Preliminary study of the turboshaft selection for a helicopter upgrade program

This paper is intended to illustrate a “rapid and easy” method to be used during the preliminary analysis for the selection of a new engine in a helicopter MLU program. The performance of the upgraded or re-engined helicopter will be evaluated. The problem of tactical (NOE) flight which is of particular importance for military applications will be especially addressed in this analysis. The use of reduced/corrected parameters for the turboshaft characterization will be outlined as well as the Flat Rating phenomenon. For evident reasons, the names and types of the helicopter and of the engines will not be given in this paper but all the data used here are based on existing elements.