“excellentia semino excellentia”

Mornington Sanford Aviation and Sloane Helicopters have embarked on a joint venture to establish a training centre dedicated to supporting the Robinson Helicopter Company’s products and their associated power plants.

This “centre of excellence” will be established at Sloane Helicopters’ facilities at Sywell Aerodrome, Northampton and will offer:

• EASA Part 147 type training and Robinson Helicopter Company factory approved airframe type training on the R22, R44 with the Lycoming engine and the R66 with the RR300 engine.
• European Robinson R22/R44 Pilot Flight Safety Courses.

Both companies have a long-standing and close relationship with Robinson:

• Mornington Sanford Aviation in flight safety, product maintenance
  and pilot training.
• Sloane Helicopters in sales, marketing, maintenance and pilot training.

This unique and outstanding combination of Robinson product knowledge, expertise and quality of service will produce a real European centre of excellence for owners, operators and pilots. It is envisaged that the capability will be extended to cover other products in the near future.

Personnel from Mornington Sanford Aviation and Sloane Helicopters will be available on the Robinson Helicopter Company stand at the Heli Expo, Dallas during 12th to 14th February 2012.

Contacts: info@morningtonsanfordaviation.com, action@sloanehelicopters.com

Sloane Helicopters Ltd
The Business Aviation Centre, Sywell Aerodrome, Northampton, NN6 0BN
Tel: +44 (0)1604 790595. Fax: +44 (0)1604 790988
www.sloanehelicopters.com

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Safety first!

Even if you've flown a Robinson for years, there's still more to learn. Helicentre, in Leicestershire, offer a training course that will make even the most experienced pilot better...

The first words I hear on this course at Helicentre's are: "The majority of fatal helicopter accidents could have been prevented if the pilot had made the right decision on the ground."

Richard (Dick) Sanford's intro to the European Robinson R22/R44 Flight Safety Course sets the pace for the rest of the three- day event, a captivating statement backed up with detailed statistics giving an in-depth look at why helicopter crashes happen and how we can avoid them.

Pilots of varying experience are in attendance. Some, like me, are freshly hatched PPL(H)s, while others have significantly more time at the controls of an aircraft. A 747 pilot, Brett Easton, has over 20,000 hr under his belt and owns a R44...

Never Say Never…

Heading into the circuit it's clear the R66 has huge power margins

Not so long ago, if I had asked Frank Robinson whether there would be a turbine-engine powered Robinson helicopter, Frank would have said: "You know, Dick, that turbine engine is just too damned expensive." The phrase 'never say never' comes to mind as I start a pre-flight inspection with Doug Tompkins, Robinson Helicopter Company's chief test pilot, prior to my pilot checkout in a Robinson helicopter with a turbine engine – the Robinson R66.

At the end of the pilot checkout, I have to say it's an absolute winner. Easy to start, easy to fly, powerful, fast, benign in autorotation, it's a step change up in safety from the R44, which was itself a major flight safety improvement on the R22 due to its docile handling qualities.

Hayward Aviation Safety Seminar

The Hayward Aviation Safety Seminar for Helicopter Club members attracted a gratifying total of 90 people, and all of us should be safer for the experience if we absorbed the wisdom on offer.

Held in the Conference Centre in the new Airspace Hangar at Duxford, which houses aircraft as diverse as the York, Comet, and Concorde, the seminar coincided with Helitech, allowing the members to go on to the show after lunch, which was generously laid on by Hayward Aviation, Europe's largest helicopter insurance brokers with some 83 percent of the market.

The Seminar was opened by our chairman John Matchett, who briefly introduced the two speakers, Matthew Day and Richard Mornington-Sanford. Matthew Day is a director of Haywards, which was set up in 1992 with one client – Bristows – and has become the third largest such company in the world. Richard Mornington-Sanford is Robinson Helicopters' international air accident investigator and is a former RAF engineer, flying instructor and examiner.

Richard Mornington-Sanford examines the cold hard truth about carburetor icing in piston engine helicopters, and warns against failing to understand this potential killer.

'Carburetor ice has been linked as the fatal cause of possible accidents involving piston engine helicopters fitted with float-type carburetors. This lamentable fact needs to be better understood if the risks of power loss and even complete engine stoppage is to be avoided'.

Click here to review parts of the No Ice, Thank You brochure...

You can order the complete 'No Ice, Thank You' brochure
for just £2.50 plus £1.20 P&P (within the UK).

Worried about engine failure, or mechanical problems in the air? Forget it.

Richard Sanford is an air accident investigator who is finding it increasingly difficult to remain sanguine when he knows that the wrecks and the bodies he deals with are almost always the result of bad decision making, often on the ground before a flight even begins...

“Its ok I have a night rating”... how many times have I heard this statement from pilots when asked about the risks and suitability of their flight after dark ?'...

Loss of Tail Rotor Effectiveness (LTE) is a critical, low-speed aerodynamic flight characteristic which can result in an un-commanded rapid yaw rate which does not subside of its own accord and, if not corrected, can result in the loss of aircraft control.

LTE is not related to a maintenance malfunction and may occur in varying degrees in all single main rotor helicopters at airspeeds less than 30 knots. LTE is not necessarily the result of a control margin deficiency...

Despite bad weather and a brutal hangover Richard Mornigton-Sanford enjoys his visit to The Central Air Force Museum at Monino near Moscow.

In December 2005 I visited Moscow as a guest of the National Federation of Helicopter Sport; you will better remember them as the World Helicopter Champions 2005.

The purpose of my visit was to conduct a Robinson R22/R44 Maintenance Course for nine of their engineers...

The Helicopter Club of Great Britain is opposing proposed new visibility minima for helicopters on the grounds that new regulations would do nothing to improve safety and may in fact make matters worse.

The CAA wants to introduce minimum visibility of 3km for VFR flight in helicopters and to make VFR flight above cloud illegal, and has proposed to amend the ANO accordingly...

Are we making a good fist of teaching people to fly helicopters? Or are we instilling in them habits that are more likely to kill them, than save their lives?

The question is moot, but there's a body of empirical evidence mostly in the form of accident wreckage - to support the idea that we're not getting it absolutely right...

Richard Mornington-Sanford reports on the delights of backwards autorotation's with a poor non-flying Russian interpreter in the back seat.

Without doubt one of the great parts of my involvement with Robinson Helicopters is that they send me on missions to some very unusual places.

Like Ekaterinburg Russia and no, I had never heard of the place either. But after consulting my Boys Own Atlas I found it tucked away in the Urals... in other words, Siberia. and it was February!...

At the end of every flight the pilot has to sit and twiddle his or her thumbs, waiting for the engine to cool down.

Believe it or not, this is crucial for the safe and reliable operation not only of your engine but also your bank balance...

Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA) has compiled a dossier to present to European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) in pursuit of its campaign for a review of the Joint Aviation Requirements (JAR) for five hours instrument familiarisation training for ab initio helicopter pilots.

The prime document in the dossier is an analysis by accident investigator Richard Mornington-Sanford of the counter-productive effects of instrument training, which he believes has led to a major increase in accidents involving continued Visual flight rules (VFR) into Instrument meteorological conditions (IMC)...

I thought that I would kick off this new column by trying to clear some very muddy water relating to the overhaul periods for the Robinson R22 and R44 series helicopters and their costs.

There are two distinct requirements for the overhaul of this helicopter: When it has been operated for 2200hrs on the hour meter (for the R22 this is engine running time and for the R44 it equates to flight time). This is a "things wear out" overhaul. When it has been in service for 12 years, regardless of hours run/flown. This is a "things rot" (environmental overhaul).

When the helicopter has operated for 2200 hours it is completely overhauled, all components are zero timed and those items that do have a critical life are replaced with new and so when the helicopter is returned to service it will have a full 2200 hours and 12 years before the next overhaul...