Selected problems of transmission wear of the Mi-24 helicopter

The hypothesis of mutual, destructive impact of the worn upper bearing of the WR-24 transmission on the Mi-24 helicopter's gearbox was stated. The Mi-24 is the only helicopter operated in Poland, in which the gearbox is mounted outside the main transmission – in the centre of the transmission shaft, between the main gearbox and the tail rotor. Damage to the gears in the gearbox of power generators is equivalent to termination of the tail rotor's drive. Such a termination immediately causes rotation of the body in the direction opposite to the direction of rotation of the main rotor. It is associated with the loss of lift and steering. It may lead to a disaster. Such an incident occurred in January 2011 in Afghanistan – both authors participated in its investigation. The authors, taking into account very good, almost legendary combat properties of the Mi-24, and their research of the specifics of wear and tear of the transmission elements, they think that, first, funds for development and implementation of the drive unit monitoring system should be made available specially for this helicopter. For this purpose, the authors propose to use the FAM-C method. It is characterised with significant ergonomics. Thank to this, multiple kinematic pairs can be observed simultaneously, and, therefore, the relationships between them as well.