Coastal Posted February 23, 2015 Report Posted February 23, 2015 Link to the New Zealand AD grounding any R44 with main rotor blade P/N C016-7: http://www.casa.gov.au/wcmswr/_assets/main/airworth/airwd/adfiles/rotor/r44/r44-024.pdf Affect on Canadian R44 ops? http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/22/new-zealand-helicopter-crash-prompts-grounding-of-aircraft-in-australia Quote
Coastal Posted February 23, 2015 Author Report Posted February 23, 2015 Sincere condolences to friends and family of those lost. Quote
Freewheel Posted February 24, 2015 Report Posted February 24, 2015 New Zealand Lifts R44 flight ban: http://www.verticalmag.com/news/article/NewZealandliftsR44flightban Thoughts? Wasn't that long ago that 206 owners were told to comply with an AD which called for a preflight inspection of main rotor blades (using blue dye). Ultimately a pair of those blades failed killing all on board. Quote
Freewheel Posted February 24, 2015 Report Posted February 24, 2015 If memory serves correct, the bell AD was to be carried out based on number of starts Quote
just looking Posted February 24, 2015 Report Posted February 24, 2015 If you are talking about the AD on the long ranger blades. It started out as a blue dye inspection every ??? hours or an X-ray to eliminate the AD. Everyone started X-ray blades. Within a few months of them saying X-ray was fine they reissued the AD stating a serious of blades were limited to 1,400 hours then they were to be scrapped. Needless to say Bell had no blades in stock which grounded a pile of L series aircraft. The reason for this was a crash in Ontario were the blade came apart 10 ours from being at its life limit. Quote
Freewheel Posted February 24, 2015 Report Posted February 24, 2015 That's the one I'm referring to. http://www.tsb.gc.ca/eng/rapports-reports/aviation/2011/a11o0205/a11o0205.asp Quote
Freewheel Posted February 24, 2015 Report Posted February 24, 2015 It wasn't an AD at the time. My bad. I guess my memory failed me. Quote
Freewheel Posted February 26, 2015 Report Posted February 26, 2015 If you are talking about the AD on the long ranger blades. It started out as a blue dye inspection every ??? hours or an X-ray to eliminate the AD. Everyone started X-ray blades. Within a few months of them saying X-ray was fine they reissued the AD stating a serious of blades were limited to 1,400 hours then they were to be scrapped. Needless to say Bell had no blades in stock which grounded a pile of L series aircraft. The reason for this was a crash in Ontario were the blade came apart 10 ours from being at its life limit. It was every 60 starts or less (Due to stresses on that portion of the blade during start up while rotor system spools up) Apparently not everyone started X-raying (and it wasn't req'd by TC) At least 2 fatal accidents occurred The accident that occurred in Indiana: the blades had just under 800 hrs remaing (to 3600 hrs) Bell later increased the life of unaffected blades by 400 hrs (to 4000hrs) Quote
Freewheel Posted February 26, 2015 Report Posted February 26, 2015 From the last wipe check to the day of the occurrence, the blade had accumulated 61.3 hours and 41 cycles. Quote
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