NATO helicopter gunship for the 70s

[uk 75]

Although the excellent AH1 Cobra was deployed to Europe in the 1970s and received TOW missiles to help it kill Soviet armour, noone else in NATO could afford it.
That left W Germany sticking six HOT missile launchers on its Bo 105 light observation helicopter and the British Army SS11 missiles on Scout. Noone else bothered at all.
Yet paper projects abounded. Despite (or perhaps because of) them no purpose built gunship helicopter had arrived in non US NATO service by the end of the Cold War. The UK had bought TOW for its Lynxes and I think the Italian Agusta A129 with TOW was coming into service.
In the Alt History world can we do better?
Clearly the TOW Cobra offered an off the shelf solution.

 

[BlackBat242]

I like the MBB BO-115.

 

[Hood]

A Lynx-based gunship makes the most sense, not as if there were not attempts to do so, just lack of money and political willpower to do so.
An AH where MBB shacks up with Westland instead of Aerospatiale would be very interesting.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

We did have this thread last year.

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/nato-cobras.42598/#post-638787

 

[uk 75]

The Bo 115 has already made this thread worthwhile.for me.. Dont remember ever seeing it.

 

[Rule of cool]

IIUC despite not mounting ATGMs helicopters were to be used extensively to rapidly deploy small infantry teams with ATGMs into the path of emerging armoured penetrations to conduct ambushes with MILANS etc.

 

[H_K]

In the 1970s, assuming the gunship reuses an existing platform & drivetrain (similar to the UH-1 Huey -> AH-1 Cobra evolution), the options are:

AH-1S: 4,500kg, 1x 1800hp T53

Lynx: 4,400kg, 2x 900hp Gem 2s

SA-360C Dauphin: 3,000kg, 1x 1,030hp Astazou XVIIIB

A109A: 2,600kg, 2x 420hp 250-C20B

BO-105: 2,500kg, 2x 420hp 250-C20B

 

[Scott Kenny]

Never heard of that Bo115 before! cute little baby Cobra!

In the 1970s, assuming the gunship reuses an existing platform & drivetrain (similar to the UH-1 Huey -> AH-1 Cobra evolution),

The reason the Cobra was created and still has an H-1 number instead of something in the 50s is how the Army went about procuring it. If it was a variation of an existing type, they didn't have to recompete the contract, they could just go to Bell and say "make us a Huey with a more powerful T53 engine." Except in this case they went to Bell and said "make us a narrow fuselage Huey with a chin turret and stub wings to hang weapons on."

So it's not guaranteed that they'd use the same engines as an existing helicopter.

Aviation being what it is, the manufacturers probably would have used existing parts as much as possible to save development time.

It wouldn't surprise me if Westland built something like the S-67 Blackhawk on the H-3 engine, transmission, and tail boom.

 

[H_K]

In the 1970s, assuming the gunship reuses an existing platform & drivetrain (similar to the UH-1 Huey -> AH-1 Cobra evolution), the options are:

AH-1S: 4,500kg, 1x 1800hp T53

Lynx: 4,400kg, 2x 900hp Gem 2s

SA-360C Dauphin: 3,000kg, 1x 1,030hp Astazou XVIIIB

A109A: 2,600kg, 2x 420hp 250-C20B

BO-105: 2,500kg, 2x 420hp 250-C20B

Thinking about this list of gunship options a little more…

1) AH-1G/S Cobra probably was hard to beat on price, given the sheer production volume and 80% parts commonality with the UH-1 Huey (at least for early model Cobras)

2) Lynx gunship with 2x Gems is basically a Mangusta… great helo but same size as a Cobra and no reason it would be any cheaper

3) A109 and BO-105 are very similar light twins. Either one could get the BO-115 treatment (which reminds me of the IAR-317 Airfox) but would probably still be too light

4) SA-360 Dauphin is an interesting hypothetical… meaningfully smaller than a Cobra (about 25% smaller) , but 20% larger than the A109 or BO105 and without the weight penalties of being a twin. Close in size to the original Huey gunships (Model 204 or UH-1B/C), it was marketed as a gunship but didn’t see any military users, civilian sales were also very disappointing. Still would be my preferred starting point for a light mini-Cobra.

SA-360 Dauphin:

With Hot anti tank missiles:

With nose mounted sight added later:

Even had a Kiowa-style mast mounted sight tested later in the late 80s: