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I've always been fascinated by the late WWII - very early Post WWII Attack a/c prototypes. While most seem to have fairly good info about, the Convair XA-41 being somewhat elusive, I can't find much of anything in print or online about the XBTC-2 (not the XBT2C, sort of a Helldiver II). Heck even a Google on the XBTC-2 comes up empty! Does anyone have any info, other than the very basics, of the XBTC-2? Especially I'd like to find at least a 3 view drawing. I'd also like to know what the XBTC-1 was even! Thanks.
 
Curtiss XBTC-2 basic info and photo at Minidocavia 10. Les Bombardiers et torpilleurs navals Américains. Alain Pelletier. Unfortunately no 3 view.
The BTC had two variants:

XBTC-1 with Wright R-3350 and XBTC-2 with R-4360
 
Had a look into the Air International article "From Torpedo and Scout Bombers to Attack
Aircraft", from October 1995 :
The XBTC-1 / 2 were designed for a request for a single seat dive/torpedo bomber in 1942.
A Wright R 3350 with a four bladed ptop should power the -1, a P&W R-4360 with 3-bladed contra
props the -2. Work on both variants was slow, to other commitments and stability problems
were encountered during wind tunnel testing. The -2 was first flown on January 20th 1945,
all work on the -1 was terminated since 1943. The crash of the first prototype in February 1947
and of the second in August 1947 ended the development.
XBTC-2 :
span 15,24m. lenght 11,76m, empty weight 6.481
kg, MTOW 9.372kg, max. speed 620 km/h at 4.940m, range with one torpedo 2.000 km.
(Photo from AI 10.95, sorry for the GA drawings, they are amongst my oldest ones)
 

Attachments

  • XBTC-2.JPG
    XBTC-2.JPG
    39 KB · Views: 597
  • XBTC-1.GIF
    XBTC-1.GIF
    28.9 KB · Views: 595
  • XBTC-2.GIF
    XBTC-2.GIF
    28.6 KB · Views: 566
Thanks! I wish I had the indexes (indices?) for later Air Ints. I've got the mags all the way back to V1N1, but only indexes to the '80s. Thanks much for the drawings.





Jemiba said:
Had a look into the Air International article "From Torpedo and Scout Bombers to Attack
Aircraft", from October 1995 :
The XBTC-1 / 2 were designed for a request for a single seat dive/torpedo bomber in 1942.
A Wright R 3350 with a four bladed ptop should power the -1, a P&W R-4360 with 3-bladed contra
props the -2. Work on both variants was slow, to other commitments and stability problems
were encountered during wind tunnel testing. The -2 was first flown on January 20th 1945,
all work on the -1 was terminated since 1943. The crash of the first prototype in February 1947
and of the second in August 1947 ended the development.
XBTC-2 :
span 15,24m. lenght 11,76m, empty weight 6.481
kg, MTOW 9.372kg, max. speed 620 km/h at 4.940m, range with one torpedo 2.000 km.
(Photo from AI 10.95, sorry for the GA drawings, they are amongst my oldest ones)
 
So this was one of the competitors to the Douglas Skyraider?
 
Again from the mentioned AI :
In early 1942 it was decided to replace the two and three seat scout and torpedo bombers
with single seat bomber-torpedo and 3-seat torpedo-scout types. For the singel seater Curtiss
was asked to submit a proposal and Douglas was instructed to modify its SBD-2 into a single seater,
the BTD-1. The design of the XBT2D, the later Skyraider wasn't drawn before June 1943, when Douglas
tried desperately to get a piece of the cake, because Curtiss, Fleetwings and Martin already had
got development contracts. At this date the XBTC-2 had already lost the race, so it wasn't
a true contender to the Skyraider (Curtiss had offered the XBT2C-1 in the meantime), I think.
 
Some stats for the XBTC-1 from my extensive Excel database from around seven years of research.

Span/length/height/wing area 14.50/11.79/5/38.65m2
Engine: 1x 2500hp PW R-2800
Max Speed: 349mph
Range: 1500 miles
Armament: 2x 20mm 21,600lbs of ordanace could be carried
Crew: 1
 
XBTC-2 :
span 15,24m. lenght 11,76m, empty weight 6.481
kg, MTOW 9.372kg, max. speed 620 km/h at 4.940m, range with one torpedo 2.000 km.
(Photo from AI 10.95, sorry for the GA drawings, they are amongst my oldest ones)
385 mph @ 16000 feet is quite good!
 
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