Why Army Wildcats are difficult to transfer to naval service

Could retired Army Wildcat helicopters gain radar and Martlet missiles or transfer to the Fleet Air Arm?

Radar and Martlet could provide a counter-drone role, while transfer to the Navy depends on how fully the Army airframes were marinised and on their maintenance needs.

Adding radar and Martlet missiles to Army Wildcats is accepted as a possible counter-drone capability. Their potential transfer to the Navy raises a separate question about whether the airframes were built to the same maritime standards as naval aircraft. Saltwater corrosion requires intensive servicing that land-based helicopters do not always need. A secondhand account from an RAF fitter attached to a naval squadron describes naval maintenance standards increasing the RAF requirement by about ten percent and the Army requirement to roughly three times its earlier level. Those figures are recalled estimates from the account. The larger burden is linked to lean Army maintenance staffing and an expectation that helicopters would be lost quickly in a Cold War conflict.