I am working on a heli-pad project. I have seen lots and lots of pictures of manual folding safety railings, but I cannot find any information on who builds these. I am assuming they are all custom, but want to try to find the joint at the bottom of the railing. Then can have the railing made up here in Alaska instead of trying to ship a whole railing system. Thanks for any help.
Think about what you want the rails to do and ask the guy who is going to build them to suggest the best way to achieve the end result.
Looks like the Eurocopter of Attessa IV. They must have encountered some heavy weather. Expensive but most likely not beyond repair. One more argument for placing a helo in a hangar. Seastate can be counteracted with proper tiedown. But seastate plus heavy wind can break the toughest rope. At least not an landing accident where somebody got injured. Unless your fold down seafence is for a ship with permanent helo operation, with many T/O and landings a day, I would go for manually folding rails. May be remotly operated by crank or lever (for crew safety) but no hydraulics. We had one case, where a hydraulically operated segment of the helipad rail came partially up due to residual pressure in the system and a failed valve. The skid gear of the helo got caught by the rail during T/O and only the lightning fast reaction of the pilot prevented a deadly accident. There are several consulting companies available on the market which give great advice for the construction of helipads on ships and all its surrounding equipment, plus helping in setting up the proper SOP for the safe operation of the onboard helicopter. Why reinventing the wheel, when the knowledge is available on the market.