Another way to get around.

I've got a couple thousand hours in them. :wink Don't let people scare you, if you do have an emergency you can land it in your front yard, obstacles permitting. With fixed wing, you better have a long, flat, open stretch of pavement to put her down (safely). :biggrin Just make sure you spend your time with a quality flight instructor and practice your autorotations as often as you can. Doing engine out autos to the deck in the TH-57 (Bell JetRanger for most folks) was fun, but made me realize 3>2>1 (that's why I flew a helo with 3 engines). In the 53 it wasn't engine failures you worried about, it was swashplate and/or tail rotor failures. Bad JuJu in that helicopter. A quote from an instructor I have always remembered when I was learning to fly 53s was "The CH-53 was designed to keep your mind, hands and feet busy while you plummet to your death" (he was speaking to a full autorotation scenario in a 53, which is highly unlikely but always possible).

Reading this post, maybe I haven't been to helpful now that I think about it lol.

Me a long time ago...

GT38 said:

I did, a lot (military & civilian). So have CH53Driver and FlorIdaho Chris, that I know of. That's Team Jeff in the last photo.

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Great pictures GT38! I finally got to fly a UH-1 a couple years back. Ironically, it was not in the Marines. Went up with the local crop dusting guy from my home town. Was a fun evening, nothing like flying 10 feet off the ground, at night, 80 KTS, and having to dodge powerlines at the end of each run. No NVDs either, just the Mk 1 Eyeball.

Damn, that is nice!:thumbsup Jealous as hell.

My bro is a civvy helo pilot and I've worked DoD programs, including on the UH-60L, so I've had the opportunity to fly/fly in a few models.. Robinsons, Schweizer, Bell, and some military ships....

My favorite was a Hiller named Peaches:lol This Kiowa was pretty sporty tho.

CH53Driver said:

Doing engine out autos to the deck in the TH-57 (Bell JetRanger for most folks) was fun,

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It absolutely was! I thought it was easier to make a smooth touchdown power-off than power on (in the OH-58A version, at least).

CH53Driver said:

I finally got to fly a UH-1 a couple years back.

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The UH-1H is my all-time favorite helicopter, although I only had about 60 hours in it (RWQC at Ft. Rucker). The ships we flew at Rucker back then were really beat up. In a formation autorotation, two of three helicopters (including us) had simultaneous freewheeling unit failures - a real eye opener. But when properly maintained, there's nothing like a Huey.

CH53Driver said:

"The CH-53 was designed to keep your mind, hands and feet busy while you plummet to your death" (he was speaking to a full autorotation scenario in a 53, which is highly unlikely but always possible).

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That's a good one! It could also apply to full autos in the CH-3E, which (especially at the high GW and temps we often flew) could charitably be described as "tricky"!

PeteK said:

Lots of time in Jet Rangers, H-1, H-46 (tandem rotor beast), and a smidgen in H-3 and H-60.

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Ditto on the Jet Rangers. Looking forward to hearing about the H-46, especially as it compares to the H-3 since they have the same engines. :thumbsup

Wow I am so impressed very cool!
The high light for me was a helicopter ride in Alaska!

Wwabbit said:

Very cool pics of the other ships, thanks for sharing. The CH53 is a personal favorite. Well I'm pretty green on the heli side of things, but they sure are fun. You can drop into interesting places like GT38 has shown us. I agree with you Mike, I am more comfortable with wings that stay in the same place during the flight, but this is growing on me. And yes, emergencies have a whole new meaning to me now. This little thing has room for 4 and travels at 120kts with about a 3hr endurance in air conditioned comfort. So far I've only found places within 30min to go. Bell is introducing a new Jet Ranger next year, the 505. I have a production slot for one, so this is sort of a pilot development tool. So far so good. [ dis - nope sorry, that's a GT3RS , a GT2 would be cool]

The first flight of the Bell 505 was today : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0p3dSKEbNs4

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Very cool. Blows my mind that people can have such a thing in their own garage. I am intrigued. Wish my wife was adventurous enough to let me get one.

Ditto on the Jet Rangers. Looking forward to hearing about the H-46, especially as it compares to the H-3 since they have the same engines. :thumbsup[/QUOTE]

Well, the H-46 Sea Knight is the little brother of the H-47 Chinook. Lots of the same parts, although the 47 is almost twice the gross rating of the 46. And most of those suckers were built in the late 1960's (both 47's and 46's), so they've been in the air for about 45 years or more. One very useful feature of the 46 is that with tandem rotor "eggbeaters" no tail rotor, there is no "tail rotor authority" to limit sideways or rearward flight. The sideways and rearward flight speeds were limited by NATOPS, but those limits were set for operating safety rather than physical limits of the aircraft (something like 25 knots rearward, and 35 knots sideways, IIRC--do you really want to be flying 25 knots backwards without seeing where you're going???). These characteristics made these helos ideal for VERTREP, and Navy SEAL insertion/extraction missions, where they spend a lot of time going sideways and backwards, with a couple tons slung underneath.

I'll probably get some argument from "Tomcat" but I thought that flying helicopters was the most fun you could have in military flying because you weren't under strict IFR flight plans all the time. The basic home operating rules were to call Tower when leaving the 5-mile limit and tell them what operating area you would be in, and what time you would return, and if you didn't call back at your ETA, they would call SAR to come look for you. Other than that, you went where you wanted and flew whatever training missions you planned, or improvised. As long as you didn't buzz the beach. Low hassle.

PeteK said:

These characteristics made these helos ideal for VERTREP, and Navy SEAL insertion/extraction missions, where they spend a lot of time going sideways and backwards, with a couple tons slung underneath.

I'll probably get some argument from "Tomcat" but I thought that flying helicopters was the most fun you could have in military flying because you weren't under strict IFR flight plans all the time. The basic home operating rules were to call Tower when leaving the 5-mile limit and tell them what operating area you would be in, and what time you would return, and if you didn't call back at your ETA, they would call SAR to come look for you. Other than that, you went where you wanted and flew whatever training missions you planned, or improvised. As long as you didn't buzz the beach. Low hassle.

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Nice attempt to bait me but I mostly agree with you. I jumped 46's with USMC ANGLICO...very cool!
Also, one of the greatest "dog-fights" I was in was when I was vertreping back to the Enterprise and the CO told my 46 to "...get rid of that pesky Soviet Helix!" that was fouling our pattern.

Yes, because of IFR, the Navy beat the fun out of a lot of flying but I was a west coaster (Miramar) so we had lots of (relatively) unrestricted desert ranges (Fallon, Yuma, El Centro), a big ocean, and when we went on cruise...someday I'll talk about Low Levels in Oman (star wars canyon) and Kenya.

ChipBeck said:

Wwabbit,

[snip] I think helicopters are a blast and I love to fly them but not enough to want to buy and maintain another aircraft. Cheers.

Chip

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Yeah, if you aren't making money with them, helos are hard on the wallet. What's that saying, "buying a Ferrari is the cheapest part of owning it;" they're kinda like that.

One thing clear is that we all need to get together sometime, maybe at Rally X as Pete suggested, and exchange some stories that, "...have the additional benefit of being true." (to borrow a line from Dan Rather). I have more than a sneaking suspicion that there are a few stories (military and civilian) on this topic that are begging to be told, but NOT on the internet! :biggrin

I fly airplanes and helicopters, I would much rather have an emergency in a helicopter than an airplane any day. They don't really drop like a rock, it's more like a heavy feather.

Fubar said:

Be careful, emergency landings have much more emergency to them.

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Jan A. Byrd said:

I fly airplanes and helicopters, I would much rather have an emergency in a helicopter than an airplane any day. They don't really drop like a rock, it's more like a heavy feather.

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I would define the nature of the emergency first. Things like tail rotor failure and main gear box seizure would be emergencies that I would not want to experience in flight. Otherwise, I agree, mostly. :wink