unknown by at the NAS Sanford Memorial Park in Sanford, FL. 37257 at the Pima Air Museum in Tucson, AZ. 37230 at the National Museum of Naval Aviation in Pensacola, FL. Ventura Mk.II, s/n AJ311 at the Pueblo Weisbrod Aircraft Museum in Pueblo, CO. 37634 owned by the Lone Star Flight Museum in Galveston, TX. 37472 owned by the Warbird Aircraft Sales LLC in Heber City, UT. 37396 owned by the American Military Heritage Foundation in Indianapolis, IN. 37211 owned by Palm Springs Air Museum in Palm Springs, CA. Powerplant: 2 × Pratt & Whitney R-2800 radial engines, 2,000 hp each
It was used by a number of countries after the war’s end, but the United States ceased ordering new PV-2s, and they were all soon retired from service. It was first used in the Aleutians by VP-139, one of the squadrons that originally used the PV-1. With the wing problems fixed, the PV-2 proved reliable, and eventually popular. When World War II ended, all of the order was cancelled. The first aircraft shipped were the PV-2D, which had eight forward-firing machine guns and was used in ground attacks. They finally resumed when the redesign was complete.
By the end of 1944, only 69 PV-2s had been delivered. The PV-2s already delivered were used for training purposes under the designation PV-2C. This hurdle delayed entry of the PV-2 into service. As this problem could not be solved by a 6 ft reduction in wingspan (making the wing uniformly flexible), a complete redesign of the wing was necessitated. The Navy ordered 500 examples, designating them with the popular name Harpoon.Įarly tests indicated a tendency for the wings to wrinkle dangerously. While the PV-2 was expected to have increased range and better takeoff, the anticipated speed statistics were projected lower than those of the PV-1, due to the use of the same engines but an increase in weight. Some other significant developments included the increase of the bombload by 30% to 4,000 lb, and the ability to carry eight 5-inch HVAR rockets under the wings. Many early PV-1s had a bombardier's position, which was deleted in the PV-2. On the PV-2, the armament became standardised at five forward-firing machine guns.
#Pv 2 harpoon full#
The motivation for redesign was weaknesses in the PV-1, since it had shown to have poor-quality takeoffs when carrying a full load of fuel. The PV-2 Harpoon was a major redesign of the Ventura with the wing area increased from 551 ft² to 686 ft² giving an increased load-carrying capability.
Send me a picture of the location by email, I’ll accept the find and replace the cache. If you can’t find a cache, it’s probably missing. The caches were not meant to be difficult to find. He flew his 25 missions and returned to the US as a gunnery instructor (Lead, Dammit, Lead!).įinding all the caches will display a GeoArt form of the Big Brother, Little Brother relationship on your map. “Danny” was one of the few airmen who flew in both Ploesti oil field raids to Romania (June 1942 and August 1943) and did so without so much as a scratch. He made it back alive, as did my father-in-law “Danny” who served as a belly gunner on a B-24 Liberator out of Libya. On a personal note, my father “John” served as a flight engineer on a B-25 Mitchell out of Italy in 19. The phrase “Big Brother, Little Brother” refers to the way the heavy bomber and fighter escort aircraft pilots called each other on the radio chatter.
#Pv 2 harpoon series#
This series is dedicated to the gallant service performed by the brave airmen of World War 2 who risked all so that we may enjoy our American way of life.