What chopper is this?

[signals]

Never seen it before

[rustywelder]

Kaman K-max. The Marines were using them (unmanned) to make supply drops to remote places in Afghanistan for a while. Wiki page

Attack squadron from Poland do a resin kit in 1/72. It is a truly gorgeous kit, I don't think I've ever seen nicer resin castings.

Edited June 6, 2016 by rustywelder

[RCAFFAN]

Agree beautiful kit and more details here: http://www.armahobby.com/k-max-unamnned-manned-helicopter.html

Unfrortunately presently sold out on the site....

[ikar]

It's a decendant of my favorite helicopter, the H-43 Huskie, better known as Pedro:

[Jure Miljevic]

A friend of mine built H-43 in 1/48 a long time ago. I think it was Esci kit and it turned out quite decent. How do Huskie kits fare in 1/72? Regards

Jure

[ikar]

I've never heard of one in 1/48th scale. I'd love to find one. I think it was Mach2 that did one in 1/72nd, but from what I've heard it wasn't that good.

The only kit I knew about was the old Hawk/Testors kit in 1/32 scale. It originally came out in the late 60s during Vietnam and was open to adding a lot of detail. Cobra did a pretty good resin kit for the large kit.

Here's the kit I built with their set:

Edited June 8, 2016 by ikar

[Jure Miljevic]

Hi, Ikar

I googled the web and you were right, of course. The Huskie I was talking about was not in 1/48, it was in 1/32 and it was Italieri kit. In my defence I would like to say that with such a small chopper it is easy to misjudge the scale, especially as the last time I saw this model was some 30 years ago.

Your H-43 looks pretty sharp. I like the heat marks on exhaust pipe. I presume the type of camouflage on a real H-43 had been applied locally? Regards

Jure

[ikar]

Thanks for the compliment.

I'm not sure if they put on the cammoflsge before they deployed to South East Asia or after arrival. It could have been a combination of both, depending on where they were sent from. Cleaning and repainting was probably done in the base's aircraft maintenance section somewhere along the edge of the flight line with dy t day maint. and cleaning done at their squadron hangers.

Where ever they came from they most likely arrived by ship, were off loaded, given extra fuel, and then flown to their assignment. These were short range aircraft and any distance flight required a refueling point or carrying a fuel bladder in the back. Our base had a serious injury and they had to take on at least one bladder so they could fly the victim all they way to Bangkok's Don Moung airport.

[Jure Miljevic]

Hi, Ikar

I did not realise you are talking from personal experience. When I first saw photos of this helicopter, it took me some time to figure out how rotors do not cut down one another when operating. That was not clear to me until I saw a model my friend built and realised rotors were tilted.

I found photos of both camouflaged and silver or light gray Pedros, used in Vietnam. It is a shame only Mach2 builds it in 1/72 scale. I have their Caravelle in 1/72 and to assure a half decent look of Mach2 kits when assembled one has to invest a lot of work. Still, lacking any other choice ...

Ikar, that must have been some flight to Bangkok. What distance did that involve, something in a region of 500 miles? No wonder additional fuel bladder was necessary. I hope the injured man in question did pull through. Regards

Jure