"On other threads, mention has been made of studies into marinising the Chinook with folding rotors etc. Given that it is faster and has a higher altitude than Merlin, is pressurised (unlike V22) and has a large cabin with lots of room for equipment and crew, would a MASC platform based on a marinised Chinook not be worth looking at?"
WEBF. Nice try, but it would be far too sensible to follow this logic. The Chinook isn't pressurised, by the way, but it can climb an awful long way into the sky (FL150+) you just need to provide O2. The other problem is the "not built in Yeovil" bit. If you were to properly marinise a CH47 (something that Boeing are very reluctant to do, mindful of the possible impact on V22) then you could re-equip some of the Jungly's with it as well. However, the CH47 isn't a one size fits all,you'd still need a Puma size ac. I think that the Jungly's will get stiched up with Merlin, and thus MASC will be Merlin based too.