The Kaman HH-43 Huskie was a helicopter with intermeshing rotors used by the United States Air Force, the United States Navy and the United States Marine Corps from the 1950s until the 1970s. It was primarily used for aircraft firefighting and rescue in the close vicinity of air bases, but was later used as a short range overland search and rescue aircraft during the Vietnam War.

Under the aircraft designation system used by the U.S. Navy pre-1962, Navy and U.S. Marine Corps versions were originally designated as the HTK, HOK or HUK, for their use as training, observation or utility aircraft, respectively.

This aircraft saw use in the Vietnam War with several detachments of the Pacific Air Rescue Center, the 33d, 36th, 37th, and 38th Air Rescue Squadrons, and the 40th Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Squadron, where the aircraft was known by its call sign "Pedro". During the war, the two-pilot HH-43 Huskie flew more rescue missions than all other aircraft combined, because of its unique hovering capability. The HH-43 was eventually replaced by newer aircraft in the early 1970s. Almost 200 were built and operated by several foreign air forces.

This is very much your standard garage kit, but without the issue of molding glitches. That means no air bubbles or pockets, though you do have to trim a bit of resin flash and the remove some of the pour stubs from parts prior to use. Not a big deal and standard stuff for those who build these sorts of kits.

The sturdy box comes with two bags that contain the various parts and one that has duplicates of the vacuformed clear bits. A nice decal sheet with several serial options and formats is also provided. A photo etch fret is also included.

The interior is nicely done with a pair of seats, cyclic and collective controls and a center instrument panel console. Etched belts and armor plating are provided for the seats though not all aircraft had the plating. The floor of the cockpit also includes a rear cabin area and there is a rear bulkhead just aft of the seats. The interior of the fuselage halves are well molded and you are provided p.e. braces as well as troop seats to fit in there if you so wish to install them. The rather interesting looking pedal assemblies are provided to be installed after you put in the various cabin and cockpit windows and close the halves.

With that done, the forward transparency and the upper rotor pylon is attached. This is followed by the booms and the tail assembly. This latter section is somewhat complex. Once that is done, the rear doors and the landing gear parts, which include the usual 'ski' parts is glued in place. This is followed by the large exhaust and the rotor assemblies. There are also some smaller pieces to glue in place.

The instructions consist of a nicely done drawn page that is folded to include construction steps. All the parts are numbered in the instructions, but since there is no parts layout guide, only the ones for the p.e. bits match up with anything. There is no interior color information, though dark gull grey would probably be appropriate. Croco does not provide painting and marking info, but as you can see, there are several serial options provided along with two sizes of insignia and the large warning stencils. There are a lot of photos on the 'net to help you with picking something appropriate that range from overall ADC grey to SEA camouflage.

The only way to get interesting kits like this is with resin as the major kits makers won't touch them. If you have the skills for a resin kit, then you should have no issues with this one.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaman_HH-43_Huskie

June 2020

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Thanks to Croco  for the review kit. Contact the owner at You can find this kit on line by doing a search. You can also contact them direct at sniff23@inbox.lv.

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