To me, the "never ages" part is the most interesting, though in terms of aerospace, this doesn't have to be literally "never". An "estimated service life of 150 years" would be half again as long as humans have had powered flight, and would basically amount to the same thing.
"Designers say the helicopter’s performance is quite unique, that it will not age. Special wear resistant composite materials are used on the helicopter’s fuselage"
I'd have thought that most problems with helicopters come from the engines and other complex parts, not the fuselage.
Yes, but they made no claims about that. In their little corner of the universe the helicopter is the air frame. Those engines, rotors, tires, batteries and whatnot are just incidentals that people insist on bolting on.
Engines and the rotor assembly are relatively easily replaced. In fact, engines are routinely rated for less operation time than the expected life time of many air craft today.
The fuselage and avionics are typically the most expensive parts of an any aircraft.
Perhaps an exciting first step to retrieving all of the human remains and the litter that's accumulated on the ascent over the years? Clean up the joint a bit?
Yeah. Helicopters in flight use less power because of "free" translational lift, the lift provided by air flowing over the rotor because of the helicopter's forward speed.
It uses much more power to lift off when stationary because there is no translational lift.
So if the helicopter is at maximum power while moving, it has no "extra" power to hover or land gently or take off. It can fly as high as Everest, but it can't land or takeoff.
I remember reading (I think it was "Chickenhawk", great book) that some pilots in Vietnam with an overloaded helicopter stuck on a ridge would basically drop it off the side of the ridge to get some forward speed before they would recover and climb up to altitude. That takes guts.
While I'm telling anecdotes, a long time friend had always wanted to fly, it was his dream, so he joined the Air Force after school. He passed the basic ab-initio training with flying colours and got assigned to heavy transports. He quit after two years. I was very surprised and asked him why. He said he was so scared he couldn't handle it. (He wouldn't say what, but I assume something like short landings at night on unmade strips in the middle of the bush, etc.)
What's up with the whacky accent? I hear this in demonstration / marketing videos from big industrial companies all the time, and I can't figure out why you'd want someone who speaks so oddly.
"We need a professional sounding English narrator. British accent, of course, it's more refined. But not a native speaker... that's too ordinary. We need someone who's faking a British accent. Also, random word emphasis is a plus."
I am british, and I could not stop laughing at the accent. You can tell its how someone not britain thinks how a british person speaks. Waaay to exaggerated.
English curriculum in Soviet schools was meant to be based on British English, but of course precious few teachers ever traveled to the UK or interacted with Britons.
That's truly amazing because I can't recollect a Helicopter that big making it to 8,800m as they claim. Usually it is very light copters that can do that. Clearly the Indian army will want to get their hands on this as they operate in the highest battlefield on earth: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siachen_Glacier
Evacuating troops and dropping supplies there is difficult to put it lightly.
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 59.4 ms ] threadhttp://www.everestnews.com/stories2005/everestcopter05272005...
I'd have thought that most problems with helicopters come from the engines and other complex parts, not the fuselage.
The fuselage and avionics are typically the most expensive parts of an any aircraft.
It uses much more power to lift off when stationary because there is no translational lift.
So if the helicopter is at maximum power while moving, it has no "extra" power to hover or land gently or take off. It can fly as high as Everest, but it can't land or takeoff.
I remember reading (I think it was "Chickenhawk", great book) that some pilots in Vietnam with an overloaded helicopter stuck on a ridge would basically drop it off the side of the ridge to get some forward speed before they would recover and climb up to altitude. That takes guts.
While I'm telling anecdotes, a long time friend had always wanted to fly, it was his dream, so he joined the Air Force after school. He passed the basic ab-initio training with flying colours and got assigned to heavy transports. He quit after two years. I was very surprised and asked him why. He said he was so scared he couldn't handle it. (He wouldn't say what, but I assume something like short landings at night on unmade strips in the middle of the bush, etc.)
"We need a professional sounding English narrator. British accent, of course, it's more refined. But not a native speaker... that's too ordinary. We need someone who's faking a British accent. Also, random word emphasis is a plus."
English curriculum in Soviet schools was meant to be based on British English, but of course precious few teachers ever traveled to the UK or interacted with Britons.
Evacuating troops and dropping supplies there is difficult to put it lightly.