Lateral-g Forums - Imagine its World War ll &Your in the cockpit

Quote:

Originally Posted by speedshopmike (Post 149639)

the main reason the wings were gulled is for landing gear height to accomodate the huge prop.
the plane was designed from day 1 as a carrier aircraft but not used as such for quite a while; they started out land-based with the marines; many were crashed early on in ground maneuvers/landings due to pisspoor visibility.
carrier landins are brutal on landing gear; it had to be extremely beefy to pass muster.
the added dihedral of the gull wing improves stability.
chance vought engineers were known as free-thinkers; unconventional solutions to problems were their specialty.
i dont know of any other reasons; would like to though.

Your right!

They wanted to get as much power from the engine as possible and put that huge prop on it (13' I think). That made it hard to fit gear struts long enough for prop clearance. Bending the wing allowed for a smaller strut. It also permitted the wing and fuselage to blend better and minimized drag. Indirect advantages where that it allowed better visibility of the ground when flying straight and level and it allowed the wings to fold over the top of the aircraft which was a space saver on the flight deck of a carrier.

The first aircraft where flown by marines who put the hook on it so they could land on carriers and refuel. The landing gear had a bad trait at first and caused the aircraft to bounce on landing. Once they got that worked out they Navy started deploying them on Carriers. The reason for all the wrecks at first was such poor visibility from the cockpit, which was so far aft (this is take off and landing) that and a lot of new pilots.

Who knew all that info I sucked in watching TV over the years would come in handy. LOL Interesting, but useless information. :lol: