Subject: Number Fifty-Seven in the Series--Tucker XP-57

From: [email-masked]
Date: 7 Mar 93 17:41:39 GMT

>From [email-masked]

The Tucker XP-57 was a proposal for a lightweight fighter, issued at a 
time when the trend was toward fighters of increasing weight and 
complexity.  

In May of 1940, the Tucker Aviation Company of Detroit, Michigan 
issued a proposal to the USAAC for the construction of a lightweight 
fighter.  Preliminary drawings showed a small single-seat aircraft 
built up around a small 720 hp Miller L-510 eight-cylinder inline 
engine mounted at mid-fuselage behind the pilot and driving a 
two-bladed propeller by means of an extension shaft.  The all-wooden 
wing was low-mounted, and a retractable tricycle undercarriage was 
fitted.  Loaded weight was estimated to be an amazingly light 3400 
pounds.  

Armament was to consist of three 0.50-inch machine guns or one 
0.50-inch and two 20-mm cannon, all mounted in the nose.  This was 
amazingly heavy armament for so small an airplane.  Tucker had some 
rather optimistic estimates for the performance of their proposed 
fighter--they claimed that their airplane would be able to attain a 
speed of 308 mph and a range of up to 960 miles.  

The USAAC found the Tucker proposal sufficiently interesting that they 
decided to order a single prototype under the designation XP-57.  
However, by February of 1941, before even any construction drawings 
had been completed, the Tucker company had gotten themselves into some 
severe financial difficulties, and the XP-57 project stalled.  Since 
the trend was toward fighters of increasing weight and complexity, the 
XP-57 contract was allowed to lapse, and no prototype was ever 
completed.  

Sources: 

  American Combat Planes, Ray Wagner, Third Enlarged Edition, Doubleday, 
  1982.  

  The American Fighter, Enzo Angelucci and Peter Bowers, Orion Books, 
  1987.  

Joe Baugher       AT&T Bell Laboratories    2000 North Naperville Road 
		  Naperville, Illinois 60566-7033.   (708) 713-4548