Welp, if there will be a new and better way to grind hellis modules i will take them all gladly
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Don’t know if this will be of any use but I was browsing the old forum and came across this list of armaments for each Wessex variant and thought it might be helpful.
Spoiler
it looks like we could then have two variants of the Wessex in game, the commando with 2in rockets and two AS.11s, and a HU.5 with up to two AS.11s plus two AS.12s
I also found this picture of a gazelle with rocket pods fitted but I don’t know if its a 7 rocket pod or larger due to the quality
Spoiler
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I really hope we get a HMS Endurance skin for the Wessex
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Came up in another thread, the AGM-114Ks we have on the Apache AH1, do they have the correct range?
I had a look and found mixed results, some suggesting 11km, others 9 and a few the 8 we have. But none Id consider reliable sources. Anyone know the answer for this?
Thanks in advance
It’s classified
Anyone ever heard of these references?
There are photographs in the Putnam’s Westland volume ( Westland Aircraft Since 1915 , Derek James, 1991) showing two Whirlwinds of JEHU in Army markings.
- A Whirlwind 2 (XK969/‘D’) with ‘an experimental machine-gun installation’ , what looks like a water-cooled Vickers machine gun, on tripod, mounted to fire at 90 degrees to the direction of flight, through the main door.
- A Whirlwind 2 (XK970/‘E’) with two forward-firing box launchers for ‘small air-to-ground milssiles’ ( I assume Vigilant) suspended from the hoist mounting.
Both photgraphs are credited to Fred Ballam.
From:
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British H-34/Mi-4.
Considering it’s a better H-34 yeah.
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Was able to find some additional digital images from googling the aircraft’s serial
Whirlwind HAR.9 XL898 with SS.11 launchers
Port side mount looks different. Maybe the rocket platform previously seen on the HAS.7, or just a shield to deflect the exhaust gas
Was also able to find an image of another HAR.9 with SS.11. This time XN386 equipped with live missiles!
The warhead of another SS.11 appears to be visible on the other side.
You can see XN386 still has the mounting point for the SS.11 bracket where it resides today in Doncaster at the South Yorkshire Aircraft Museum. This isn’t present on every HAR.9, so may be helpful for spotting serials of other Whirlwinds (potentially other Marks) that were modified for carrying weapons
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Could it be a test helicopter then for SS.11 launch trials?
It seems the HAR.9s could only carry two SS.11s. How many did the HAR.10s carry?
I don’t think so. There are at least 3x HAS.9 airframes with this modification. All appear to have been HMS Endurance’s helicopter at some point, operating in the Antarctic (penguin decal): XL898, XN386 and XN359.
4x according to research presented in this thread.
The mounting for the HAR.10/HC.10 shown on the photo you got, appears to be different to the HAR.9 mounting. With a platform suspended from the side of the fuselage similar to the Wessex weapon platform, rather than a simple socket. I haven’t been able to find photos of the Mk.10s that were apparently modified for Nord (XP301, XP332, XP358 and XP393) showing a semi-permanent mount like the HAR.9 have
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Interesting. Another thing I find odd is that these were done for helicopters from HMS Endurance.
Interesting, maybe it shows tow different programs running at roughly the same time.
Maybe we should consider writing to Leonardo UK and/or the Helicopter Museum, amongst others, into whether they have further information
The modification to Mk.9s seems like it was probably done at the end of the 1960s. There are photos of XL898, XN386 and XN359 in 1966, 1967 and 1969 respectively without the Nord mounting point that’s visible in photos of the same aircraft in later years. I think 1968 is probably when the first aircraft was equipped since this is apparently when XL898 deployed to the Antarctic with Endurance.
So this would be several years after the RAF started using the missiles on Mk.10s in South-East Asia (1962-1964 IIRC) and is likely why there are different engineering solutions to how the missiles were mounted. RAF one resembling the Wessex arrangement from the same 1962-1964 time period, and the Navy one being similar to the arrangement seen on Scout, Wasp (and Alouette, Huey, Gazelle) that entered service later.
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Is this thread just for British Helicopters or can we include commonwealth here? If so here’s my suggestion
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/sikorsky-mh-60-seahawk-helicopters.html&ved=2ahUKEwj4h_DP3c6CAxVdWUEAHZo9Am4QFnoECF8QAQ&usg=AOvVaw2tTCOEsBnmPvnR1ikVUxPk
https://www.navy.gov.au/aircraft/mh-60r-seahawk
Sea hawk is a bit redundant as we can get the Westland Blackhawk with all the cool toys
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Is it possible that the next update will flesh out the British helicopter tree?
Chnaces of that are the same as Cr2 getting fixed next update.
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