The unusual sight of shrink-wrapped helicopters being trucked to Port Kembla last week was the final ignominious chapter for the failed Seasprite helicopter project estimated to have cost Australian taxpayers $1 billion.

Eleven Seasprites were supposed to be delivered in 2001 at a cost of $600 million.

In March this year, Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon ended the Nowra-based program after more than $1 billion had been spent on the helicopters without any becoming fully operational.

The Seasprites will be shipped to the United States, but neither manufacturer Kaman Aerospace nor Defence would confirm if the failed helicopters had been on-sold.

Industry publication Aviation Week recently reported that Kaman was to display its test aircraft in Romania and was eyeing new Eastern European NATO members as potential customers.

Kaman needs to sell the helicopters to meet its commitment to pay the Australian Government $40 million.

Kaman president Sal Bordonaro told Aviation Week that his company was "just months away" from delivering full capability to Australia when the program was scrapped.

But Mr Fitzgibbon said that even if the Seasprites had entered service, their technology would have been dated.

Mr Bordonaro said the Seasprites could be delivered to a new customer within six months at "a great cost advantage" over competing small-ship naval helicopters.

The complex task of shrink-wrapping 10 Seasprites went to Bomaderry company Integra Packaging.

Sales manager Matt Hill said the task was the biggest the company had undertaken.

"The material we use is called Intercept Technology, a specialised anti-corrosive wrap which uses copper polymer," he said.

"In fact, it's one of the very few anticorrosive products that's been approved by NASA."

Mr Hill said a specialist from UnderRaps in Western Australia measured up the helicopters to create a pattern from which shrink-wrap kits were made.

"Then we sealed them up and heat shrunk them to get a snug fit," he said.