PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - Hughes/MD 500
Thread: Hughes/MD 500
View Single Post
Old 10th Mar 2009, 11:32
  #153 (permalink)  
ericferret
 
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: England
Posts: 1,459
Received 34 Likes on 20 Posts
The 369 HS and HE are identical apart from the fact that the HE (Hughes Executive) had a plusher interior. Both are left hand drive 5 seaters.

The HM is the nearest to the OH6 and came with a troop seat interior with hard points and is a right hand drive 4 seater. Reason for 4 seats is that the centre seat cannot be fitted as the pilots collective is a permanent fixture.

The HM cost more than the others due to the cost of the hard points.

The only HM I am aware of was originally Irish registered and belonged to one of the Ferranti brothers. There was a specific reason why a right hand drive aircraft was purchased but old age sadly has stolen that information. I do remember Ferrantis engineer Malcolm Ebbut telling me a tall tale about how his bosses eyesight was so poor he had a ships binnacle compass fitted just behind the centre console. Anyway the first time I ever saw the aircraft I made a beeline for the cockpit and lo and behold residing on the floor behind the console was a six inch gimbal mounted ships compass!!!!!!!!!!!!!l
ericferret is offline