Roden 1/48 Pilatus Turbo Porter Floatplane | 445

  In 1959 the Swiss company Pilatus Aircraft built a single-engined light utility aircraft, the PC-6 Porter, with a Lycoming GSO-480 340 h.p. engine. The aircraft was built in relatively small quantities (72 units), but its construction, despite its basic nature, had great potential for a variety of tasks. Two years later there appeared the PC-6A Turbo Porter with a 520 h.p. Turbomeca Astazou engine which was better than its predecessor in all major performance indicators. Later, another engine was installed in the aircraft - the 550 hp Pratt & Whitney Canada PT6A. Now there were individual pilot doors on both sides of the fuselage in the PC-6B version, in addition to sliding side doors, which facilitated departure from the airport or evacuation of the cockpit in the air in case of emergency. As in the PC-6A, the nose displayed a characteristic straight and elongated shape. In the modified PC-6/B2-H2 a 680 horsepower engine was installed, which greatly improved the aircraft's capa