Puma2
SARF
To get the ball rolling,
It depends………….
Assuming you don't mean the ASW Merlin, then a couple of advantages (seen from the back end) of the Merlin are:
- It can carry/deliver a full infantry platoon in one go
- The ramp is far far better for heavily laden troops
Batco
To get the ball rolling,
It depends………….
Assuming you don't mean the ASW Merlin, then a couple of advantages (seen from the back end) of the Merlin are:
- It can carry/deliver a full infantry platoon in one go
- The ramp is far far better for heavily laden troops
Batco
Last edited by BATCO; 20th Jul 2015 at 03:58.
Avoid imitations
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You'd have to join the navy to fly a Merlin. Apart from that, it's not too bad.
A whole platoon? Why is that an advantage? From a piloting perspective, you only fly the cockpit....
A whole platoon? Why is that an advantage? From a piloting perspective, you only fly the cockpit....
According to the blurb the upgrade means the Mk2 can carry twice the payload over 3 times the range of the Mk1 without significant hot and high issues. Whatever the comparison with the Merlin, on the face of it that sounds an unusually worthwhile upgrade. I believe crashworthiness has also been improved, although how that compares to the Merlin I don't know.
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In fairness, some would probably need to be slung underneath.
The Question really should be the one asked back in the late 80's answered for us by one Mr Heseltine. Is the Merlin better than Chinook? And the answer of course is No!!!! Puma 2 has replaced Puma1 and at last we have/are getting more Chinooks to replace an aircraft we were forced into buying to save jobs at Westland.
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I wasn't aware that there was a "pinger version" of the Puma 2 ever considered by the UK.
there was talk of selling the Puma to the Fleet Air Arm as a SAR cab to replace the Whirlwind. Unfortunately for Westland they were already delivering the Sea King, which freed up rather a lot of Wessex 3s to supplant the Whirlwind instead.
