The bombing of Darwin on the 19th February 1942 made the RAAF realize the p-40 was obsolete so the RAAF Asked The Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation or CAC to make A heavily armoured Aircraft to counter the rising threat of the Japanese empire however CAC was struggling to find an engine to power such a heavily armoured plane CAC had developed the airframe but couldn’t get enough power with its current Allison V-1710-39 luckily in 1943 Prat and Whitney introduced the R-2800-21 Double Wasp this 2000hp 18 cylinder engine would be enough to power this plane numerus changes to the cowling firewall and airframe where needed to fit this engine this setback the development even more the designers fitted this aircraft with 2 M4 autocannons and 6 .50 cal M2 machine guns due to setbacks this plane was finally used in combat on the 19th December 1943 pilots of this aircraft say it is extremely hard to land
Specs
Top speed: 380 mph
Gross weight: 6,873 lbs
Propeller: 128in Three-bladed metal
Empty weight: 5,475 pounds Length: 29.4 feet
Hight: 11.9 ft Wingspan: 34.4 feet Landing speed: 135 mph Cruising speed: 300 mph Service ceiling: 42,000 feet Armament: Six Browning .50-caliber machine guns and two M4 autocannons
Standard controls warning don’t touch the brakes