the least likely helicopter that I've flown to 'bite you back' . I did see 100kts once.....but I also had 300-400 fpm ROD....and the bad guys were still pulling away from us! Possibily our torque pressure reading was not accurate, but we did re-check it more than once. For our machine to see 125kts we'd of had to find a hard point for the JATO bottle!:E
The door latch problem was never solved but it did make a great secondary torque indicator!
:uhoh:
The major 'breakdown' we did have was the tranny letting go in low hover....and I thank the lord for his mercies everyday!

Thanx for the info guys, much appreciated.

i must agree with tot[who has also flown my 480s] i have owned 2 x 480s 1 s/h and 1 new

and have nearly 500 hrs on them i found them a joy to fly ,safe and very reasonable in cost ,the bills i got were substantially less than some of my friends 206/500/341s

parts wernt that bad and the doors they were a problem but when the modded doors from enstrom came i didnt have a problem at all

enstrom staff take time to speak with you ,they help out if you have a problem and a vist to the factory is a must i bought a new 480 they treated me as if i had bought the factory great company great people , and a fantastic product ,[i have also had 4 piston enstroms too ] sadly i wanted more seats so i changed otherwise i would have stayed with the product.

note to my knowledge no person has ever died in a accident in a enstrom product in the uk [europe too i think]


steve atherton
N485A
GOSKP
GBPOZ
GOSWA
GOSAB

OT I assume you were the pilot of the york region police machine . Any idea if it is still parked at Fort Erie ?.
How are they doing with their new machine ?.

Edited due to errors :-

Yep
 

Not sure where it is now, and not even sure how the new program is going. Silverline lost the contract....it went to National and thats the last I heard of it.
Flew the 480 for about 6 mos, long enough to get pretty familiar with it and like I said, nice bird, but needed more ummpphh...
Glad to hear the door issue has been resolved in later models.....sure got our attention the first couple of times it happened inflight!

Enstrom F28
 

Noticed a posting under the 'widowmakers' thread re. the Enstrom.

Anyone got any pro / con views on the Enstroms ?

Cheers, BeeGee

Enstroms
 

Never been in one myself but my instructor hated them ever since the donkey on his let go (hey Im picking up this lingo eh?) in the mountains. He made a perfect auto but never trusted the things after that. I never did hear what caused the engine failure.

i have had a f28a,f28c,f280fx,f28f,and 2 x 480s i found them all to be inexpensive safe helicopters
relaiable and over all nodody has ever died in one in the uk and we have lots over here

steve

Niagara/Pan-Air Helicopters of Metcalfe, Ontario had a small fleet of F28Fs back in the 70s and early 80s, before they were sold. According to the owner at that time, the machines gave excellent service -sightseeing in the summer and instructing in the off-season.
He said during the whole time they had them they only had one mid-air mechanical problem which necessitated a precautionary landing.
However, turbocharging apparently shortens the life of engine.

In my limited experience with the 280C, I found it to be safe and predictable in flight. It was also demanding maintenance-wise, but if you took good care of it, it took good care of you. Drag dampers could be a source of irritation, but the only engine-stopper in the aircraft I was involved in came from a failed fuel-injection system.

When using it for training, the CFI must watch boost and RPM carefully, and monitor EGT and CHT as well, otherwise stuck and failed valves are likely (I saw one of those).

However, there's a very solid feeling to the aircraft, and they auto very nicely. The turbocharger is great in the mountains, and the ship is comfy for two and luggage.

Many years ago we got a corporate demo of a turbocharged model to park alongside our f/w jet. Corporate honchos were distinctly UNimpressed by sea level slow speeds with limited weight while turbocharger boosted engine in struggle to stay in the air. Conclusion (cheap shot) was that all that sexy streamlined bodywork weighed so much the machine couldn't get out of its own way. Certainly there wasn't much reserve power, and it appeared that maintenance would be a bear.

But at that time (1987) the Pasadena police department had a sizeable fleet of Enstroms and seemed perfectly happy with them. And it probably wasn't the sexy lines that did it. So we probably didn't give it a fair chance.

(The winner with the corp. honchos was the AS305 at $2 M; not exactly in the same class.)

Flingwing207 has it right.

Built well. Flies well. Loads of room.

Can be a maintenance headache if not looked after well.

I didn't like the F28C, but the 280FX is pretty nice ship to fly. VERY, I mean EXTREMELY, stable in flight. In fact, with the trim set right you can take your hands of the cyclic and change course by shifting your weight in the cabin (not recommended - just an observation). Auto's are relatively smooth, but it's a little different with that "boat-like" fuselage because it catches a lot of air.

Furthermore, the transmission was made from an old Chevy (I think) and the design hasn't changed much. One of the major CONs is that you have to send the transmission to the factory for any major maintenance or overhaul... they don't allow that job to be completed in the field.

Also, the lamiflex seems to be troublesome for some folks. That, plus the higher maintenance and the difficulty in getting a really good track and balance may lead you to other manufacturers. Anyway, it is a very stable platform and you can do cross-country's in the 280FX for days and days without killing your spine.

I am a fan of the Enstroms. Good, solid and ideal for trips around the UK. Two up and luggage and I mean not the piddly stuff that's squeezed into a Robbo.
Good auto as good as or better than the 206/47.
Lamaflex bearings mean that when on the ground the collective lever needs to be set at mid way up. Turbo chargers need plenty of cooling/stabilising temps before shutting down.
F28 trim is a problem but this was sorted on the 280. In the F28 hovering needed cyclic muscle to hold position.

Thanks for posts.

So, better than the R22 or 44 for a novice learner type ? Or is the Schweizer better ?

Bee Gee

I am happy enough with my 280c, it has more room than the robbo 44 in the front and can lift me (100kg) and a similar passenger with full fuel and luggage.

Pros - Pleanty of power and not calander lifed
Cons - 1ltr - min fuel consumption

BG, I think if you're going to fly an R22 or R44, you should train on an R22 (or R44), as the Enstrom is a much more forgiving ship for the low time pilot. The Enstrom is also more practical (i.e. carrying a load and going somewhere) than the Schweizer, although I think the Schweizer is an excellent training ship. I want a 280fx as my first helicopter, but a late F28 might be a good choice as well.

I use to fly an F-28 A way back in 1983. As I recall it was not a bad helicopter. We did have a lot of Lamaflex berrings go bad. I think that was a tracking problem at the time. We also had a F-28c as well. As I remember they performed pretty good in the hill for what we were doing with them.

Only limited time in the machine, but I HATED every minute of it. For a repetetive job like film work (lots of stops and starts) it was a mongrel to start when it was hot. It shook, it rattled, the fake woodgrain plastic and the dashboard looked like an old car (a Leyland P76, actually) and the dipstick was the worst design I have ever seen.

It needs 29" MAP just to hold level flight, so if the turbocharger quits you are out of the sky, even with the rest of the engine working.

There was a fatality in Sydney in the 80s when a junior pilot on a photo shoot ran out of pedal in a hover and spiralled into the deck. Another Enstrom made a spectacular landing in a front yard when the engine stopped due to "fuel contamination" - it was contaminated with air!

Glad to never fly one again.

Enjoyed my time in the Enstrom. Very solid feeling machine. I flew the F28A out of Fresno in 78. Very high rotor inertia. Autoed like a dream. The comparison above to the B-206 is right on. The A model, without a turbo, was underpowered anywhere but sea level. It was imperative to lead collective pull with throttle or you were going to loose rotor Rpms. Once lost, and at full throttle, you had to "milk" the collective to get em back ever so slowly.

Having talked to the factory lately, they claim to have extended the life of lamiflex bearings significantly. No AD's or bothersome service bulletins. No calender parts.
I'd buy one again.

Fly safe,

DT