-40%
RARE WWII WW2 Fighter Jet Airacuda XFM-1 Bell Aircraft - Blueprint - Original
$ 105.59
- Description
- Size Guide
Description
Up for sale is a complete assembly blueprint for the Airacuda XFM-1(Experimental Fighter Multiplace)
. This piece is large and almost 12 feet long by 3 feet wide. I got this in a lot of other NASA and Bell Aircraft Items. It looks to have a stamp of 1960 (something) on it in red. I am thinking they reused it for something during that era and made the blueprint for some purposes. Feel free to check out all the photos and please message me with any questions. This is folded many times and does have some creasing and middle fold holes throughout. Thank you for looking at this unique piece.
Airacuda XFM-1 (Experimental Fighter Multiplace)
The XFM-1 was an exciting design. The Airacuda was the first military aircraft produced by the Bell Aircraft Corporation. By 1941, the Bell product line consisted of the AIRACUDA, the P-39 AIRACOBRA [a much maligned but arguably successful aingl-engine combat airplane], and the XFL-1 AIRABONITA [an experimental shipboard interceptor developed largely along with the P-39 except that it had a tailwheel undercarriage rather than a tricycle landing gear]. The Airacuda was the first plane on which 37 mm. guns, two of them, each firing forward from an engine nacelle, were mounted. It was troublesome to fly and maintain, and was not put into mass production.
This machine was the largest fighter flying [as of 1940] and is among the first to be designed with cabin supercharging in view. Originally called the "Bell Model 1," the Airacuda first flew on the first of September 1937. It was a rather large mono–plane powered by two pusher prop engines with a crew station in each engine nacelle. It had a crew of five and was armed with six guns: two forward–firing in the nose; one forward–firing in each engine nacelle; and two flexible waste guns. The problem was that the XFM–1 lacked the required performance to be useful. The XFM-1 was to prove one of the most disappointing technical and tactical failures of the pre-World War II period.
