The Bae 146 is the future

[telecat]

Of US fire fighting!!!!

seems it's the ideal plane to replace the Very ageing and crashing US Wildfire fighting P2V's and P4's. I always liked them and it looks like the design could well live on for a number of years.

[Eric Mc]

How robust are the airframes for this type of fairly high stress flying?

[telecat]

Looks like they are holding up very well. At Least two of them have been operating for over a year. The Operators like the speed which allows them to land load up and turn round quickly. The Lowered pressured though the Under carriage on Ramps and taxi ways is also appreciated by most operators.

In the air it's "Proven jet reliability, Low speed manoeuvrability, Great airfield performance, Superior steep approach capabilities, Excellent initial attack range and speed and it's Small noise footprint" seem to have convinced the Americans.

[Eric Mc]

Hmm - I wonder.

The aircraft was designed as an airliner - which is a fairly low stress life for an aircraft.

Bumbling around at a couple of hundred feet and pulling steep climbs out of wooded valleys etc may not be what the designers at Hatfield were thinking back in 1972/73 when the aeroplane was on the drawing board.

[Fishtigua]

This is a good link to it's abilities.

http://www.mindenair.net/minden/BAE-146.html

[Eric Mc]

They won't be biased, obviously.

[mattdaniels]

Eric Mc said:

The aircraft was designed as an airliner

...for operation into short rough strips, I thought? Which is why they created a high wing design and a robust gear.

[topsparks]

As long as they keep Charlie boy away from the controls I'm sure they will be a great success !

[Mojocvh]

Seems it's always the crews that have to fly demanding profiles in airframes that were never designed for it....

Go look at the accident stats for the federal airborne fire-fighting service [sic] it's pretty horrific.

the reason the wings came off that Herc was the fatigue profile of the firefighting missions was far removed from those that the fatigue life was calculated from, the accumulation of wing box stress was never anticipated...

[eccles]

Mojocvh said:

the reason the wings came off that Herc was the fatigue profile of the firefighting missions was far removed from those that the fatigue life was calculated from, the accumulation of wing box stress was never anticipated...

No it wasn't.
Where the centre wing broke was a known stress point, and that aircraft hadn't been modified to the latest standard.
Whilst the fire fighting missions may have accelerated the break, it could have happened in a 'normal' flight profile.

[eccles]

mattdaniels said:

Eric Mc said:

The aircraft was designed as an airliner

...for operation into short rough strips, I thought? Which is why they created a high wing design and a robust gear.

I can't see how having a stronger undercarriage and associated structure makes an airliner suitable for higher stress low level operations......?

[Eric Mc]

I never thought the 146 was designed for rough strips. They do indeed have STOL capabilities - with the intention that they could be used on shorter runways and at airports that needed steeper approaches.

BAe did try and market a military freighter version in the mid 1980s - which no air force took up.

[mph1977]

Eric Mc said:

I never thought the 146 was designed for rough strips. They do indeed have STOL capabilities - with the intention that they could be used on shorter runways and at airports that needed steeper approaches.

BAe did try and market a military freighter version in the mid 1980s - which no air force took up.

but has become a renewed interest with the RAF picking up acouple of secondhand QCs as a UOR as noted in the Chinese C17 thread

[mph1977]

eccles said:

mattdaniels said:

Eric Mc said:

The aircraft was designed as an airliner

...for operation into short rough strips, I thought? Which is why they created a high wing design and a robust gear.

I can't see how having a stronger undercarriage and associated structure makes an airliner suitable for higher stress low level operations......?

as a STOL aircraft it can fly much steeper approaches and landings than other aircraft - it's one of the limited numbers of types that can fly into and out of London City for example.

the steep approach angles and the higher power required for short take offs means it;s built stronger overall as does having rough field undercarriage ...

the 4 engine arrangement has safety benefits ...

the high-wing is for STOL performance primarily although it has benefits for rough field in terms of reduced FOD risk ( compared to a turbofan 737 for example which has to have oval shaped engines with the minimum of ancillaries around the 'bottom' of the engine to allow some ground clearance)

[mattdaniels]

Eric Mc said:

I never thought the 146 was designed for rough strips.

Set your Sky+ box to record "Flight Deck" the next time they show the Avro RJ100 episode on Discovery Wings. It includes a short piece on the history of the 146, and how its designed to cope with non tarmac strips and how the high wing design reduces FOD damage to the engines. Gives the overall impression of quite a robust little aircraft.

[Eric Mc]

mph1977 said:

Eric Mc said:

I never thought the 146 was designed for rough strips. They do indeed have STOL capabilities - with the intention that they could be used on shorter runways and at airports that needed steeper approaches.

BAe did try and market a military freighter version in the mid 1980s - which no air force took up.

but has become a renewed interest with the RAF picking up acouple of secondhand QCs as a UOR as noted in the Chinese C17 thread

And will they be flying them into rough, unprepared airstrips - the kind of airstrips that a Hercules or even a C-17 is specifically designed to be able to use?

I was always a fan of the 146 and had a number of flights in them. And I always thought that BAe failed miserably in developing and marketing the aircraft properly.

But I do think that second hand ex-airliner 146s, unless they have been properly modified and beefed up for tasks such as firefighting and tactical rough field military missions, may not be the as robust as they need to be.

[telecat]

Hi Eric, Looking at the 146 and the RJ and RJX variants they are designed to "take" a high volume of take off's and landings into small, even undersized airports and "semi" rough strips. I also felt the aircraft was under sold by BAE at the time. It certainly is capable airframe and could be configured with different engines for different roles. A twin jet variant could give Boeing a rough time in the 737 market for example. It did find itself Squeezed between markets but the expansion of roles would have meant it would be a "peg" that fitted many holes.

[Eric Mc]

BAe lost interest in the civil market completely and more or less abandoned the 146 and the 125 biz jet. I always thought it was tantamount to criminal negligence by the board at that time. They thought that defence work would be far more lucrative - typical UK big business short termism at its worst.

It would be nice to see the 146 have an extended life in other roles - partly to show BAe what a bunch of muppets they were 15 or so years ago.

[Fishtigua]

My old boss wanted to order a 146 as a bizz jet, he wanted to buy British, but was treated quite poorly by the company. It put him off buying for good and he only chartered after that experience.

[ExiledTaff]

The 146 still makes a good biz jet!
G-MIMA is an ex Manx aircraft, converted a few years ago.