Why The 407 Is The Superior Aircraft

[Sisyphus]

The AStar is, and its important that there be no doubt about the import of this, that we are all perfectly clear on the meaning, that the case is stated with great clarity and precision, the AStar is a big fat cow.

 

Now the 407 on the other hand, my god that thing goes. You pull, she answers. If you are not careful, she will exceed Vne with green power. Load her to the max. She'll take it all and she'll take it all the way up. High as you want to go. So high it'll blow your pants off. I'm telling you, she's a screamer.

 

Instantanious resonse with the FADEC. What a treat. No silly little levers on the floor, on the friggin' floor for cryin' out loud, where skiers snag them and ya gotta build a guard or some stupid thing. The throttle is on the collective where it belongs.

 

The fuel rides low in the airframe instead of in a great ugly tank half way up the vertical axis, where the fuel sloshes around and makes the whole sorry thing go through the air like a corkscrew. The pilot sits behind the front of the skids, which actually sit more or less level rather than one low. What a pain in the *** that is. Landing the Edsel is like trying to land diving board.

 

The airframe is narrow and short. The rotor diameter is small. The tail rotor is closely coupled to the centre of gravity and responds promptly. The visibility is fabulous especially with the door off. You can lean all the way out and even look behind you if you want. You can't even see in front of you in the Edsel. Its got that big mother of an instrument panel and half of it is blank and geez its ugly. You can actually long line out of a 407. Wait until I get my hands on the phantom from the depths of **** that invented that stupid window.

 

Press a button, the **** thing starts. Want to know if those pesky pilots have been reefing on your beautiful machine? No problem. And the properly illuminated gauges are big enough to read as opposed to those little tiny wrist watch things with goofy fibre optic what ever the **** it is. And real man switches instead those square punchy things. My god they're ridiculous.

 

If it rolls over you stand a chance with that bulk head but the Edsel is just a big hollow coffee can. Hydraulics? We won't even go there.

 

You can get seven passengers in a 407. For about the same amount of cash to buy, you just increased your revenue by 17%. Got a technical problem? Call this number. Someone will show up in a few hours instead of god knows when. Ever tried to read the Edsel's flight manual? Ever tried to figure out one of those weight and balance thingies? You'd think it was written in another language.

 

One thing though, you stretch right out in the back of the Edsel and have a snooze.

[4961]

Ho hum.

[picapart]

been awhile since i've seen this discussion about 350's vs 407 ( like 10 months).

[cap]

#### ------ may I humbly suggest that some of that "market share", perhaps has something to do with easier financing at Eurocopter. There's a whole host of reasons why a product will capture a majority of any market and it's not always because of the performance of that product, although it is a factor.

[arctic_front]

I'm on my way to NLC for an AS350 course next month.....I still prefer my 205.....never had the pleasure of working on a 407...but definitely like a Bell product over anything eurocopter....so far.

[Phil Croucher]

hey Cap - you must have bought betamax too!

 

Phil

[cap]

Albert -----VHS my man!....in '78 no less. Considering what you're flying I'll consider you biased on this subject.....besides, you got two "stoves".

[Phil Croucher]

You're up early! I never did betamax, but I've still got all these laserdics......

 

We only need the two stoves for when we go over cities or water - otherwise, I'd be happy to replace some of our machines with the 407.

 

To be fair, each has cheesy bits that could have been designed better, but aside from being able to put 8' poles across the cabin and stretching out in the back seat, I think the 407 has the definite edge - for our purposes, being able to look out better would be the deciding factor, but it is fast and there can't be many helicopters that have to be restricted to 2000 fpm ROC at MAUW! Not only that, I have never really been happy with the Eurocopter corporate attitude.

 

Phil

[matador]

Sorry to bother, but......

How come you compare apples with oranges ? or when you talk about AS 350 you're actually talking about the B3?? because if that is the case, the issue about power looses the point. The B3 is actually more powerfull that the 407 in some like 100 kgs. which is a lot, and talking about cockpit instruments... you can harly beat the simple FLI that allowes you to forget about everything else realated to performance, and boy ... that instrument is BIG and easy to take a look at.

Just my two cents, of course is only MHO.

Buen vuelo :up:

[Phil Croucher]

I'm not saying that one is better than the other necessarily - it all depends on the job, really - we do powerlines and need as much visibility as possible, including when slinging. I've not flown a B3, but I'll bet you won't see so much from that either! Straight power is not the issue, as we hardly ever go to all up weight - we need the ability to get out of some of the strange valleys over here, which includes engine and control response as well. Overall the 407 would be the better choice for us to replace our tired old jetboxes with. One main difference would be the external noise at low level

 

 

Phil