1/72 Italeri Nardi-Hughes NH-500M of Italian Custom Police

The first model of this helicopter dates back to 1961, when Typ 369 was developed due to an US Army tendering for a light observation helicopter. As production was stable for the military versions (by name: OH-6 "Cayuse", later versions MH-6 "Little Bird" and AH-6 "Night Fox"), the Hughes company started the development of a civil model. This non military version was simply called Hughes 500 and was available from 1966 on as 5- and 7-seater version as well as customized utility chopper. Finally there was also a military version for export purpose, called 500M, which was built under licence e.g. in Argentina, Japan and Italy.  The choppers built in Italy are called (Breda-) Nardi-Hughes NH-500M.

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The Guardia di Finanza (eng. "custom police") is a specialized Italian police force, which is directly subordinated to ministry of economy and finances. The force mainly fights business crime and observe customs- and international boundaries. The Guardia di Finanza is organised in a military way and in case of defence and war time they support military forces in regards to border patrol. Due to the long Italian coastline the custom police have available quite a big fleet of armed patrol boats and helicopters as well as some recon-planes. The chopper fleet consists of a mix of AB-412HP, Agusta A109 and NH-500 – in sum approx. 80 choppers. They have different configurations available such as floats/skids, external radar, weapon systems, .ect,…

My build is from the Italeri Kit 1028 "OH-6 A Cayuse" and gives the opportunity to build 3 different models straight from the box: US Army, Spanish Navy and Italian Custom Police. I decided to do the more - compared to the usual war paintings I have on my shelf – colourful paint scheme for this helicopter and went for the Guardia di Finanza chopper. I've been doing 1/72 scale for a couple of years now and therefore I’m quite skilled at handling the tiny parts, but to be honest I had my troubles with fitting the doors and the canopy due to the poor quality of this special parts (twist & shrinkage). I used some etched parts from Airwaves (AC72-125) to detail the cockpit. Further I did some scratch on the exterior such as antenna console, the metal sheets under the skid as well as the boarding aids on the back doors. I am not 100% sure but if my internet investigations are right the helicopter I built has the markings from a model that was in service at the AFB in Pratica di Mare, which is on the coast south of Rome.

Juergen "jott” Klinglhuber