I Bought an Army BlackHawk Helicopter: Now What?

guys i did it i bought a blackhawk helicopter now this is something that's been on my vision board it's been one of my life goals and i'm finally making it happen and i'm going to take you along for the ride after i purchased this helicopter from a military auction i have to then head down to huntsville alabama which is where it's located in the storage facility and pick it up we're not gonna go down and fly it out of there because it needs a bunch of maintenance and inspections and all sorts of stuff done to it before we can legally and comfortably fly it around so what you're about to see is a journey of us flying out from salt lake city utah to st louis missouri from there we're gonna head over to washington missouri to my friend joe at midwest military equipment's yard because he's gonna let me borrow his specialty lowboy trailer which is literally perfect for hauling a blackhawk he also has a buddy who's going to let me borrow his brand new kenworth w900 brian from jbc transport and from there we're going to get on the road down to huntsville alabama [Music] so [Music] [Music] recap what's happened so far usually i fly in the day early and i get the rental car and i make sure everything's good to go and then when i pick them up i have snacks in the car and everything well this time dave had me fine with them got a rental car reserved that's the rental car place it was like an hour and a half long wait to get our car so then we decided uber the hour distance here got picked up by a guy in the uber who no working air conditioning in his car an hour long drive uh in the air the advanced door conditioning bucks rental car place and the rental car needs fuel too small just give me one of those trips where every corner is going to be a party spurs can figure out how to open the thingy and he kept telling me just to keep hitting us like i'm hitting it couldn't figure it out look for the button and it is just a hit thing you just have to unlock the car just unlock the car and then unlock the today [Music] [Applause] so in this video i'm going to introduce you to a few different people now these people are very very important and they're critical to this series that i'm going to be creating of purchasing and owning and flying a black hawk first you've got jt tannehill now jt is a good friend of mine but he also happens to be a badass active duty blackhawk pilot and he has been for a long time he's served multiple tours of duty flying combat missions the guy's experienced and he's just an overall badass but more importantly he's a close friend of mine and you guys may remember him from the video where we got kidnapped up in the mountains but jt is basically my guy when it comes to helping me figure out what to do with this thing he's going to teach me how to fly he's my instructor he's like my right-hand man on this deal next you're going to meet joe ott joe ott is hands down the best aviation mechanic i've ever met my entire life he owns a big outfit down in kentucky called thoroughbred aviation i trust joe with my life with my money and with this whole project the thing about joe is he is honest he's extremely smart and he's got a huge facility with an excellent staff that can figure out just about anything so they're the guys that i trust to be able to do all the work on the blackhawk because once you buy a surplus blackhawk it has to go through a bunch of different inspections and maintenance so you have what's called a pmi1 and a pmi2 those are basically giant inspections i'm talking inspections that cost anywhere between 200 000 to a million dollars depending on what components need to be replaced so rather than have somebody pick it apart and try to sell me parts and pieces that i might not need joe is going to do those inspections for me and he's going to tell me what the helicopter actually needs and what is required to be able to safely and comfortably fly this thing home which is what we're hoping to do in about september once joe's done with all of his work on it everybody joe for midwest military equipment you've seen him at our shop but now we finally get to see your shot yeah we're here to be here for a while man this is uh this is kind of paradise joe has the same problem that i have which is guys we have a serious problem here at the office i'm gonna show you guys it's this has become just like a full-blown outbreak and you know let me show you what's going on here look at these guys [Music] a little energy you know that drink yeah see my guys are all strong out on energy drinks you see they had low energy so they're like oh we'll take an energy drink well now it's just snowballed into this huge mess they have no energy they have no ambition they have no drive they're not getting the proper nutrients so what i'm gonna do is solve this problem once and for all anyone know how nutrients boys hey yeah you don't have never really looked good and now you just look worse how many inner jeans we had today 14 14. and how much energy do you have zero guys here's the deal energy drinks well i'm just going to come right out and say they're not good for you 99 of energy drinks on the market are absolute trash there's a couple out there that maybe have a couple good things but to be honest with you real energy comes from real vitamins and minerals so guys the solution to the low energy crisis and obviously all the other problems these guys are experiencing due to lack of nutrition is bam this nutritional drink this is ag-1 by athletic green this is something that i drink every single morning and it has helped me improve my focus my energy my gut health this is packed with like over 75 different vitamins minerals superfoods all the stuff that our bodies need and crave to be able to feel better and perform better and it's super easy to use literally use the travel packs or get your container take one scoop of that every single morning bam i've noticed a huge difference and i want you to feel better as well and i'm also probably going to give these guys like an iv infusion of it because they are down right now so if you want to try it out athletic green is going to hook you up click the link in the description below when you place your order they're going to give you a one year supply of vitamin d for free plus five free travel packs literally a no-brainer you can't beat it this is one of the most important parts of my day and it's something that i rarely miss almost never because it's so easy [Music] shake it up literally that easy bro pull yourself together is the energy in this yes dave there's energy man [Music] it's working so guys if you want to feel better check it out listen guys i'm not a doctor i'm not a medical expert i'm not making claims that this is gonna heal anything all i'm telling you right now is i'm a guy that likes to feel good and when i drink this i feel better i perform better and my health is just overall better so you want to click my description below don't be like these clowns joe has the same problem that i have which is compulsively buys military vehicles without seeing them but his problem well his condition is significantly worse i've got i've got a better bug you've got a better bug man he just closes his eyes and goes to town in fact he just bought ten of those literally like anything that you see he probably just bought 10 or 20 of them he has the world's most comprehensive collection of surplus military trucks parts and equipment everybody that i know who's anybody who wants a military vehicle comes to joe right here so he's letting us use his trailer it's a brand new trailer yeah not a cheap trailer trip out really no pressure right this is a specialty trailer which is designed to haul a blackhawk helicopter joe is also nice enough to have his friend brian from jbc transport group let us borrow his kenworth because our truck with hunter is coming in through texas right now going to meet us in alabama with our little boy this lowboy should have everything we need to be able to move the blackhawk the blades and look cool doing it that's a good looking truck yeah it's a real nice looking brian's proud of it that's for sure listen the sikorsky uh-60 blackhawk helicopter is one of the most successful helicopters ever built of all time it's known for its durability it's rugged just capabilities and it's brute strength i mean these things are massive just the airframe alone is like 50 feet long it's 13 feet tall without the blades on it's like 10 feet wide i mean i'm telling you this is like the definition of an oversized load that a newer truck uh 21 21. what i'm about to do is dangerous this is extremely dangerous and joe knows it that's why he's got that smirk on his face walking me back past this gate means i'm probably gonna leave here i mean here's the thing i bought the helmet from him i bought another it's a 10x10 pls which i haven't even showed you guys yet it's like one of two in civilian hands yeah i bought the navy boat the second one you did so now of course we're set up now yeah now we got the only two 10 by 10 trucks in civilian hands like these i also bought the navy boat from him which he has a handful more that's the newest truck there that's the only one i know of is north america yeah civilian fully armored fully armored uh m1085 a1p2 so that's what the military is currently using like you see all the oshkosh trucks with the square nose that's the truck right there it got set up for where it's designed to have supplemental armor and then full armor which if you open the doors on this truck here you can see just how wild the armor plating is on it you gotta give them a touch hold a man handle it jeez yeah this truck is actually a 2009 and it's got a 1057 original miles on it so the guy bought this off the assembly line that i bought it from out of sealy texas and it's sat in a clinical controlled shop since 2011. that's beautiful i've never seen one up close and personal actually yeah it was kind of an experience for me we've kind of owned everything under the sun and this one this one definitely takes the cake it's got a fully operational turret and we've got a gutter protection kit for it too so it's got a c7 cat in it and then they changed a lot that's got hydraulic cab air ride versus the older trucks had just an air ride cab system hydraulic yeah it's a hydraulic air ride so if you look we've got hydraulic rams on either side a lot of people buy these longer trucks to make an expedition vehicle absolutely this glass is so thick yeah this this thing's legit like they're there's what are they supposed to hold up to like uh it's 50 caliber at point blank the glass i'm not playing and everything lighting i know for a fact the glass i'm sure it's 7.62 point blank grilled growler yeah a couple of growlers are they cool or they they're fun are they they're a lot of fun yeah they've got a turbo diesel engine and then they've got a 4l80e automatic transmission yeah they're just kind of a combination of a whole bunch of different vehicles morphed into a combat vehicle and this is the only vehicle that was ever certified to fly in the v22 offspring that's yeah that's what it was developed for that's yeah yeah you got a half track i found this out in kansas and the family that i bought it from uh her father bought it in 1948 did it run it does not run we unloaded off the trailer and this is as far as we got and then if you open the hood here you'll see the world's largest rat nest [Laughter] i don't think anybody's ever seen one like that dude they packed it in there all right so you got a lot of switches here these are your airbags if you want to glow green let's switch right here your cab lights glow green on three uh-huh when you are oversized if you want to run one in the cab lights say dancing spare key all right man thank you so much good luck man i really appreciate you can't wait to see it yeah this right here the man brian from jbc transportation you guys are right here in washington uh warrington missouri mornington i've never met this man but he's a jet friend of joe and i'm a friend of joe and joe reached out and said hey i got a buddy who's got a badass truck because they knew that the load that we're hauling you can't just haul any old truck you got a haul with something special which this is probably one of the most special w9s i've ever seen my entire life so so logistically this is this is a challenge getting everything in the right place at the right time to be able to show up and get this thing picked up i mean there's a reason why there's really only kind of one company in the country that is known for transporting these helicopters you know i had the option of hiring them to move it but i thought that doesn't make a good video hiring some specialty company which does a really great job doesn't make for great content so we decided to do it ourselves which means that we had to basically get the dimensions of a blackhawk and build our own cradle design that sits on top of this lowboy to be able to secure it to the trailer and make sure that it's just the right dimensions so that we can get oversized load permits and not be too tall for overpasses and different things like that much appreciate it brother no problem all right [Music] so [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] all right ladies and gentlemen we made it from st louis missouri to huntsville alabama took us so somewhere between eight nine hours we stopped and had dinner it's about two a.m right now we've got a uh we gotta be over here at the yard getting ready to load at eight a.m while the guys at the yard there are loading up the blackhawk they're going to take us for a ride in their demo blackhawks so we're going flying we're going to load the trailer hunter should be here somewhere he was pulling into town right around the same time we were we're going to stay at the hotel right here get as much sleep as we can shower off you guys saw me when i started the day it was just profuse sweat by the way that truck ryan from jcb transportation got a nice rig right there that thing's just a cadillac we're gonna get our rooms get a little bit of sleep [Music] [Applause] moving a blackhawk helicopter on a semi truck is much more complicated than you might even think the logistics required to be able to put a helicopter that large on a semi-trailer along with all of its parts and pieces and move it across the country not an easy task and we are about to learn through trial by fire exactly what it takes to be able to move one of these that's a monsters helicopter there she is miss 311. [Music] [Music] so we're here at the app depot advanced precision parts this is one of the many steps that the government uses to be able to offload the decommissioned aircraft they load like two or three of these things out here every week everything looks good this is my helicopter right here number 311. that's a specialty cradle that we built specifically to hold this blackhawk so the tires sit down inside there we chain that down to the trailer and then we strap the blackhawk down to that so that keeps it positioned exactly where we need it that's kind of like the secret sauce here that only one of the company uses but once we started realizing what it takes to build one of those it was like to come to an afternoon to do it so not gonna work [Music] so he's about to buzz the tower right now we're gonna see it come by and then they're gonna let me go up and sit in the pilot seat go for a little ride which is really cool so dave down advanced precision parts which is basically the warehouse that holds these blackhawks after they're sold from the government just super cool dude he's like one of us in dealing with a government contractor like that typically it's not a great experience i'll tell you right now though dealing with dave and his team at app these guys are dialed he said look when you get here we'll have you load it up in and out in like 30 minutes i was like all right that's an ambitious goal but let's do it so we get to app pull in boom his team has the helicopter on a crane ready to go all i had to do was back the lowboy literally into their bay garage there and like dave said before within 30 minutes the helicopter was tied down and loaded [Music] so the reason why they're showing me this why they're taking us for a ride it's because uh they offer parks and services and some equipment for these things and so obviously it's in their best interest for me to get excited about what they do because i then potentially be a customer of theirs for whether it's their products services whatever based on my experience here so far you guys are the real deal they're awesome [Music] so this is a technology demonstrator aircraft we've got a weather radar flares motorcycle transport system full glass cockpit autopilot the terrain of audit systems synthetic vision the latest and greatest state-of-the-art cockpit so it's more modern what the army class today welcome to the blackout community thank you appreciate it a warm welcome so what you hear running right now is what's called the apu it's a third turbine engine it's the starter motor that's not the that's not the drive engine you're hearing it's literally a turbine engine that creates gas pressure that fills these accumulators so rather than having like a regular gear starter like most aircraft and vehicles would this uses another turbine that just blows a ton of air into the big turbines and that's what starts them he shuts down the main turbines and then fires up the auxiliary turbine and that's part of the shutdown procedure because if you didn't do that then you'd have to hand crank the accumulator pump to build the air pressure that that turbine is building right now and apparently jp tells me that's just an absolute nightmare so now he's shut down i mean the accumulator's full he's got all the air pressure he needs this is cool though this is exactly what i wanted to see a blackhawk doing you know we've seen him in military service and they do a great job there but try and understand and get a vision for what they look like in the private world i mean you're looking at it [Music] [Music] we'll be back in 45 minutes probably everybody else's briefing my house is going good let's go [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] i'm telling you right now that flying that demo blackhawk helicopter was one of the greatest moments of my life now i've had a lot of great moments right the moment my kids were born the moment i got married the moment like i've had some killer moments and obviously this doesn't compare to the family stuff but it's like right there on the next shelf below it because having wanted this for so long and having dreamed about it and having come from like this poor kid who had nothing to now i'm able to go out and purchase my own blackhawk helicopter like that's a feeling of accomplishment that i'm damn proud of and like i said this helicopter isn't just for me our plan is to use this helicopter to help others to entertain you guys to be able to provide support on missions where really only a helicopter with these kinds of capabilities can perform i love how clean it is man that whole layout right there is just it's more modern in the current blackout absolutely that glass cockpit yeah synthetic vision terrain warning system yeah autopilot you got to learn to not fight the aircraft yeah that's what i was doing and then when i would when i would release the trim i'd already be fighting that direction and then jump over there at my 105 i'm gliding through turns and whereas with this he's like full powerful power so yeah yeah you're you're powering through stuff that just a different experience now i thought this was going to be more like a hey sit over there and don't touch anything and just smile and have a good time no that was not the case they literally threw me in the pilot seat they had the co-pilot right there next to me and he said all right helicopter's yours take it away and i grabbed the controls and i took off on a blackhawk for the very first time under all my own control nobody else was touching it nobody else was doing it and that was a wild experience just picture flying a school bus very maneuverable school bus there's really no other way to put it all right we're gonna get on the road hey thank you so much appreciate that it's great [Music] so after we went on the test flight we got on the road and boom smooth sailing we got there way ahead of schedule in fact we were not even planning on getting there until about midnight and we ended up rolling in around like 6 p.m which is fantastic because joe already had everybody on standby at his facility ready to unload the helicopter unload the blades and get us back on the road to st louis because remember we are on a tight timeline to get this whole truck and trailer turned around and get back home we pull up boom wrecker pulls up we hook it up within 10-15 minutes we are picking up the blackhawk from the helicopter and dropping it on the ground in lexington at thoroughbred aviation where it's going to spend the next couple of months getting all this work done to it all right we're here we're at the lexington kentucky uh airport where thoroughbred aviation is this is where joe has his shop and in front of us i'm seeing a big rotator record which i believe is probably what joe has on standby to uh unload us here also this is a bigger airport with delta flights and tsa so we have to go through the security process they're gonna come check everything out and then uh once that's good pulling through the gates i'm strapping the blackhawk and getting her unloaded it was a smooth trip super smooth all the way from huntsville up here to kentucky driving through kentucky anybody from kentucky watching this you live in a beautiful state you should have seen hands the whole way just just drooling over the property it's thorough bread i now get it yeah thoroughbred horses get it they made an old melon yeah you say thorough bread like thorough bailey thorough daily thorough thoroughly bread thoroughbred he's we just passed the castle and he's all frazzled we're actually a little bit ahead of schedule we didn't think we're gonna get in here until dark so we're going to unload relatively quickly and then get headed back to st louis i just been smiling this whole time just ever since i flew that blackhawk this morning i'm just giddy like a little kid happiest to be [Music] so [Music] there's 900 pounds of uh left back that we hang off the front that helps get the center of gravity where it needs to be otherwise it would hang two tail low boom out pick me up i'll drive out from underneath and then he'll set it back down and then throw it in there [Music] [Music] [Music] happy day right here guys just so smooth no stops from d.o.t no issues with the boards we had all our permits filed thanks to brian at jbc transport brian stepped up big time to make this trip happen for us giving us his truck and joe midwest military equipment letting us take the trailer like such a dialed setup [Music] this was a very big moment for me because it's something that i've wanted for a really really long time and it's taken me a while to get here but i'm finally here and i now own a blackhawk that i'm going to be able to use for private use and for search and rescues and for recoveries and for all these different missions that we plan on taking it on because i didn't buy it just for fun i mean i am definitely planning on having fun with it but this thing is an absolute monster it fits like 15 people you can haul like 9 000 pounds from the cargo hook as you saw in the demo flight they have motorcycle carriers you can basically adapt this helicopter to do just about anything you need it to do but like i said first things first we got to get the maintenance done the inspection's done we have to do a lot of paperwork i'm telling you guys in order to buy an ex-military aircraft and make it able to be used in the civilian world by a private pilot not easy and then obviously i have to get trained in it i have to get a specific license i have to get a type rating because it's such a massive helicopter that weighs over 12 000 pounds in fact when this thing's fully loaded the gross weight is at 22 000 pounds now to put that to comparison the heaviest my bo 105 or any other helicopters i've flown in the past are 5 000 pounds so i'm going from a 5 000 pound fully loaded helicopter to a 22 000 pound fully loaded helicopter i'm ready i'm stoked this is the perfect opportunity for me to be able to take that next step in my flying career and for us as a group to be able to find ways to solve more complex more robust and more difficult problems from the air rather than from the ground all the time all right ladies and gentlemen that is it that's a wrap we did it and we're ahead of schedule we're unloaded trucks are ready to hit the road we were gonna stay the night here but no we're gonna head straight back to st louis get an early start on getting back home now listen i realized that buying a blackhawk and owning it like personally the way that i'm doing this is something that probably haven't seen many people do before especially coverage on youtube you need to let me know how much of this you want to see my plan was to show you kind of like the high level like we picked it up right now we're dropping off a thoroughbred and joe my guy is going to go through it let me know how in depth you want us to go on this as far as covering it we may not cover everything on the main channel but i might do a little separate channel to cover some like the real technical stuff of the build but you guys definitely should plan on seeing a full series of blackhawk videos including some of the build stuff some of the modifications and improvements because by the time i fly the thing back to salt lake in september it's going to be a whole different animal completely different color it's going to look brand new and i will have gone through all the necessary training to get my license to be able to fly that thing because you actually have to have a separate type rating to fly a helicopter that big because of the weight so i want to show you guys that process i'll show you some of the faa paperwork i'll show you some of the crazy insane paperwork that we have to go through for a private pilot to be able to operate a military aircraft like that but let me know guys drop your comments below let me know what you want to see how much of this you want to see and uh we'll just keep on cranking it out you probably won't see another blackhawk video until end of june because that's when we'll come back down to the maintenance flight with that said we got five hours to st louis we got to drop off some trucks i'm sweating i haven't stopped sweating since we landed here in the midwest but i want a blackhawk let's go [Music] you

Channel: HeavyDSparks

Views: 4,568,669

Keywords: susan powell, true crime, trailers, family friendly, no swearing, Recovery, Diesel, Diesel brothers, Heavy equipment, Caterpillar, Whistlindiesel, Cleetus McFarland, Demolition ranch, Matt’s Offroad, Adventure, For you, Heavydsparks, Sparks motors, Freedom bus, Dirt, Dirt work, Tractor, Machine, Dave sparks, Diesel Dave, Dieseldave, diving, murder, mystery, racing, tow truck, wrecker, blue collar, adventure, missing persons mysteries, csi, blackhawk, helicopter, army surplus, trucking, kenworth

Id: -QFcqlXQVJ4

Length: 33min 7sec (1987 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 19 2022

Reddit Comments

[u/Reislaufer]

It is Fireball summer by king80industries. https://www.king80industries.com/beat/fireball-summer-8765624

[u/AlarmedDistance7339]

Been watching HeavyD for quite a while now and I am trying to create my Youtube content in his kind of style if that makes sense...? Not easy, as he has access to much more funding etc of course.

Example if anyone is interested :-)