RotorSexual

30 Male, mostly aviation, memes, and gay shit. Helicopter pilot and flight instructor. Still too young to be this bitter.

[rotorsexual]

[enriquemzn262]

One of the biggest advantages of airplanes is that when something goes wrong mechanically, it typically gives you plenty of time to pause, discuss it with your copilot, radio control, have control gather a team of people to examine the problem from every angle. In a helicopter you have 30 seconds at most.

Depends on the issue, but mostly yeah, a plane with an engine issue WHILE IN FLIGHT is a relatively calm affair, on take-off you rely on your training to do what’s right at the right moment almost automatically, but it can be handled well in most cases, on landing its even more forgiving, and when the issue is more of a control one, you still have tools to handle it with relative calm.

On a helicopter, autorotation seems to be a bitch, resonance during take-off can literally destroy a whole helicopter if not dealt with immediately, transmission failure, while rare, will get you back on the ground seconds after occurring whenever you like it or not, and a tail rotor failure can be ride or die depending on how fast you’re going.

The plane wants to fly, the helicopter fights you to stay on the ground.

[rotorsexual]

It depends entirely on the aircraft, the problem, and the situation you're in when it happens. Mechanical failures are rare and catastrophic ones are rarer. The majority of accidents happen at low altitude during takeoff/landing and most of them are caused by pilot error which is why risk management and decision making is drilled so heavily.

If something happens at altitude in an airplane you may have time to pull out the handbook and run emergency checklists or you may not. In a helicopter we never really fly that high in the first place and will never really have time to reference the handbook so we memorize the entire emergency procedures section instead.

Autorotations aren't that bad after you've practice them a lot and are all about energy available. If you dont have that energy then you're not going to be able to glide safely so we plan flights to minimize those moments.

Resonance isn't possible in the helicopters I fly and all it takes to solve is to pick up into a hover.

Transmission failures are very rare like you mentioned and so are mechanical tail rotor failures. You're much more likely to lose tail rotor effectiveness due to wind than something breaking.

All in all there is risk involved but if you educate and train you can manage that risk. Some things will be out of your hands but of all the problems ive had only two were serious and one was my fault.

[enriquemzn262]

Mil Mi-24 “Hind”

[cheaphalloweencostume]

all time tumblr moment for me was when Overwatch was relevant and i made a post like “idc about team balance i opened the Junkrat game to play Junkrat” and someone was very seriously like “it’s people like you who got Trump elected”.

[wiki-sights]

Collapsed pingo in the Mackenzie Delta. The outline of the previously drained lake can be seen. August 8, 1987

[identifying-planes-in-posts]

Bell 206 JetRanger

[rotorsexual]

This one is actually a TH-57

[magicalastronomies]

counting or not counting stand violence

[retrogamingblog2]

Walter White plays Mario Kart

[ladyghostbusters]

Tell me about your day.

[lordthundercox-deactivated20180]

This clip pretty much never fails to make me laugh.

[nomeki]

[timberwool]

Happy Pride 🌈

[beardedmrbean]

[rotorsexual]

Thats another thing I love about flying helicopters is the random and bizarre jobs you can do with them.

Airplane pilots are almost all just focused on getting to the airlines so they can collect the paycheck from sitting IFR in a 737 day in and day out. But who else can say that they are dropping anti-rabies raviolis...

Or placing logs and gravel for fish spawning,

Or hovering over cherry trees to dry them after rain,

Or hunting feral invasive animals,

Or stringing power lines,

Or avalanche control,

Or cattle mustering,

Or tuna fishing,

Or geological surveys,

Or any number of other wild jobs.

Don't get me wrong I like airplanes and flying them, but being an airline pilot never appealed to me when there was so much else to experience.

[jabberding0]

Wei Weaving is a Chinese artist

[nepharim-tree]

[busty-shackleford]

LOLLLLLLLLLL

Reddit - Please wait for verification

The rest of us who already knew this shit seeing data back it up are SO VALIDATED rn

[enriquemzn262]

@rotorsexual we just found out the Colombian Army is buying 18 new helicopters to replace the Bell 212 fleet, which served in liaison, armed escort and recon duties in the army, leaving troop transport and air assault to the Black Hawk fleet

So, in your experience, what would you say could be a nice replacement? Personally I believe that’s the Bell 412, essentially the same chopper but with 4 blades, quieter, with more modern avionics and better engines in the current production versions.

But it’s also still an old Huey at heart, so maybe there are better options that combine the economics of a civilian model with the versatility of a military one, hence my question.

[rotorsexual]

Im a sucker for two-bladed hueys so its sad to see another batch go. But when it comes to replacements the choice is often based on politics rather than the best one for the job.

I don't know the specifics of Colombia's time with the 212 but if they could get a consistent and reliable source of parts then the 412 would probably be a fine option. In my experience and people I've met, Bell can be kind of hit or miss depending on your aircraft. Nothing but a Bell 412 would be close enough to a 212 for a nearly identical replacement. From there you would have to go larger or smaller. Anything modern would probably be more capable but also more expensive.

For a larger option there is the MH-139.

Big, fast, stable, useful for utility flights, capable of hoisting or winching, and sliding side cabin doors reminiscent of the Huey. The biggest downside is the cost - nearly twice as much as a Bell 412 to buy and more per flight hour to maintain.

A smaller option might be the UH-72 Lakota.

The US Army adopted them to replace their own O/TH-58 and UH-1 helicopters for training and liaison. So Colombia could possibly use it in a similar role. Lakotas dont typically come armed, but there exists the EC635 which can equip rockets and gunpods so I imagine a similar modification for the UH-72 wouldn't be too difficult.

One more option might be a AS350/355 variant.

A lot less expensive to buy and maintain yet still has some of the best performance in it's class. These have been used for basically any job you can do with a helicopter including the roles in question. Of course it can't carry as much as a huey but its smaller and faster and you could possibly keep a larger fleet of them due to its lower cost.

This is all assuming each helicopter is available. As I mentioned before the choices are almost always political. I could see Colombia aligning more with Airbus or Leonardo rather than Bell with the state of the current administration in the US.

[enriquemzn262]

I checked and the Army considered the MH-39 a few years back but backed out due to lack of funds, this after the air force bought a single unit for transporting the president.

Man you were spot on with the very first pic! But I guess they will go for something cheaper now, and since the army likes modeling itself after the US, it could end up being the Lakota.

By the end of July we should know what they picked, let’s see how they do.

[enriquemzn262]

The many faces of the Bell Huey helicopter

UH-1A Iroquois, the original short design

UH-1H “Huey”, the definite classic version

Bell 212/UH-1N Twin Huey, the first major modification, now with twin engines.

Bell 214 Huey Plus, more powerful version of the single-engine Huey.

Bell 214ST, twin-engine development of the 214, with enlarged and radically redesigned fuselage, visually the furthest from the original.

Bell 412, essentially a 212 with a 4-blade rotor, a first for the Huey family.

UH-1Y Venom, deep modernization of the 212 for the US Marines, using the engines and transmission from the UH-60 Black Hawk, and featuring the only 4-bladed tail rotor design of the entire family.

Out of all of these rotorcraft, only the 412 and its latests licensed-built variants remains in production, but besides the original version, all remain in service with militaries and civilian operators/owners all around the world.

[longislandairpower]

[lyril]

[cornedbeefhashtags]

[battletoads]

[enriquemzn262]

@rotorsexual we just found out the Colombian Army is buying 18 new helicopters to replace the Bell 212 fleet, which served in liaison, armed escort and recon duties in the army, leaving troop transport and air assault to the Black Hawk fleet

So, in your experience, what would you say could be a nice replacement? Personally I believe that’s the Bell 412, essentially the same chopper but with 4 blades, quieter, with more modern avionics and better engines in the current production versions.

But it’s also still an old Huey at heart, so maybe there are better options that combine the economics of a civilian model with the versatility of a military one, hence my question.

[rotorsexual]

Im a sucker for two-bladed hueys so its sad to see another batch go. But when it comes to replacements the choice is often based on politics rather than the best one for the job.

I don't know the specifics of Colombia's time with the 212 but if they could get a consistent and reliable source of parts then the 412 would probably be a fine option. In my experience and people I've met, Bell can be kind of hit or miss depending on your aircraft. Nothing but a Bell 412 would be close enough to a 212 for a nearly identical replacement. From there you would have to go larger or smaller. Anything modern would probably be more capable but also more expensive.

For a larger option there is the MH-139.

Big, fast, stable, useful for utility flights, capable of hoisting or winching, and sliding side cabin doors reminiscent of the Huey. The biggest downside is the cost - nearly twice as much as a Bell 412 to buy and more per flight hour to maintain.

A smaller option might be the UH-72 Lakota.

The US Army adopted them to replace their own O/TH-58 and UH-1 helicopters for training and liaison. So Colombia could possibly use it in a similar role. Lakotas dont typically come armed, but there exists the EC635 which can equip rockets and gunpods so I imagine a similar modification for the UH-72 wouldn't be too difficult.

One more option might be a AS350/355 variant.

A lot less expensive to buy and maintain yet still has some of the best performance in it's class. These have been used for basically any job you can do with a helicopter including the roles in question. Of course it can't carry as much as a huey but its smaller and faster and you could possibly keep a larger fleet of them due to its lower cost.

This is all assuming each helicopter is available. As I mentioned before the choices are almost always political. I could see Colombia aligning more with Airbus or Leonardo rather than Bell with the state of the current administration in the US.