A nice 5000hp T-56 in the nose of a Skyraider would be interesting….

The Douglas A2D Skyshark was a turboprop-powered attack aircraft built by the Douglas Aircraft Company for the United States Navy. Only 12 were built before the program was canceled and the developmental funds used for the A4D (A-4) Skyhawk.

Maximum speed: 435 knots (501 mph, 813 km/h)
Powerplant: 1× Allison XT-40-A-2 turboprop, 5,100 shp (3,800 kW)

The Douglas A2D Skyshark was intended as a successor to the Douglas AD Skyraider. It appeared at a time when the Navy was reluctant to use pure jet aircraft on its aircraft carriers, and it was powered by a turboprop engine. Although it had substantial performance improvements over the Skyraider, there were serious reliability problems with its engine, and the program was cancelled after only a few examples were built, and the aircraft never entered operational service with the Navy.

On June 25, 1945, with the war in the Pacific still in progress, Douglas was asked by the Navy to explore the possibility of producing a turboprop-powered carrier-based attack aircraft. At that time, the Navy was reluctant to consider pure jet aircraft for its carriers because of the high fuel consumption of the jet engines of the day and the resulting short ranges and low endurance times. Nevertheless, it was assumed that Navy attack planes might eventually be called upon to go up against an enemy equipped with jet fighters, and the Navy wanted an aircraft that could survive in such an environment and deliver its weapons successfully on the target. It was thought that an engine thrust approximately twice that which was currently available in the most powerful piston engines would be required to make it possible for an attack aircraft to be able to fly unescorted against enemy jet fighter opposition and still have an useful range and payload. The XBT2D-1 (the prototype of what later would be the AD Skyraider) had only just flown a couple of months earlier. The aircraft, if it were ordered, would have been naturally designated XBT3D-1.

Two F-22As for the price of one VH-71?

Sapphire 200 series: 125″ long; 37.5″ diameter; 3,180 lb weight; 11,000 lb.s.t.

Avon 200 series: 126.9″ long; 42.0″ diameter; ~2,800 lb weight; 11,250 lb.s.t.

Gyron Jr: 102″ length; 32.3″ diameter; ? weight; 7,200 lb.s.t.

Spey mk101 (S.2): 114.6 ” long; 32.5″ diameter; 2,471 lb weight; 11,030 lb.s.t.

And a similar potted history for G-AMLY …

WFU at Paya Lebar, dismantled and moved to Singapore Technical College (Singapore Polytechnic).
Cancelled 15.10.70. Parts extant there (One engine, rudder and an aileron) in 12.80.

So her body was donated to higher education?

This is the story that goes with that model, Nils.
Note that it was written before the invasion of Iraq in 2002.

by Darren Roberts

In 2012, Hillary Rodham (She had long since dumped “Clinton” in every sense) became President of the United States through the untimely attack of unknown origin during the State of the Union address that took out the entire US government. She was the only member of the government not present, since she didn’t really care to hear President Jeb Bush speak, and “had better things to do” with her time. Unfortunately, she became the President by default.

Her first act was to slash military spending by 50%, with the promise to the liberal groups that there would be more later. Boeing saw the handwriting on the wall, and immediately made their case to the Navy that they would only have money for one airplane, and they had the answer. They had secretly developed the F/A/R/S/E-18H. It was capable of performing all required missions by the Navy, including fighter, attack, recon, surface patrol, and electronic jamming. When asked by a reporter to sum up the F/A/R/S/E-18H, one Boeing employee was quoted as saying, “It’s supercalafragalisticexpealadocious!”.
It was soon after named the Super Duper Hornet.

The Navy was convinced, and ordered enough to equip 5 squadrons of 25 aircraft each, before more money was taken away. They retired all other aircraft in the fleet, with the exception of the helos and COD aircraft, although Boeing has promised to develop detachable rotor blades in the place of the dome and a towed delivery pod for supplies.

To keep some shred of decency, the first squadron to stand up was VFARSQ-14 Tophatters, the oldest Navy squadron, who turned in their tired old F-18E Super Hornets. Since their designation became cumbersome for maintenance crews to paint on the sides of the jets, they were redesignated V-14. They soon learned their new mount could carry a dizzying array of weaponry, including, but not limited to, a MAD boom pod, a TARPS pod with a refueling nozzle directly behind it, a LANTIRN pod and various other air-to-air and air-to-ground weapons. The only weapon it couldn’t carry was the AIM-54 Phoenix, which the Tophatters discovered was a horrible oversight when their carrier, CVN-68 Nimitz, was blown out from under them during the third Persian Gulf war by Saudi Arabian cruise missiles after Hillary Rodham made an alliance with “the poor, picked on Saddam Hussein” against the “greedy, big-oil mongering Saudis”, which is another story all-together.

Thankfully, new elections took place, Hillary was banished to Iraq, and the world settled down again. In the end, the F/A/R/S/E-18H proved to be a dismal failure, and Boeing went belly-up, leaving Northrop/Grumman in a position to introduce the F-14X Tomcat II.

As the A-10 was designed around the GAU-8, and its considerable weight is an integral part of the weight&balance of the aircraft, if it is removed in favor of say… 2xM61 Vulcans, you still have to have the same total weight in the same places for the aircraft to fly correctly.

OK, I’m going out on a limb here, but from what I can find, no B-26 (or RAF Marauder) had a US serial ending in 3013.

The Douglas A-20B Havoc, however, had the 14-cylinder Wright Cyclone 2600s, and had serials 41-2671 to 41-3669.

Note the “window” in the pic the OP posted looks like it has a pipe sticking out of it, like that on the A-20.

Incidentally, most of the A-20Bs were sent to the USSR under lend/lease, but some were kept in the USAAC/USAAF.

I agree with Jon Peterson… A-20B.

http://aeroweb.brooklyn.cuny.edu/database/aircraft/getimage.htm?id=14339

There are a whole bunch of retired USMC OV-10Ds already equipped with the FLIR pod (with laser designator). They just didn’t get the provisions for the multi-barrel cannon turret.