Flying a Fishbowl

This is the face that launched a thousand helicopters — and many thousands after that. This is the Bell Model 47, which to much of the world is what a "real" helicopter looks like. Possibly, the reason for that strong association is because the Bell 47 was the first helicopter ever certified, receiving helicopter type certificate number one from the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA), predecessor to today's FAA, in May of 1946, two months before my Piper J-3 Cub was pushed off the assembly line. Since there were no regulations for the certification of helicopters at the time, the folks at Bell and the CAA literally wrote the rules as they flew the prototype through its test program.

Although many know the helicopter as the one that starred in the Whirlybirds television program of the 1960s or the M*A*S*H series of the 1970s, it's a whole lot more than just another pretty face. It's a workhorse, too. It literally created a large part of the helicopter industry through its role in offshore oil exploration, news gathering, medical transport, search and rescue, and police work. Knowing this, it's hard to believe that Bell's biggest challenge in the early days was helping people understand how a helicopter could ever be useful.

Sitting among a couple of Bell JetRangers and a trio of colorful new Bell 407s at Bell's Training Academy in Hurst, Texas, the little bubble-headed Bell looks angular and antiquated — perhaps a bit out of place — beside its smooth, svelte, New Age offspring, all smelling of jet fuel. The newer generation goes faster, climbs higher, and speaks in higher tones. But there are not many helicopter pilots alive who don't speak reverently when talking about the venerable Model 47. Its solid reputation was earned in more than 50 years of day-in, day-out service.

This Bell 47G-4A was built in 1967; it's the next-to-last model of the bubble-headed Bells, which remained in production until 1973. It belongs to Bell Helicopter and is everybody's favorite pet at the training academy, though it is only taken for infrequent, short walks by a couple of carefully chosen pilots at the school.

Flying the 47

Starting the 280-horsepower Lycoming VO-540 was not as easy as starting the turbine 407 the day before, reminding me of one of the wonderful things about turbines: their ease of starting. In fact, it took three attempts and a little starter life before Bell instructor Kevin Brandt finally found the right combination of air and gasoline to build a fire in the Lycoming.

When the engine finally coughed to life, it immediately filled the cockpit with that familiar sound many baby boomers will fondly recall from childhood, when they watched the Whirlybirds on black-and-white TV. It's a rich, full sound, followed quickly by the familiar whistle-swish of those 37-foot blades seemingly a foot or two above my head. The sound was markedly different than what I'd heard all week while attending 407 ground school at Bell, as countless turbine trainers came and went from the training academy ramp.

As the Model 47 shakes itself alive and the rotors stabilize at a lazy 160 rpm, we watch oil pressure, cylinder head temperature, and carb temperature rise. Every eye in the adjacent training academy pilot's lounge is watching us with envy.

As you climb away from the ramp the Earth seems to fall from your feet — much like an Omnimax movie, only with more vibration. I don't know how you could see any better out of any aircraft; the huge bubble makes you feel like you're flying a fishbowl — and you don't even have to change the water. It was hard to contain my grin as we slowly climbed over the trees south of the field.

The Model 47 is a little noisy and it vibrates more than newer ships, but it is a gentle one to fly. This one has hydraulically boosted controls, as the later ones did; the earlier ones had a lot more vibration and control feedback, according to Brandt. I began to feel comfortable in the helicopter after a couple of approaches and learned that the power required to slow the descent rate in the flare is more than I'm used to in the Schweizer 300C that I often fly. The Bell 47 is no speed demon, though; it seems quite content to amble along at about 70 to 75 mph, the better to view that red-tailed hawk in the trees just off our right. You can see why the helicopter became such a popular observer of traffic, city cop beats, late-breaking news, and football games. What a view!

Although some Bell 47 parts are becoming about as expensive as a JetRanger's, according to Bell mechanic Larry Hansen of Century Helicopters in Fort Collins, Colorado, the type will probably live forever. It now has its own fan club, a small but growing group of enthusiasts (about 286 members at last count) called the Bell 47 Helicopter Association ( www.bell47helicopterassociation.org).

The present

In the early 1960s Bell lost the competition for an Army observation helicopter to Hughes. Bell's losing design was called the OH-4, but that "loser" was given a nose job and a makeover by a New York design firm and it became one of the most popular helicopters of all time, the Bell Model 206 JetRanger.

The new design was first delivered in 1967, and it became as ubiquitous as Cessnas with high wings. An updated version of that successful design called the 407 debuted in 1995, with more power, a new four-blade composite rotor system, FADEC (full authority digital engine control), more fuel, and a wider cabin. It's a natural evolution of an already-mature helicopter.

When you sit down in the Bell 407 it becomes immediately obvious that this bird is in a different class than the Model 47. Comfortable seats, quiet cabin, doors that go "clunk" like an old Packard when you shut them, a panel of colorful, magical avionics, and that new-helicopter smell! We've come a long way in 50 years.

This impression continues as you crank the Rolls-Royce turbine and the FADEC monitors the temperatures, and a gazillion other parameters, to ensure a cool start. First liftoff in a 407 will make you think you are about to destroy the tail rotor. As you raise the collective, the nose rises first and the helicopter rocks back on the heels of the skids because of the 5-degree forward tilt of the main rotor mast. This can be a little disconcerting, but there's more than adequate clearance, instructor C. "Mac" McMillan assures me. Once the skids clear the ground you will probably overcontrol the helicopter at first, as nearly everyone does; the 407 has very sensitive controls with little control feedback. But smoothness (and your smile) comes naturally after a few hours of practice.

In cruise, that "sports car with power steering" feel continues in the 407; once you get used to the powerful responsiveness, the helicopter becomes a joy to fly. The composite four-blade rotor system moves the aircraft smoothly along at more than 130 knots (over twice the speed of the little bubble head). With seven seats and a useful load of more than 2,100 pounds, this helicopter is a very capable workhorse.

And talk about power! With 750 pounds of fuel (full fuel is 856 pounds), two pilots, and no baggage, temperature of 8 degrees Celsius, and 10 knots of wind, McMillan asked me to fly a maximum performance takeoff from Bell's practice area, shooting for a target of 90-percent torque. I smoothly raised the collective and the aircraft climbed away from Bell's practice strip at 1,800 fpm. I was well over our imaginary 100-foot obstacle when I transitioned to forward flight — and never did get all the way to McMillan's 90-percent target! Going up, anyone?

Although you can see the resemblance to the 35-year-old JetRanger design, the 407 looks modern and fresh. It's a beautiful helicopter — a practical, capable, mature design with impressive performance.

The future

Here is a glimpse of the future: It's an aircraft that combines the best attributes of airplanes and helicopters. It can fly faster than many turboprops — and hover. It's fly-by-wire, highly computerized, sophisticated, and high tech. But its roots reach all the way back to a time before the Model 47 was even certified. The Model 47's chief designer, Arthur Young, made a model of an aircraft called "Convert-O-Plane" that could hover like a helicopter, then convert to an airplane, long before Larry Bell met the designer in the early 1940s.

Bell's dream and design team also worked for years on the idea of an aircraft that could convert from airplane to helicopter. As the Korean conflict began to heat up in the early 1950s, the Army recognized the value of such a combination, too, and requested bids for several aircraft to test the idea. Bell offered its first "tiltrotor," called the XV-3, with a single Pratt & Whitney R-985 radial engine powering propellers at each wing tip. The design was similar to the current tiltrotor concept, but had many problems including cooling, and was a flop.

In the 50 years since those first tentative steps, Bell and a few other brave manufacturers have been trying to perfect this still-novel idea of a helicopter-airplane hybrid. It's a compelling idea — one that is long overdue. To the first company that conquers the not-insignificant design challenges come the rewards.

Bell Helicopter and Agusta Aerospace have collaborated on projects since 1952 and recently merged to form Bell/Agusta Aerospace Company (BAAC). The company's newest challenger, the Model BA609, at 16,800 lb gross weight, is about a third of the size of the only other flying tiltrotor, the Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey. The 609 is designed for the civilian market, not military use. It is roughly the size of a King Air 200 and cruises at about the same speed, 270 to 280 kt. But it will also land next to your Lexus in the company parking lot — or at distant offshore oil platforms. You can do that in your royal Beechcraft — once.

The two PT6C-67A Pratt & Whitney engines run independently and are connected through a common gearbox in the wing center section, allowing both twin-engine performance and single-engine hovering. Hydraulics are used to tilt the engines with a switch located at the end of an otherwise ordinary-looking collective at the pilot's left hip. It's a center-off, sliding switch that moves the nacelle horizontally with forward movement of the switch, and vertically as you slide the switch aft. The nacelle motion speed is fixed and slower than the V-22 Osprey for ease of flying.

The 609 prototype carved its first steps into the air in March of last year. But I flew the engineering simulator at Bell's main plant to sample the handling qualities of the new machine in December 2002. The software package in the simulator I flew was the very same as installed in the prototype aircraft.

Flying the tiltrotor

How does it fly? Stable, solid, and intuitive were words that immediately came to mind as I flew the simulator. I was very impressed. To my surprise, it's not a difficult aircraft to fly; in fact, it was easier to hover the tiltrotor than the 407 I had flown the day before.

I hovered a bit, then backed up by simply moving the nacelles 5 degrees aft of vertical, transitioned to high-speed flight by rotating the nacelles forward like an airplane, and then went back to hovering again. After 20 minutes of doing this several times I had one of those "aha!" moments: The ability to tilt the engines and vector the thrust of the two 26-foot-diameter rotors is nothing less than an additional flight control that I've never had before. You can actually control the fore-aft movement of the helicopter with engine nacelle angle alone.

Combining the qualities of helicopter and airplane opens up a whole new dimension to flying. I wondered how such a machine could mix it up with the big boys at a large metro airport and challenged myself to find out. As I flew across the outer marker at 180 kt, I translated the nacelles from horizontal to vertical, from airplane to helicopter mode, while maintaining the glideslope. At the threshold, flying at about 20 kt, I broke off the approach and hover-taxied over to the ramp for landing. Now, that's a lot of capability!

As with the original cadre of helicopters, future operators probably will have to learn how tiltrotors can work for them, much like the early days of the helicopter when Bell had to teach people what helicopters were for.

To fly this unique combination of machinery, pilots first will be required to be both helicopter- and fixed-wing-rated. An additional rating, called powered-lift, with a type rating in the Bell/Agusta 609 also will be necessary to command the tiltrotor. Bell/Agusta is in the process of creating a training program for pilots that will be as unique as the ways that this machine can fly. Pilots should understand that the 609 is actually three different machines: a very capable twin-engine helicopter, a speedy turboprop, and something quite different than either of those two — a hybrid aircraft called a tiltrotor. Bring three hats — and three complete mindsets — to fly it.

All this capability and technology comes at a price: about $10 million in 1996 dollars. That means somewhere north of $12 million of the greenbacks that you carry in your wallet today. This amazing machine is slated for certification in 2007.

Michael Maya Charles, AOPA 1082652, of Erie, Colorado, is a DC-10 captain. He instructs in Schweizer 300s in Colorado.

The Evolution of Helicopter Training

During my weeklong visit to Bell's Training Academy in Hurst, Texas, I was struck by the evolution in training that has occurred in the years since the Bell 47 was introduced. My first clue came when I received the flight manual before flying the Bell 47. It is a scant 35 pages and doesn't go into depth on much of anything.

Conversely, the Bell 407's book, now called a pilot's operating handbook (POH), is almost three inches thick. And there's a separate inch-thick training manual for the Bell 407 that takes a week to cover in ground school; there is no training manual for the Bell 47.

In the early days of the Bell 47, you read the skimpy flight manual, climbed in with someone who'd flown one before, and flailed around for an hour or two until you convinced the instructor that it was safe to sign you off for solo. Those days are long gone.

Nowadays, insurance companies require that you attend a factory school like the one I attended on the Bell 407 in December 2002. At that school, I was treated to a wonderful classroom presentation by David Fox, a pilot-mechanic who owned a Bell maintenance shop for years. His presentation was complete with modern audiovisuals, lots of parts to show how things looked and worked, and years of insight gained by fixing things that break in the real world. His experience was priceless.

Bell integrates this valuable classroom time with a fixed-base, visual computer simulator called a flight training device (FTD) to allow students to practice engine starts and systems malfunctions without buying expensive turbine engines or putting your derrière in danger. You can sit in it for hours, reading checklists and performing the correct motions until you get it right.

Right down the hall from our classroom, a hangar full of helicopters and helicopter parts offered an opportunity to get "hands on" with parts and pieces. Since the helicopters are all partially disassembled, they brought the ground school drawings and discussions to life.

Next door to Bell's Training Academy is FlightSafety International, with visual non-motion and full-motion simulators. I sampled their full-motion twin-engine Bell 430 simulator with Woody Woodruff, director of pilot training, and found it every bit as realistic and instructive as the airline sims in which I regularly practice. The visuals are bright and clear, and the controls are programmed to feel like the real thing. Pilots who "fly" these simulators feel quite comfortable — and have a much better safety record — when they flap off on their own in the real thing.

Future training for the Bell/Agusta 609 Tiltrotor probably will be even more high tech and advanced than the simulator I sampled during my visit. It's exciting to think that the hardware and software for this machine are probably not yet invented, but they will train the next generation of hover-lovers and more effectively prepare pilots for the challenges of tiltrotor flying.

The evolving capabilities of the helicopter require unique training, too. I spent an enjoyable evening with C. "Mac" McMillan flying a Bell JetRanger modified for NVG (night vision goggles). No longer just the expensive tools of our military, goggles are becoming increasingly common in police units, emergency medical services, and electronic news gathering. Bell has taken the lead by developing an FAA-approved course of instruction in the use of these magical tools so that operators are well trained and competent.

I made my first goggles landing on an elevated platform called Vertiport, in downtown Dallas — my first on a downtown heliport, and in a helicopter I wasn't too familiar with. The approach and landing went well until the final couple of feet, when I really started missing visual clues because of the restricted field of vision of the goggles. Keeping my head moving was the secret to increasing my comfort and adding badly needed visual cues. I can see that pilots wouldn't want to give up these magic lenses once they learn how to use them.

We returned for landing at Bell's private practice area, and I was amazed to spot a skunk near the runway edge — I could see it clearly! That's pretty amazing to be able to distinguish a mostly black animal on a dark runway in total darkness. Makes you wonder if it could see us as well as we could see it.

The final exam was to fly a particularly dark, unlighted, two-rut pathway called the River Run at 100 knots — just below treetop height. I was quite comfortable with the view through my goggles and the rotor clearance — until McMillan asked me to lift my goggles. I was stunned that I could see nothing! Instant blackness. McMillan continued to fly the aircraft with his goggles and then gave me back the aircraft once I replaced my goggles. OK, I'll take the goggles, please.

As our machinery has become more complicated and computerized, so has the need for machines such as full-motion visual simulators, FTDs, and computerized classrooms. The more senses with which we experience learning, the more effective and lasting it becomes. Bell understands that and creates training programs that mirror the increasing sophistication and evolution of the helicopter. — MMC