To avoid going further off topic I am responding to the comments made on
The FAA go American topic in the
The Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda GB so it is not overwhelmed with things that are capable of taking it off topic and allow Harold to continue with that discussion of his rather lovely Panther. So taking up where we left off over there we have the following from Mike (cliffyB)
Jeff, have you ever seen the Grumman XTB2F-1?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grumman_XTB2F
It was meant to replace the Avenger on board the CVBs but the USN was too weary of running twin engined aircraft off of carriers at the time (not sure why...).
You can't deny that it had some influence on the Tracker and it could certainly be viewed as a ancestral attack version. It also had a dorsal and ball turret with twin .50s in them along with a 75mm cannon in the nose like the B-25s. Something to think about maybe?
I have a 3-view drawing of it if you want one.
Hi Mike, yes, I would certainly like to have a copy of that three-view drawing if you want to share it with me. I had found some information on the XBTD-1 previously and Jon (jcf) has shared some of his references with us in the past on that subject to.
I would imagine that the big belly Tracker/XTB2F hybrid would not be carrying much in the way of guns if it were to be a strike aircraft. Maybe a gun package as an option for the bomb bay with a battery of four or six 20mm cannons and a fuel tank for such a mission that could be removed and normal bomb bay doors installed again. The belly turret was a neat idea but I soon realized that secluding a crew member to the nether regions of the tracker all by his lonesome was kind of cruel. So I am steering away from a belly turret for any project I undertake with the "Strike-Tracker-Attacker".
If the attack Tracker were flying at low level the need for a belly turret to defend from below is no longer necessary. Several forward firing weapons would be desirable for a torpedo attack if only to make the pilot and bombardier feel more proactive about the mission. So maybe a couple of .50 BMG along the side of the fuselage? I had thought about the gun packs/package guns that were installed on the B-25 and B-26 bombers for the strafing mission as these would be ideal with the guns clear of the airframe and the ammunition magazine could be installed between the bomb rack assembly and the fuselage. So four package guns/gun packs with two on each side of the aircraft would provide the desired forward firing weapons in a nice tight group around the outside of the aircraft.
IRL the Tracker had only a 3500 pound weapons capacity when powered by the R1820's. If it were powered by R2600's then there should be a corresponding increase in payload should there not?