The P-38 Swordfish was a variant of the P-38E with an extended gondola to improve high-speed dive-performance. I have basically three lines of questioning
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wuzak
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- Design: Did the P-38 Swordfish have laminar flow sections from the outset, or was that added at a later date?
- Chronology: When was the extended gondola first conceived as an idea, first tested in the wind-tunnel, from what it seems it first flew June 2, 1943
- When was the P-38 first known to have compressibility effects? The first event I recall mentioned was in 1941, but...
- Ezra Kotcher first mentioned a proposal to General Arnold to develop a high-speed wind-tunnel program, and high-speed research aircraft involving some form of jet-propulsion (jet in those days meant anything that used exhaust gases directly for propulsion, so that meant rockets, gas-turbines, and caproni-campini style engines).
- Lockheed had supposedly started the L-133 design to get around compressibility problems encountered in the P-38 as of 1940 with gas-turbines as a good fit. Some even listed 1939 as a date they had first started to entertain some kind of idea.
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wuzak
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XBe02Drvr
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