a few years have passed since it entered service and what say ye?
great looking helicopter but seems to be plagued with ongoing teething issues, improper layout placements, and high costs seemingly make it seem that the Blackhawks, Hips, and Merlins to be a better value for operators.
By: halloweene - 31st May 2018 at 11:18
One has to admit one thing : NH industries is (was?) making a very poor job for maintenance.
By: Levsha - 29th May 2018 at 17:17
A Swedish news outlet says that they’ve read a classified report on the NH90 operating costs:
https://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/a…ya-helikoptrarThey say that the NH90’s that the Swedish Armed Forces have in service at present cost about 24 000 euros per flight hour to operate, six times (!) more than the UH-60’s that Sweden bought as an interim measure while waiting for the delayed NH90’s. So not only were they more expensive to acquire than planned, and delayed by many years (making the Swedish Armed Forces spend even more money acquiring UH-60’s, simply by necessity), they are also incredibly expensive to operate and each flight hour requires some 20 hours of maintenance.
They are allegedly considering to mothball them at this stage.
Firstly, I think it costs a lot more than 4,000 € per hour to operate the UH-60, where did they get that figure?
Secondly, Swedish SAR and ASW equipped NH90 is a very different beast from the Swedish UH-60M basic utility helicopter. Anti-submarine operations are a lot more expensive than just simply hauling troops and their equipment. How much more does the ASW suite on an airframe add to the cost of that airframe – around 50%?
By: Dr.Snufflebug - 29th May 2018 at 14:20
A Swedish news outlet says that they’ve read a classified report on the NH90 operating costs:
https://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/a/l10LQ9/skenande-kostnader-for-forsvarets-nya-helikoptrar
They say that the NH90’s that the Swedish Armed Forces have in service at present cost about 24 000 euros per flight hour to operate, six times (!) more than the UH-60’s that Sweden bought as an interim measure while waiting for the delayed NH90’s. So not only were they more expensive to acquire than planned, and delayed by many years (making the Swedish Armed Forces spend even more money acquiring UH-60’s, simply by necessity), they are also incredibly expensive to operate and each flight hour requires some 20 hours of maintenance.
They are allegedly considering to mothball them at this stage.
By: Levsha - 28th December 2017 at 20:10
It seems that the corrosion problems that the Dutch naval NH90s suffered from have been solved:
http://www.lieuwedevries.com/?page_id=2891#.WkVOvN-nGUl
You don’t really hear many problems about the NH90 today – I suppose they have ‘resolved’ many of the other problems it suffered. Germany has recently taken delivery of some new example recently.
By: Arabella-Cox - 28th December 2017 at 18:01
I seem to recall that the floor was too weak for certain loads (and damaged by guests in high heels at airshows), and the fuselage too delicate for austere landings- not so good for a battlefield utility helo….
By: Siddar - 28th December 2017 at 09:26
It had potential but was ultimately sabotaged by poor reliability and spares that cost to much.
Apaches had a similar problem but once US got involved in Iraq and Afghanistan in early 2000s they were fixed.
A similar transformation for NH90 is possible but unlikely given the bad taste the NH90 has left in all the customer mouth.
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December 28, 2017 at 6:22 am