Andover What-If Idea

[Dave Homewood]

I was thinking, our RNZAF Andovers were extremely awesome and capable transport aircraft, and when they retired they left a big gap in the RNZAF's capability in my opinion. So I was thinking, imagine if rather than retiring the fleet in 1996, they'd instead have put them through a life-extension programme and an upgrade that gave them glass cockpits. And the tactical ones were rolled out of the programme in the modern overall grey colour scheme that all the other RNZAF operational types now have. They'd have been really neat looking.

[camtech]

Dave, I agree that a life extension programme with glass cockpit could have given a very capable aircraft another few years. One of the issues was some of the other major components - undercarriage, engines for example. The costs of maintaining/servicing these specific to Andover items I guess would have been extremely expensive. I am slightly biased, but the Andover is one of my favourite aircraft.

[Dave Homewood]

Yes I guess with so few having been built and most of them no longer flying by that time, the parts support was not east or cheap.

[shorty]

The other problem was that the Darts were old technology.

[tbf2504]

As CAMTECH says the major reason for retiring the Andovers was the horrendous cost that Dowty wanted to remake new undercarriage legs which were needed because of the state of the existing ones
running out of life. If I can recall correctly from my days in Air Staff when this was discussed, the cost for four sets was more than the total cost of purchasing the 10 Andovers in the first place.
And as Shorty states the Darts were old technology with the inherent problems of maintaining and obtaining critical spares.

[Bruce]

Could put PW126 Engines on them as with the BAe ATP...

[baronbeeza]

Some of the Andovers went to Africa.
Many of the East African countries were operating DHC-5 Buffalo aircraft and indeed I flew on a Tanzanian Defence Force one.
There was a civilian one in the region as well, flying aid during the Sudan war. It was operated by a group of NZ'ers, Aussies and Canadians.



I was involved when there was talk of buying ex-military aircraft and spares, even doing refurbishments.
They were not in the same class, maintenance, wise as the Andover. I was in Lusaka for a military asset disposal sale.
A dozen engine, props, gearboxes could be had for the price of just one Dart engine (Andover). No doubt I could have picked up a few aircraft for similar prices.
I had involvements with the RNZAF Andover and Friendships and saw the Andover as very expensive to maintain, and it was still a compromise. It was probably ideal for the role at the time, given the NZ situation and operation.
I would have been far happier operating the Buffalo in Africa though and we saw some weird types flying in the region. I did a flight in a AN-32, that was very close to an Andover in many respects and may have been cheap to operate as well.



I think the RNZAF would be well served by a small fleet of ex-airline aircraft for the communications role. The Dash-8, and similar turbo-props, come to mind there.
The F-27 was very good but was just too old, same era as the Andover but much cheaper to run.
Modernising sounds good but something out of the airlines is going to be far easier on the pocket.

[tbf2504]

The Andover purchase as described to me when interviewing Sir Richard Bolt (CAS at the time of purchase) was that over a dinner with CAS RAF in the UK in 1976, Sir Richard mentioned that we had
to look at replacing the Dakotas and Freighters. CAS RAF said that the RAF had Andovers parked up at Kemble and were looking to dispose of them and for a really cheap price we could have as many as we needed.
A deal was then struck. As Sir Richard remarked "The best deal he did while in the service"

[Dave Homewood]

I guess the tired undercarriage legs is the reason a few that went to Africa ended up on their bellies?

[camtech]

More likely poor airmanship. The undercarriage may have had issues, but it was pretty solid.
Referring to the decision to buy the Andover, about the same time the RAF decided they were going to retire the Whistling Wheelbarrows (Argossy) and needed something to replace them. Oh wait, we have a bunch of Andovers we could use - only got two engines, so cheaper to run. There were around 20 Andovers at Kemble, so the RAF got in quickly, snaffled back about 7, leaving NZ the choice of 13. Why we only got 10 still annoys me as two more would have given us two sets of major component spares (cf Seasprite, NH90, A109).

[baz62]

Sept 9, 2021 11:16:23 GMT 12 tbf2504 said:

And as Shorty states the Darts were old technology with the inherent problems of maintaining and obtaining critical spares.

Am I correct saying Air New Zealand was one of the few companies with a Dart overhaul line?