I was involved in a discussion with the chief design engineer on the 505 and he explained that the 40 lbs. is capability to support the turrets that were considered in development at the time. The customer base wanted an 90 lbs payload on a forward hard point. This plus camera monitoring equipment in the front left seat. That configuration needed approximately 30 lbs of ballast. 40 lbs was to give some growth for the future. The lead engineer said they structurally tested the boom with quite a bit more than 40lbs on the boom and it was statically broken at some obscene multiple of the Max hard landing load they have seen. I recall it was more 400%...
its funny that FH1100 doesn’t reaslize that when he says “out of CG” he’s making my point. The aircraft he sat in was ballasted before he sat in it for light single pilot ferry... the Garmin was updated for the ballast before he started drooling on the cockpit bits... then he went and added 900 lbs at the front of the aircraft. It wasn’t ballasted for that and was out of CG.,. Duh... it’s like he doesn’t have a firm grip on his immediate surroundings... literally it was probably a difference of a few lbs of ballast. The one I rode in with 3 other folks (4 people total) had 8 lbs. of ballast on the tail per the Bell demo pilot.