Story ID: 345
GPMS HUMS along with Bell Programs
By: Chad Trautvetter
Caption: Company partners with Bell on health monitoring system for light-single helicopter
Word Count: 331
GPMS International is bringing its Foresight MX health and usage monitoring system (HUMS) to the Bell 505 helicopter. At the same time, GPMS also won contracts with Bell helicopter operators Halo-Flight and Helicopter Express for HUMS system upgrades.
Announced this week at Verticon, the company’s partnership with the OEM on the Model 505 expands the portfolio of Bell platforms supported by Foresight MX and will provide operators of the light-single helicopter with advanced vibration monitoring, predictive maintenance insights, and flight-data monitoring capabilities.
With Foresight MX, operators can automatically capture and analyze aircraft vibration and operational data after each flight through GPMS’s web-based analytics platform, enabling maintenance teams to better assess aircraft condition and operational trends. The system also allows operators to share HUMS data with Bell’s customer support team.
Meanwhile, Helicopter Express of Tate, Georgia, has become the first Bell 412EPX operator to upgrade from the Bell Helicopter Vibration Monitor (BHVM) system to Foresight MX. This marks a step forward in the BHVM-to-GPMS upgrade program developed in partnership with Bell, as operators seek modern, supportable alternatives to aging legacy monitoring systems.
Helicopter Express operates a mixed-mission fleet supporting the U.S. Forest Service under a contract that requires operators to use modern helicopters equipped with HUMS. Its HUMS-enabled fleet now includes a Bell 429 and three Bell 412 EPXs, bringing the company’s HUMS-equipped fleet onto a single platform.
South Texas nonprofit emergency air ambulance service Halo-Flight has placed an order to equip three more Bell 407s with Foresight MX. With this order, its entire fleet of five 407GXis is equipped with the health monitoring system.
In other news, GPMS has received FAA supplemental type certificate (STC) approval for Foresight MX on the Columbia CH-47D helicopter and is pursuing an approved model list STC for other Chinook variants. PJ Helicopters of Red Bluff, California, is the launch customer for the HUMS unit on the heavy-lift twin helicopter.