Hi, all! When Vultee developed the Vengeance dive bomber, there was a brief time in which they considered providing a version to the US Navy, as the TBV-1. The project never moved to an actual mockup, but there was discussion of including folding wings. Peter C Smith’s “Vengeance” mentions this but only in passing. I’ve been looking online for any examples of any technical drawings of this but haven’t found any. Do any of you know of any sources for such info?
Thanks in advance for any info you may have!
Have you tried AirCorps Library? It’s not free, but you may be able to get exactly what you’re looking for.
Edit: Did a quick search there and come up empty. But it is good resource overall for future projects.
It may be worth calling Boeing HQ in Missouri and seeing if they can help you get in touch with their heritage committee/department or whatever they may call it. Vultee should be part of that and they may me able to help guide you.
Since the Navy version (tentatively named “Georgia”) was never developed, there are no photos of it. Every web search returns the Vengeance.
I did follow one lead to the Library of Congress, but again, all of the content was on the Vengeance. Then next most common content is on the single-engined V-1 airliner.
I picked up another clue from re-reading the relevant paragraph’s in Smith’s book. Vultee apparently did design a wing fold, that they wound up calling “the Vultee method”. I’m going to see if I can find anything in aviation magazines of the day, too.
I’m thinking of building one of the Vengeances in my stash as a USN what-if. If I can find actual info on the wing fold, I can reproduce it. Next best is creative gizmology like Shep did. Worst case is just finishing the wings deployed as they are in the kit. I think a TBV-1 in USN livery from late 1942 would look pretty cool. Maybe an Atlantic ASW dark gull gray and white, too…
That sounds like a great project! We’ve found on the car side that going to the companies and asking for their help with these sorts of things gets results. It may not be super fast–although GM and Chrysler have always been great to work with–but usually those departments are more than happy to try to help out. Good luck!
Thanks, Tim! I have another build to finish first, and then this’ll be my first for the new year.
It’s like Monogram when they developed their B-17 kit. They wrote Boeing, expecting nothing, and got back practically a filing cabinet full of technical docs, photos, manuals.
Best regards,
Brad
That was the old Boeing, unfortunately, The bankers that own these companies now don’t see much shareholder return on heritage assets, other than trademarks.