Bell Helicopter and Cessna will open a combined sales and service center later this year at Seletar Aerospace Park in Singapore. The facility will handle business jet and helicopter MRO, marking the Textron companies’ first factory-owned service center in Asia-Pacific. The 48,700-sq.-meter (160,000-sq.-ft.) complex of hangar, office, storage and maintenance space will employ 90 technicians and office workers when fully operational.
Any remaining doubts over whether the recovery in the civil helicopter market is for real were dispelled in a whirl of record orders, new product announcements and building backlogs at this year’s Heli-Expo. As if to underscore the rising tide of optimism, the show itself was busy, with attendance topping 19,200, eclipsing 2008’s record of almost 18,000. More than 650 exhibitors covered nearly 1 million sq. ft. of floor space; manufacturers brought in 60 helicopters for the show.
Jet Aviation is expanding its operation at Singapore’s Seletar Aerospace Park. The company’s second hangar is in its conceptual phase and will be built on land adjacent to its existing FBO/MRO facility. “We’ll probably get our final specification for the 4,000-6,000-sq.-meter hangar development sometime after the Singapore air show, around March, and be operational by the fourth quarter of 2013,” says Christof Späth, Jet Aviation EMEA and Asia senior vice president of MRO and FBO services.
Eurocopter later this year will begin delivery of its next generation EC-130 T2 that will sport a new engine and almost a completely new airframe from its EC-130 predecessor.
Bombardier is making big investments in China, both in rail – it’s teaming with in-country manufacturers to develop a 280 kph train – and aviation, since AVIC is supplying fuselages for both the Q400 turboprop and new CSeries airliner. However, company President & CEO Pierre Beaudoin said last week that the Canadian manufacturer will not be partnering with Chinese entities to build or develop a business jet there. “We have no intention of doing that,” Beaudoin told reporters at a Wings Club luncheon in New York, ending speculation about such a possibility.
Cessna recently boosted the expected range for its new Citation Latitude midsize aircraft by 15% to 2,300 nm. Initially targeted for 2,000 nm, the range adds a number of additional city-pairs to the nonstop capability, such as between Singapore and Shanghai, Perth and Mumbai. Unveiled during the October National Business Aviation Association annual meeting, the Latitude is scheduled for first flight in mid-2014 and certification a year later. The aircraft is designed with the widest passenger cabin in the Cessna fleet and with stand-up access.
Greenwich AeroGroup’s Summit Aviation reached a long-term agreement with Sikorsky Global Helicopters to manufacture, assemble and test transmissions for new production Schweizer 300 CTM aircraft. The agreement also covers aftermarket support. The accord expands the ongoing partnership between Sikorsky and Summit, which has built subassemblies for the Schweizer 333 for the past five years. The agreement is valued at about $5 million. The work will be completed at Summit Aviation’s Middletown, Del., facility.
Sikorsky’s Composite Technology Inc. (CTI) unit last week officially opened a new $15 million facility dedicated to composite rotor blade services. The facility houses a bidirectional whirl tower that will test main rotor blades that rotate either clockwise or counterclockwise. The balance stand is able to test blades of all sizes and rotational speeds. The whirl tower is powered by two 3,000 shp variable frequency drive induction motors for rotation of three blades – two test blades and a precision-balanced master blade – in either direction. The tower’s 6,000-lb.
Global deliveries of new civilian-use helicopters will increase to 4,700-5,200 through 2016, Honeywell predicts in its 14th Turbine-Powered Civil Helicopter Purchase Outlook report released at Heli-Expo 2012. Recent order momentum and strong purchase plans for 2012 bolster the near-term outlook, despite lingering tight credit conditions and significant inventories of used current production models for sale which continue to shadow the industry.
The Royal Aeronautical Society’s Washington chapter will hold its annual general meeting March 8 in Washington, D.C. Flight Safety Foundation President and CEO William Voss will address the meeting. He also will be presented with an award during the event.
BOMBARDIER Challenger 300 airplanes [Docket No. FAA-2011-1089; Directorate Identifier 2011-NM-110-AD] – revises an earlier proposed AD that would require an inspection to determine if a certain oxygen cylinder and regulator assembly (CRA) is installed and the replacement of affected oxygen CRAs. That proposal was prompted by reports of deformation found at the neck of the pressure regulator body on the oxygen CRA. This action revises the compliance times.
Piper Aircraft named Eagle South America S.A. as a distributor for its new airplane sales in Chile. Eagle South America is located near Santiago at the Aérodromo de Chicureo and headed by General Manager Martin Andrés Busquets.
Embraer and Avic would extend their cooperation in business jets to sales and service if Beijing approves a proposal to build Legacy 650s in Harbin. Approval should come in the first half of this year, says Ernest Edwards, president of Embraer Executive Jets.
Bell delivered its first 407GX to Toluca, Mexico operator Avemex. Announced during the 2011 Heli-Expo, the 407GX incorporates the Garmin 1000HTM integrated glass flight deck, including two 10.4-in., high-resolution LCD displays, synthetic vision and a terrain avoidance warning system. Avemex, which has operating Bell 407 helicopters for nine years, will use its new 407GX for executive transport.
CHAD LEEWARD has joined Socata North America as a sales director. Leeward will be responsible for sales of the TBM 850 single-turboprop in Florida. Leeward, a third-generation pilot in the family that developed Leeward Air Ranch, has more than 20 years of flying experience and 12 years of corporate aircraft sales experience with companies that include Pilatus Aircraft and Cirrus Aircraft.
Jet Aviation Hong Kong has received FAA approval to service Dassault Falcon 900 LX/DX/EASy, Falcon 7X and Falcon 2000EX aircraft. The approvals follow similar authorization granted by the European Aviation Safety Agency. Jet Aviation Hong Kong is an authorized Dassault Falcon line service center and is the closest base outside of mainland China for the Dassault services. The facility houses a nearly 100,000-sq.-ft. hangar and holds repair station approvals from FAA, Hong Kong and China, as well as maintenance approvals from a number of other authorities.
BOMBARDIER Model CL-600-2C10 (Regional Jet Series 700, 701 & 702), CL-600-2D15 (Regional Jet Series 705) and CL-600-2D24 (Regional Jet Series 900) airplanes. [Docket No.
Helicopter Association International President Matt Zuccaro is appealing to FAA to take action to “remove people who shouldn’t be in the air.” During a “Meet the Regulators” session at last week’s Heli-Expo in Dallas, Zuccaro notes that some companies operate at unacceptable safety levels, but their actions get the most attention and hurt the entire industry. He concedes that it may be strange for a community to ask for more enforcement, but he notes that the industry must deal with the fallout of operators flying with thin safety margins.
JetCorp Technical Services, a St. Louis-based subsidiary of Flying Colours Corp., has received supplemental type certification for installation of the Aircell Cabin Telecommunications Router (CTR) on a Learjet 60. The CTR provides Wi-Fi capability using the Aircell Gogo Biz inflight Internet service. The system can be used on laptops, tablets and smart phones. JetCorp has completed the first two installations and has five more in the pipeline.
Gulfstream Aerospace donated $50,000 to the Corporate Angel Network (CAN), a charitable organization that arranges free flights to treatment for cancer patients using empty seats aboard corporate jets. Gulfstream was one of the first corporate flight departments to join as a CAN participant in 1982. Joe Lombardo, executive vice president, aerospace for Gulfstream parent General Dynamics, serves on the CAN board of directors. CAN has facilitated the transport of nearly 40,000 patients over the last 30 years.
CHRIS BOTT has joined PATS Aircraft Systems as certification manager. Bott will oversee certification efforts for PATS and Hollingsead International-designed and manufactured products. He is an FAA designated engineering representative with more than 35 years of aviation experience.
The U.S. Export-Import Bank is vowing to better facilitate sales of business aircraft and helicopters, after a long period in which commercial aircraft were at the forefront. The “golden age” of Ex-Im’s support of commercial aircraft is over, but “the golden age for export credit for business aircraft and helicopters is ahead,” says Ex-Im’s vice president for transport, Bob Morin. Last year, Ex-Im provided $11.75 billion in aviation-related financing support, $11.5 billion for commercial aircraft and the rest for business aircraft and helicopters.
