First Lakota class finished... Any questions?

MckeeC · June 3, 2016

So will everyone be training in the Lakota's now? Or is that the goal anyway? Are they phasing out the TH-67's?

Creep0321 · June 3, 2016

Yes, by 2019. With a higher proportion of classes being in the Lakota every year, right now it is 1/4.

akscott60 · June 3, 2016

How has aircraft availability been? Had to bump some? Were there many PLs?

Sapper · June 3, 2016

I honestly do not have a preference, but out of curiosity:

Do students have any choice in the selection of the -67 or -72 track?

Guessing no one finds out what track they are on until well after classing up for BOLC?

Creep0321 · June 3, 2016

How has aircraft availability been? Had to bump some? Were there many PLs?

I think my class has had one PL for a minor avionics problem, and one day where one stick buddy pair didn't get to fly due to availability. And I'm almost done with instruments.

As for choosing, early on they were asking for volunteers the Lakota class but now it seems like there is.no option cause a lot of people are asking to get into the Lakota classes.

crash · June 3, 2016

How has aircraft availability been? Had to bump some? Were there many PLs?

Availability was good when I went through because we were the only class so there were lots of spares. My class only had one actual in flight pl because one of the students said they could smell fumes. When we first started flying though, am flight line Jan-Feb we had a lot of PL's. Mostly avionics issues. I personally do not think they do very well being exposed to excessive moisture and condensation. I say this because it wasn't uncommon to have 3-4 pls in one am period during that time frame, but was almost non existent for pm flight line or later during the year after it warmed up. Very, very few actual mechanical issues with the helicopter and all minor from what I can remember.

StockTrader · June 4, 2016

Availability was good when I went through because we were the only class so there were lots of spares. My class only had one actual in flight pl because one of the students said they could smell fumes. When we first started flying though, am flight line Jan-Feb we had a lot of PL's. Mostly avionics issues. I personally do not think they do very well being exposed to excessive moisture and condensation. I say this because it wasn't uncommon to have 3-4 pls in one am period during that time frame, but was almost non existent for pm flight line or later during the year after it warmed up. Very, very few actual mechanical issues with the helicopter and all minor from what I can remember.

Lol i wish that was the case with us. We were the 67 class right before you. We had a couple tach failures, an underspeed when on final at cairns, the helo that went down in dothan, a few more tach failures in BWS, and a sweet bird strike. Probably a few more things I'm forgetting too.

crash · June 4, 2016

Oh yeah! Y'all were crazy unlucky! Although if that bird strike had been 8inches higher... goodnight! I've got some good pictures of that. I actually had an overspeed/engine split on short final twice... but it's not that big of a deal in the 72. Just the vartoms being weird. The n2 trim switch fixed it both times.

StockTrader · June 4, 2016

Oh yeah! Y'all were crazy unlucky! Although if that bird strike had been 8inches higher... goodnight! I've got some good pictures of that. I actually had an overspeed/engine split on short final twice... but it's not that big of a deal in the 72. Just the vartoms being weird. The n2 trim switch fixed it both times.

Ever have a day where you know its just not gonna end well? Yea, we had a day where it was like 600-700ft ceilings with storms rolling in quick and we were assigned aircraft 666. Me, my stick buddy, and IP all looked at each other like "yea i think we're gonna sit this one out". About 3/4 of the class went out that day with no issues. The next day we saw 666 getting towed off the flight line as we were running up lol.

Lindsey · June 4, 2016

Lol i wish that was the case with us. We were the 67 class right before you. We had a couple tach failures, an underspeed when on final at cairns, the helo that went down in dothan, a few more tach failures in BWS, and a sweet bird strike. Probably a few more things I'm forgetting too.

Whatever happened with everyone on that one with the engine failure?

StockTrader · June 4, 2016

Whatever happened with everyone on that one with the engine failure?

Everything turned out as good as it could have for them thank god. They are back and should be flying again shortly.

ElJay · June 4, 2016

Glad you went Lakota or wish you'd have chosen the 67?

Lindsey · June 4, 2016

Everything turned out as good as it could have for them thank god. They are back and should be flying again shortly.

Good to hear.

Creep0321 · June 4, 2016

Glad I went lakota.

MichaelRyanSD · June 4, 2016

3rd Lakota class here....glad I went Lakota's....

cwil7280 · June 4, 2016

So I'm curious, with the rigid rotor system in the 72 what are your actual slope limitations? If I remember right the 67 could only do like 8 degrees but anything over 5 was getting sketchy.

SBuzzkill · June 4, 2016

Sketchy? Maybe for a ham fist... You gotta make love to those young birds.

Edited June 4, 2016 by SBuzzkill

cwil7280 · June 4, 2016

Haha that's out of the -10. It was something like "caution should be used on slopes greater than 5 degrees since loading, rigging, terrain, light winds, and no balls can decrease slope landing capability" I don't know if that's verbatim though, it's been a while since I've studied 67 stuff.

Creep0321 · June 4, 2016

11 degrees down left, 6 degrees down right, 8 degrees nose up or down(if terrain allows).

crash · June 4, 2016

Slopes in the 72 are kind of nice. The mast moment indicator shows the exact amount of deflection of the cyclic while you are setting it down, so you can pre-load it to the exact same spot when picking it up. I think I hit the limits or pretty close to in all the directions and it felt really stable... so I don't know if those limits are in place for rollover or for mast moment limits as I think you would hit a limit there before actually exceeding any of those slope angles.

Creep0321 · June 4, 2016

Agreed, I've been at 45% MM on like a 7 degrees down left slope. So the Mast Moment really seems to be the limiting factor.

akscott60 · June 6, 2016

Awww, slope limits. What are those?

CharyouTree · June 6, 2016

Awww, slope limits. What are those?

I think that's like... the max a runway can slope up/down, before it increases your takeoff/landing distances beyond your required distance? (I've never actually calculated for runway slope. Hasn't been that close, yet...)

Edited June 6, 2016 by CharyouTree

01CelicaGTS · July 6, 2016

From what I understand, the new system that replaced Primary, Instruments and BWS progresses as follows:

Basic Rotary Wing Skills (BRWS) - 6 weeks

Basic Instrument Skills (BIS?) - 4 weeks all in the sim

Advanced RW and Instruments (ARWS) - 4 weeks

Basic Tactical Navigation (BTN) - 2 weeks

Day and Night Warfighter Skills - 4 weeks

If that's correct, what does ARWS look like? Is it mostly IFR stuff with a few more advanced VFR maneuvers thrown in. Or do you plan VFR cross country flights as well as IFR?

Creep0321 · July 6, 2016

Mostly IFR cross country flights, 2 days VFR cross country, 2 days Composite, 3 days at the stage field doing EP's, one day doing left seat EP's. Checkride consists of ITO, unusual attitude recovery, precision approach and supposed to be one EP, although my IP had me do almost an entire primary checkride, I think I did 5 traffic patterns at Eufaula.