FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1980
1980 - 0970.PDF
RIGHT International, 22 March 1980 929 I N July next year the first Boeing Vertol Model 234 Commercial Chinook is scheduled to begin to earn money for its operator. The introduc tion of every new type of helicopter is something of a leap into the un known, but this one will be bigger in every sense of the word. Yet these last few weeks before the first Model 234 flies may be the most testing time of all. To introduce a new type with twice the gross weight, passenger capacity and range of the existing fleet workhorse, the Sikorsky S-61, into an area as in hospitable as the northern North Sea arouses uncertainties and suspicions of problems which hardly anyone can answer with absolute finality. Only time will tell and many people are hedging their bets. But Boeing Vertol can point to 939 Chinooks of earlier models in service worldwide, tested by wartime field operation in Vietnam, and continuously improved both in US Army service and by up graded models exported outside the US, notably to Australia, Canada and, now, to Britain. The US Army is virtu ally redeveloping the military Chin ook by introducing the CH-47D, of which three prototypes took to the air last year. Finally, the Commercial Chinook is going through a complete civil certification programme to both US and British requirements. The conversion of military to civil Chinook has brought about 250 changes to the basic machine, some related simply to civil comfort and utility, but many applied as basic im provements in reliability and main tainability. Behind all that lies a major Boeing Vertol effort to set up a civil product-support operation, including some airline - standard ATA100 practices, advanced spares depots and AOG facilities and an orderly progression towards on-condi- tion maintenance of transmissions and engines. There is now a close practical associ ation between Vertol and the Boeing Commercial Chinook February. But commercial orders now cover 12 firm and five reserved by non-refundable $50,000 deposits. Boeing Vertol sees potential sales of 50 to 75 Commercial Chinooks by 1990, with new applications beyond off-shore transport and logging already beginning to appear. If the CH-47D programme develops as planned, Boeing Vertol expects to convert 361 CH47As, Bs and Cs to Ds during the coming years and to start manufacturing new Ds in 1984 or 1'985. The US Army would like to have a fleet of 580 CH-47DS during the 1990s. In addition, Boeing Vertol is producing 273 kits for converting CH46Ds and Fs to Es. The company is also working to unearth some funds, possibly through Nasa, with which to MARK LAMBERT reports from Philadelphia parent company, whose vast commer cial know-how is evident at Philadel phia, both in inputs to the Commercial Chinook programme and in the dis ciplines being applied to Vertol's manufacture of subassemblies for Boeing 757 and 767. Commercial Chin ook, incidentally, will have Boeing 727 windows and 747 overhead bag gage bins. Even though Boeing Vertol has practically stopped its railway car riage business and is spending about $40 million on reorganising and re tooling the factory beside the Dela ware river outside Philadelphia, its sales are increasing. The company pro duced only six Chinooks in 1978 and nine in 1979, but plans 19 this year and 32 in 1981. Most of these will belong to the batch of 33 for the Royal Air Force, the first of which was rolled out at the beginning of restart the XCH-62 Heavy Lift Heli copter project which was cancelled only a few months before first flight in 1974. This aircraft promises two- and-a-half times the .lifting capacity of the CH-47 and, with further de velopment of the transmission, Boeing Vertol could have it up-dated and flying by 1984. Why should Russia's - new giant Halo heavy lifter be unique? There are two main versions of the Model 234 Commercial Chinook, the so-called long-range and the utility, though each can be converted in hours to perform a good proportion of the other's role. The long-range Model 234 was launched by the British Air ways Helicopters order in 1978 for three, plus an option, since confirmed, on three more. A virtually separate department has been set up to bring the Model 234 into being. Since then, Bristow Helicopters has ordered five, and Columbia Helicopters one. Colum bia took an option on another, fol lowed by Canadian operator Highland Helicopters, Okanagan and B.CAL Helicopters (2). The seventeenth Model 234, for Okanagan, is to be de livered in February 1983. The ex pected Norwegian order for three Chinooks has lapsed for the time being. The very long lead times for forgings and special parts is forcing Boeing Vertol to decide very soon whether to set the production rate from mid-1983 onwards at one or two a month. Price of the Commercial Chinook is set at $9-45 million at 1979 values, escalating according to US Govern ment indices of material and labour costs. The Chase Manhattan Bank's econometric estimates suggest that the price might have increased by no less than 40 per cent by the time the machine next ordered is delivered. Columbia plans to use the Chinook for logging in the US north-west. A helicopter can lift individual tree trunks out of standing forest and allow selective felling, but Boeing Vertol expects helicopter logging to open up further afield, in South-East Asia, for example. Construction of new nuclear power stations far from conurbations in the USA will require long transmission lines in remote areas, which the Chinook Utility could help build. Already, helicopters are ' being used to take mining and quarry ing crews from living areas to remote work sites. Truly public scheduled passenger operations are still not clearly viable with the present 44-seat capacity. Boeing Vertol is looking at various •- •- page 932
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
