My friend George Y. was the flight test engineer on this project, and I happen to have the flight test report (somewhere) in my collection.
The goal was to develop a cheap, air-tranportable attack helicopter. This may have been part of the Army's High Technology Light Division experiment in the early '80s (I don't remember it it was for sure, but they had several armed OH-58 experiments).
The basic airframe was an OH-58C with the LCH (Light Combat Helicopter) kit. The LCH kit consisted provisions to carry and fire external stores, and an air-transportablity kit, which consisted of flolding skids, folding elevators and a folding vertical fin.
An M197 gun from a Cobra was mouted where the co-pilots seat used to be, with the ammo drum in the rear seat area. The cylinderical device above the pilot was a video camera, which served as the gunsight (there was a video monitor in the ****pit). The heilcopter also had a pitch-axis SCAS (Stability and Control Augmentation System) to compensate for gun recoil.
The test program took place in about the 1980 timeframe. The SCAS was not up to the job, and the helicopter pitched severly nose-down when the gun was fired (beyond even the ability of the pilot to reasonability compensate) which made it impossible to keep the gun on target. Also, large amounts of gun gasses entered the ****pit.
The concept, having proven a failure, was abandoned, and the aircraft reverted to a standard OH-58C.
KAI Light Civil Helicopter (LCH)/Light Armed Helicopter (LAH)
Very light combat helicopter projects?
Entwicklungsring Süd GmbH (EWR) Light Attack/Observation Aircraft