SHAH ALAM: BASED on the pictures posted on Pulatibang 2 official Facebook page, it appears that it had qualified the last pilots on the Alouette III helicopters. It is also likely that the next batch of rotary pilots to get their wings will complete their training on the Airbus Helicopters H120/EC120 Colibri helicopters.
From the FB page, we can discerned that at least two EC120s are already stationed at the Pulatibang 2 located at the Kolej Tentera Udara at Kepala Batas, Kedah. The unit has also qualified its instructors on the EC120 helicopters which are leased from Gading Kasturi Sdn Bhd.
According to the company website, Gading will provide total engineering & logistics support to five Airbus EC120B helicopter and one EC 120B simulator through Company Own Military Operates (COMO) concept for its basic helicopter flying school. The program also involves in house upgrading of the EC120B to fully glass cockpit and NVIS.
The H120/EC120 helicopters are supplied by Gading under a RM120 million PFI deal.
I have been trying to get official confirmation on the developments at Pulatibang 2 but so far nothing yet. Perhaps the Alouettes will only be retired once all the trainee pilots that had started their basic flight training on the aircraft are graduated.
But its likely that the latest batch of trainee pilots for the rotary wing will start their flight training on the EC120s.
— Malaysian Defence
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View Comments (18)
The Allouete is a truly magnificent piece of engineering and has served the RMAF well. It's all mechanical system means that we can still fly it for the next 50 years, if we want to. The use of all mechanical aircraft is outmoded with the introduction of FADEC system, but come to think of it, the newer electronic-controlled aircraft of fly by wire will have issues with aging and support. Only time can tell. Good bye Alleoute.
Better retire that old helicopter and donate it to some museum. The maintenance cost must be pretty high so its more cost effective to operate new helicopter.
Alouette is as simple a helicopter that you could get. Old does not automatically mean more expensive (just more things to do, put greases regularly for example). Even the french navy still uses Alouette on its nuclear carrier
The indian armed forces also still uses it and if i am not mistaken they also license manyfactured it as the cheetak. But if we can get a better ones without costing an arm and a leg,why not
Should we transfer them to ESSCOM? Sure it's old but if we can still squeeze it at least until the MD550s are delivered
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Unfortunately only the instructors and the newly qualified pilots are rated to fly the Alouettes. So it will not be practical to send them elsewhere
Since all our operational helicopters will eventually have glass cockpits, digital flight and engine controls, it is only appropriate that pilots are exposed these early.
On the Alou you only learn the fundamentals of helicopter flight, which is important but costs pilots a lot of time relearning when they reach the squadrons.
For the same reason advanced jet trainers are updated to have the same systems as operational fighters.
In general; as things get older, they become more expensive to run as more checks have to be made and stuff wears out faster. The Alo 3 is a great helicopter which has served us well but it's high time a newer helicopter [with amongst others, a more up to date cockpit and one that is NVG compatible] is introduced to better provide basic rotary training.
kamal,
We've bought parts from HAL in the past; parts HAL makes for the Chetak.
Yes for training new pilots, i believe the Alouette value for training has passed and new helicopters like the ec120 is needed for students to be exposed to all the latest technologies earlier.
Get the Alloutte III and turned em' to ersatz gunship..We've done it in 1980s with Aloutte with 20mm guns Rhodesia style.. So why not do the same thing today? We've expertise to maintained and repaired the Aloutte III for years..It didn't hurt a budget if this bird got upgraded and uparmed.
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Yes it could be done even much cheaper than buying the Little Birds. But then there are also many arguments against it. Anyhow based on my recollection of reading about the Alouette gunships on the XNuri pilot blog much of the expertise are already lost and forgotten.
The third, or should we say the first EC120 is not shown in the picture because it does not look nice in the picture.
Zaidi,
"It’s all mechanical system means that we can still fly it for the next 50 years"
soooooooo not true.
"the newer electronic-controlled aircraft of fly by wire will have issues with aging and support"
...,
If you want simple, Robinson is what you looking for. Practically a rubber band turn takecopter.
Its not FBW and it was only mod-ed with glass cockpit locally.