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What was the weight penalty of the landing gear on the P36 and P40 over a standard inward retracting setup?
What was the top speed penalty for the P36? For the P40?
What advantage did the P36/P40 landing gear have over a standard inward retracting landing gear?
The Fairey Battle design allowed for in wing bomb cells but was also handy for Fairey's repeated offer to the Ministry to use twin engines in which the wheels would have been hidden behind the engine nacelles.The landing gear used on the P-36/P-40 and others was actually a Boeing patent and royalties were paid to Boeing
The Landing gear used on the P-35 wasn't actually all that unusual at the time. It was claimed to have the advantage of minimal damage if the plane was landed with the landing gear up, either due to mechanical failure or pilot error.
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True. At the beginning of 1942 everyone knew that a single-engined fighter with less than say, 2100 cu in, was not going to hack it. The future was twin V-1710's, the V-3420, the R-2800, the Sabre and Centaurus, twin R-2800's and even twin V-4320's. The Germans were already there with the BF-109 and FW-190.
Then the two stage supercharged Merlin came along, unexpectedly, and changed everything.