Picture....Briles H-21C (1971)
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Picture....Briles H-21C (1971)
Briles H-21C Lifts material to the roof of a building during a construction job.Notice how the helicopter has been stripped of all excess weight including the vertical tailplanes.Taken in Van Nuys California
April 1971 ( my dad took the pic...i was only 6 years old but loved helicopters from birth)
[This message has been edited by Larry (edited 03 March 2001).]
April 1971 ( my dad took the pic...i was only 6 years old but loved helicopters from birth)
[This message has been edited by Larry (edited 03 March 2001).]
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I posted this on just helicopters in response to a question about Briles.
What I am about to say is time dated and that it reflects the quality of maintenance that existed many years ago. I used to be a techrep on the S 58 (H-34, HSS-1). When I discovered that Briles was converting an Israeli H-34 to an S-58 T I asked if they could use my services on a consulting basis. The first thing they wanted me to do was approve the dynamic and power train systems. It was my understanding that they wanted to use the systems as they were and not perform any overhaul or repair on the items comprising the two systems. I ran a few cursory checks and found the pitch and flapping as well as the lead lag bearings were all bound up and ratchety. It was later determined that all of the bearings had been contaminated with fine sand and had encountered serious wear. When I told them that the rotorhead and swashplate had to be returned to Sikorsky for overhaul and replacement of the damaged and defective parts, they said that they did not want to incur too much cost in the conversion. Another thing that they did was to convert directly from the H-34 configuration to the S-58 T configuration without first converting the airframe to an S-58 commercial configuration and having it certified by the FAA and then convert it to an S-58 T with that configuration being certificated.
I also found out from some of the pilots that Briles had purchased a crashed S-55 from an outfit in Alaska and rebuilt it without the aid of jigs and fixtures. After completing the repair they attached a tailcone from another crashed S-55. Since the fuselage was not in plumb or referenced to the necessary jigs the aircraft never flew correctly. They then sent it down to Central America where it was registered down there. This aircraft was used to haul passengers to and from the oil fields and it also carried internal and external cargo.
As previously indicated, the information provide above represents the maintenance operations as they existed many years ago and hopefully has since improved.
(edit this message)
This is one of the responses to the above post.
Its ( S-58-T ) sitting out behind the hangar at Tundra in Fairbanks. Been rotting there for years.. Me thinks it gets moved around from one Briles company to the next as inventory for Tax Poiposes....Wouldnt be the first one. It has a twin pack but in total wouldnt be worthy of a gate mount at any airport............
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The Cat
[This message has been edited by Lu Zuckerman (edited 04 March 2001).]
What I am about to say is time dated and that it reflects the quality of maintenance that existed many years ago. I used to be a techrep on the S 58 (H-34, HSS-1). When I discovered that Briles was converting an Israeli H-34 to an S-58 T I asked if they could use my services on a consulting basis. The first thing they wanted me to do was approve the dynamic and power train systems. It was my understanding that they wanted to use the systems as they were and not perform any overhaul or repair on the items comprising the two systems. I ran a few cursory checks and found the pitch and flapping as well as the lead lag bearings were all bound up and ratchety. It was later determined that all of the bearings had been contaminated with fine sand and had encountered serious wear. When I told them that the rotorhead and swashplate had to be returned to Sikorsky for overhaul and replacement of the damaged and defective parts, they said that they did not want to incur too much cost in the conversion. Another thing that they did was to convert directly from the H-34 configuration to the S-58 T configuration without first converting the airframe to an S-58 commercial configuration and having it certified by the FAA and then convert it to an S-58 T with that configuration being certificated.
I also found out from some of the pilots that Briles had purchased a crashed S-55 from an outfit in Alaska and rebuilt it without the aid of jigs and fixtures. After completing the repair they attached a tailcone from another crashed S-55. Since the fuselage was not in plumb or referenced to the necessary jigs the aircraft never flew correctly. They then sent it down to Central America where it was registered down there. This aircraft was used to haul passengers to and from the oil fields and it also carried internal and external cargo.
As previously indicated, the information provide above represents the maintenance operations as they existed many years ago and hopefully has since improved.
(edit this message)
This is one of the responses to the above post.
Its ( S-58-T ) sitting out behind the hangar at Tundra in Fairbanks. Been rotting there for years.. Me thinks it gets moved around from one Briles company to the next as inventory for Tax Poiposes....Wouldnt be the first one. It has a twin pack but in total wouldnt be worthy of a gate mount at any airport............
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The Cat
[This message has been edited by Lu Zuckerman (edited 04 March 2001).]
