Day Two HeliExpo 2011

Today was a Sikorsky day. It started with Jeff Pino, CEO of Sikorsky Helicopters, giving a packed media room a company rundown. Eurocopter and Sikorsky are vying for the top slot in helicopter production and both have a turn-over of 6.7 billion. Not bad for companies that started with one small dream each. Jeff Pino said that for a few moments - due apparently to the exchange rate - Eurocopter overtook Sikorsky as market leader, but now Sikorsky has inched ahead. Who knows - 6.7 billion each sounds good to me. The profit, Pino said, allows them to continue their aggressive drive in R & D.
We then moved onto their new products and how the market is moving - this includes the X2 pictured and the electronic Schweizer 300. The electronic 300 has already been launched (and mentioned in Helicopter Life) but Sikorsky are working hard to make it viable - ie improving the flight durabily from its current 5 minutes!
The market is moving towards togetherness rather than competition he said - echoing an earlier statement from Agusta's Orsi. There is much more to write, however, since I'm off to a Bell Helicopter party you'll have to read about it in Helicopter Life, or if I have a quiet moment tomorrow. Hope to see you then.

Day one at HAI HeliExpo in Orlando Florida

The Orange County convention centre in Orlando

Day one at HeliExpo started with the Eurocopter breakfast - information on the state of the company and an invitation to join them at their booth for the unveiling of the EC145T2.
The next press conference was Turbomeca, who make the engines for many of the Eurocopter products and who are closely involved in the new Eurocopter 'E' incentive to produce more environmentally friendly and cost effective engines.
This was followed by the ribbon cutting event to open the exhibition floor to the buyers, viewers and enthusiasts.

The SKYe SH09 Marenco Swiss Helicopter

11.15 was the unveiling of the SKYe SH09 'revolution in rotary aviation'. This turned out to be a 2.5 ton metric ton class helicopter with a full composite fuselage, bearing free rotor system of 5 blades and ... so they say - none were in sight - an electronically governed engine with a glass cockpit.
As one who has seen a few of this prototypes arrive and go nowhere we will see if anything happens - of course there is no doubt a wonderful Swiss Hedge fund or two behind the idea, but will it actually come to fruition or will the financiers pull out first?
The next excitement of light and smoke came from Eurocopter.

Eurocopter EC145T2

This was the unveiling of the EC145T2, an upgraded version of the EC145, which has a fenestron tail (the original EC145 had a conventional tail rotor) which will lower noise and increase safety (Lutz Berling said). Presumably, the technology to allow a helicopter the size and weight of an EC145 good tail rotor authority has now been developed. It has Turbomeca Arrile 2e engines and a new main gearbox, which give increased engine performance. It has a FADEC system and a new 4 axis autopilot, with a 20% increase in mission performance. The last bit is, of course, not a fact but an interpretation of possibility by the company. But, afterall, that is what marketing (or we call it spin in the UK) is all about.
Lights, smoke and another unveiling - the third in so many moments (well about 45 minutes) and in fact the third and fourth as Bell was unveiling two beautiful new helicopters. New? Well, ok no but new to you kids. It was the 407GX with a new super Garmin 1000 H console, which we were told was a beautiful machine, and then the 407 AH, a 407 with weapons, which was 'a beautiful machine' no lack of vocabulary there then.

Bell 407GX with the new helicopter Garmin 1000 H

CEO John Garrison, who is probably the fastest speaking man I have ever heard, introduced the machines, just as he later gave(a fast speaking) rundown of Bell finances. 3.2 billion revenues, one of the best years for a while, thanks to the rebound from military spending.
The next two press conferences were the HAI favourites: Robinson and MD Helicopters.
Robinson is just fun. This is now the Kurt Show, son of Frank Robinson, the old man of helicopter innovation, who is the new CEO, but we learnt that Frank still works 7 days a week, he just enjoys it more than he did when he was CEO. There was some chat about the Robinson R66 and - fascinatingly, the information that Robinson are already on the up and getting in orders - in fact 130 order to date on the Robinson R66. I get to fly it next week and I am told I will love it. I certainly hope so, and I will let you know.
And then finally the Lynn Tilton show. Why are we bothering with watching Charlie Sheene drooling and wombling about when we could have the lovely Lynn? Her press conference, like that of the Robinson family, was standing room only and she exploits us all, but who can blame her. It seems that the production problems in Mexico have been resolved, that the company that make the MD902 fuselage in Turkey has lost its way and the fuselages are returning to Mesa, and that if (and she seems confident here) they get the EMS contracts they have been promised in the Middle East (God willing) then MDs financial problems will be over.
Thus ended the first day of Heli Expo - roll on tomorrow.

HAI HeliExpo preshow day

Swiss helicopter - a teaser for tomorrow

First day at HeliExpo in Orlando. There were only two press conferences and most of the show was still setting up in the main hall. However, we did get to hear about Thommen's new search light the HSL 1600.
Thommen is a Swiss company, which started making clocks and watches (there's a surprise 'eh) moved into aviation watches and then into search lights. This one is at the forefront of the market having integrated software and the ability to operate up to 200 knots in a static position or 150 if moving... more in Helicopter Life magazine.
The other press conference was Agusta Westland - who still hope for the US Presidential Helicopter - humm, bet you thought that dream had died, but guess they have some Charlie Sheen like tendencies. Anyway, they also see the vertical market as the hope of the future. Signor Orsi sees 2050 as being a world of verticality - towns will be revolutionized by vertical entry and exit and helicopters will no longer be for EMS, rescue and rich VIPS but general transport like buses... he may be right but we are notoriously bad at predicting the future.
Enough for tonight. Tomorrow is a long day starting with the Eurocopter breakfast.

Slippery snow and 300s

This was last winter. We were trying to push the helicopter into the hangar after a beautiful flight over snow covered fields...
However, less romatically, when we tried to push the helicotper back into the hangar we kept falling over on the ice...even with my tough Timberland pink boots!
In the end I had to start-up and hover backwards until we were off the ice and in the edge of the hangar. Trickey but it worked!
I hope we are into Spring now....

LPC on H300

Ok this is not a very suitable photo - but it would be fun to fly this would it not....especially in the snow.

The LPC was good - unusually nothing went wrong (!) but I did learn not to believe the weather forecast, which originally claimed it was going to be wet and windy. It was a babe of a day, with puffy little clouds around Southend, and 8 knots of wind. Lovely.

The only problem is the cost - I feel the CAA gets most of its income from pilots who can least afford to pay it - ie the ones who have to keep current to get work, however much or little work they get. A very odd system.

UK SAR, Soteria bid cancelled

It is now slightly over a year since the Soteria consortium lead by CHC won the United Kingdom SAR contract. In that time doubts and worries have been gathering speed. First, we heard that the heir to the throne Prince William, himself a RAF SAR pilot, had ‘voiced concerns to the government’, then we heard that the Royal Bank of Scotland, an integral part of the consortium had pulled out. Finally, in February we were told that there were irregularities in the bidding process. On February 8th, 2011 we were told that the 6 billion privatisation programme had been cancelled and that the preferred bidder admitted that it had been helped by a former Whitehall insider and given access to “commercially sensitive information.”
There appear to have been other more basic concerns too, both around the co-operation and training aspects, and around the location of helicopter SAR bases. The first concern was voiced by rescuers who were nervous of the 70% reduction in staff in the new service, and the suitability of the Sikorsky S92, given its extra weight. The second set of fears was exacerbated by the news that RAF Kinloss is to close, closely followed by the likely closure of RAF Lossiemouth and RAF Leuchars. All going as part of the Coalition's cost cutting programme.
Now we have the leaking of commercially sensitive information and the knowledge that CHC is itself under investigation by the MoD police.
While we are told that the government is keen to reopen the bidding process and that they wish to continue with the privatisation of the SAR in the UK, the most likely outcome is a considerable period of reflection. Let’s hope that from this reflection comes a wise outcome. We can only continued to watch the news and see what happens.

Eurocopter in Aberdeen

Would you recognise this as an EC225? Here we are in Aberdeen, flying the sim - it was a good day. Eurocopter chose an Indra sim from one of the biggest Spanish companies as it was 'much better value'. Indra do a lot of sims including Harriers - ha not much use here any more! They also do buses and police car sims - wonderful eh-