Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Oddball on April 06, 2009, 03:08:42 PM
Teh wreck has been raised and been returned to Aberdeen harbour earlier this morning also heard about anothe Super Puma employed by CHC got into trouble: http://uk.news.yahoo.com/4/20090406/tuk-final-crash-bodies-brought-to-port-dba1618.html
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Frank N. O. on April 06, 2009, 03:32:43 PM
Man, there sure are a lot of bad news around that helicopter type :(
My condolences |:)\
Any idea if it's a design or maintenance fault?
Frank
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Oddball on April 06, 2009, 04:19:15 PM
Find out soon the FDR's have been removed and are being studied at RAE Farnbourgh home of the AAIB.
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Oddball on April 11, 2009, 07:47:45 AM
The AAIB have released a primary report turns out the main gear box had failed and another Puma with a company called CHC als had trouble with one of thier Pumas during the last week.
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Mike on April 11, 2009, 03:19:59 PM
The AAIB have released a primary report turns out the main gear box had failed and another Puma with a company called CHC als had trouble with one of thier Pumas during the last week.
Really!? ::unbelieveable:: ::eek::
I was just about to post that I would be surprised if the Puma had a maintenance issue. I was guessing environment..... The weather those guys fly in scares the crap out of me.
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Ragwing on April 11, 2009, 04:41:51 PM
The Report says: ‘Examination of the wreckage indicates that the accident occurred following a catastrophic failure of the main rotor gearbox.
‘This resulted in the detachment of the main rotor head from the helicopter and was rapidly followed by main rotor blade strikes on the pylon and tail boom, which became severed from the fuselage+'.
‘It is apparent that there was also a rupture in the right-hand engine casing’.
The failure had evidently happened with no forewarning. The Black Box flight recorder, recovered from the scene and analysed by experts at Farnborough, showed that, prior to the crash, the crew had been engaged in ‘routine cockpit activities’.
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Oddball on April 12, 2009, 02:00:38 PM
aye saw that in yesterdays paper. Only caught a small bit about it on BBC world service while at work on friday night. Looks like the Puma fleet is in trouble just now after 30 years service.
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Mike on April 12, 2009, 03:26:02 PM
Looks like the Puma fleet is in trouble just now after 30 years service.
That's what surprised me the most. Could be though that they're using a certain Overhaul Facility there up North who is doing something wrong which has nothing to do with the aircraft design.
A few years back we had boost pumps fail left and right on the AStars the whole summer. We finally opened one up (because we're stuck in the desert and HAD to see why it failed) and it turned out that whoever put those together used wires so short that they would chaffe on the casing and rub through the insulation withing a few hours and short everything out.
Just this spring we installed 3 different RPM sensor boxes in the two Hueys and they kept failing. One would turn on the horn randomly with the RPM being in the green. A little unnerving if you're flying along minding your on business. The other woudln't work at all and one was intermittend.
Sadly, in general work quality has gone down with a lot of things we run on our aircraft. Either they can't find qualified people, quit caring, or can't afford it. Pretty scary ::sick::
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Oddball on April 12, 2009, 04:08:11 PM
Bond has its own in house servicing just like Bristows the other company serving the North Sea rigs. So I dont know if its shoddy workmanship poor parts or if its fatigue and dont want to guess since I dont know a lot about helos. i cant say for certain about CHC the other Puma user though.
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Mike on April 12, 2009, 06:10:24 PM
Yeah, I can see something going wrong there. I find it hard to believe that a design that's been around for 30 years falls out of the sky all of a sudden....
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: TheSoccerMom on April 13, 2009, 02:00:29 AM
Well I probably shouldn't throw this in here, as I can't recall the details, but I did read somewhere a few weeks back that there was some question about the initial certification?? That the gearbox needs to be capable of running a certain amount of time without any oil, and that somehow the first tests were not done to the proper levels??
Sorry, but I don't have time right now to google this and quote those exact articles, but it seems there may some underlying reason why this happened... or perhaps that was just part of the initial investigation.
It's sure a sad thing, no matter the history of the machine... :'(
:(
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: G-man on April 13, 2009, 02:05:38 AM
Well I probably shouldn't throw this in here, as I can't recall the details, but I did read somewhere a few weeks back that there was some question about the initial certification?? That the gearbox needs to be capable of running a certain amount of time without any oil, and that somehow the first tests were not done to the proper levels?? :(
That whole gearbox certification thing was about the S-92 that crashed in Canada a few weeks ago. They had a loss of oil and the reliability of the "run dry" test from Sikorsky has been called into question. (Very unbecoming of me---answering a technical question do'nt ya think..).
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: TheSoccerMom on April 13, 2009, 02:28:25 AM
Ahh, thank you for the clarification, G-Heli-Man!! :)
It's probably NOT a good habit at all, to read 350 aviation articles and then be able to remember only 1-2% of each one.... ::whistle:: ::loony::
What's that line about "just enough information to be dangerous...."??!?? ::silly::
Oh hey look! There's an oil leak! Hey, what altitude did he just tell us?? And wow, there's a shiny object!! Oh, OOPS, I just threw my GPS-equipped underwear into the hotel washer....!!!!!
::banghead::
NO BRAIN.......... NO PAIN..........
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: G-man on April 13, 2009, 02:39:51 AM
Oh, OOPS, I just threw my GPS-equipped underwear into the hotel washer....!!!!!
::banghead::
NO BRAIN.......... NO PAIN..........
Bummer---hopefully with all the advances in technology it will be waterproof.
After looking at the new all-glass instrument panels at the heli-expo earlier this year, I now have an appreciation of what a dog feels like when watching TV.
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Mike on April 13, 2009, 05:10:49 AM
Well I probably shouldn't throw this in here, as I can't recall the details, but I did read somewhere a few weeks back that there was some question about the initial certification?? That the gearbox needs to be capable of running a certain amount of time without any oil, and that somehow the first tests were not done to the proper levels?? :(
That whole gearbox certification thing was about the S-92 that crashed in Canada a few weeks ago. They had a loss of oil and the reliability of the "run dry" test from Sikorsky has been called into question. (Very unbecoming of me---answering a technical question do'nt ya think..).
Whaaat? ? ?
What S-92 crashed?
Already?
Didn't they just build that aircraft? It's already crashing? ::eek::
You guys are just full of bad news tonight, huh?!
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: G-man on April 13, 2009, 05:21:46 AM
Title: Re: Puma update:
Post by: Ragwing on April 18, 2009, 01:30:56 PM
In case you miss the link: http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20090417/tuk-urgent-probe-into-copter-gearbox-6323e80.html (http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20090417/tuk-urgent-probe-into-copter-gearbox-6323e80.html)
The checks had been done after a small chip of metallic debris had been found, 34 flying hours before the crash, on the gearbox metallic detector which is used to attract any bits of metal which can get into the system.
There was no description of the metal chip and is hard to evaluate without the hardware. A chip could have been there for some time. It could have just chipped off. The maintenance group appears to have applied standard monitoring following detection.
Clearly mechanics will have to be a lot more aggressive in the future. Hardened gears will have to be treated with kid gloves.......
