The Bell 427 is powered by two Pratt & Whitney Canada PW207D turboshaft engines with FADEC . Like the Bell 407, the 427 uses a 4-blade main rotor system with a rigid, composite rotor hub and a 2-blade tail rotor.
32.
*1944 Sole Platt-LePage XR-1A helicopter, 42-6581, is damaged in an accident at Wright Field, Ohio, due to the failure of a pinion bearing support in the starboard rotor hub and is shipped back to the manufacturer.
33.
In 2012, AgustaWestland stated that they were planning to produce the AW169 in their facilities in Yeovil, England; the design and manufacture of various components such as the rotor blades, intermediate and tail gearboxes, and tail rotor hub has been performed by AgustaWestland's UK branch.
34.
On 22 January 2010, Sikorsky Aircraft opened a $ 20 million Precision Components Technology Center in Stratford, Connecticut which will focus on production of the CH-53K . This facility will produce the rotating and stationary swashplates, main and tail rotor hubs, and main rotor sleeves among other parts.
35.
Following a cross-country flight to Wright Field in Ohio from Platt-LePage's Pennsylvania plant, testing of the XR-1A continued until a mechanical failure in the rotor hub led to a crash landing on 26 October 1944, the company deciding to sell the wreckage for scrap.
36.
Today, on most modern aircraft the swashplate is above the transmission and the pushrods are visible outside the fuselage, but a few early designs, notably light helicopters built by Enstrom Helicopter, placed it underneath the transmission and enclosed the rotating pushrods inside the mainshaft . This reduces rotor hub drag since there are no exposed linkages.
37.
The " SpeedHawk " aircraft includes an SPU ( third engine ), high forward-swept wing concept, a 45-inch " fuselage plug " cabin extension, and several other drag reducing and performance-oriented improvements, including a rotor hub fairing, landing gear streamlining, and a fly-by-wire flight control system.
38.
An attempt was to be made in April 1949 to set a 62 mi ( 100 km ) closed-circuit record, but two days before the date selected a poorly machined flapping link in the rotor hub failed during flight and resulted in the crash of the aircraft at Ufton, near Reading, killing the pilot, Foster H . Dixon and observer, Derek Garraway.
39.
*1950 AFirst of two RAF Cierva W . 11 Air Horse helicopters, VZ724, G-ALCV, ( at the time, the largest helicopter type flown ), breaks up in flight and crashes due to fatigue failure of a swashplate carrier driving link in the front rotor hub, killing all three crew : Ministry of Supply chief helicopter test pilot Squadron Leader F . J . " Jeep " Cable, Cierva's Chief Test Pilot Alan Marsh and flight test engineer Joseph K . Unsworth.
