Country of origin:

United States of America

Description:

Two-seat dive-bomber and ground attack aircraft

Power Plant:

(SB2C-1C)

One 1,268 kw (1,700 hp) Wright R-2600-8 fourteen-cylinder two-row air-cooled radial engine

Specifications:

Armament:

Two fixed forward-firing 20 mm cannon; two 7.62 mm (0.3 in) machine-guns on flexible mount in rear cockpit; max internal bomb load 908 kg (2,000 lb); provision for bombs or depth charges under wings

History:

In 1938 the Curtiss-Wright Corporation was developing a new dive bomber for the US Navy known as the SB2C (scout bomber, 2nd type, Curtiss). It eventually became known as the Helldiver in November 1941. In November 1940 the US Navy had ordered 370 examples as the SB2C, before the prototype flew late in December that year. Soon after further orders were placed for 7,200 Helldivers for the US Navy and US Army. An order was placed for 350 examples fitted with Edo floats as the SB2C-2 but only one (Bu Aer 00004) was completed.

After 900 examples had been completed of the order for 3,000 for the US Army (known as the A-25) the remaining orders were cancelled and the aircraft were transferred to the US Marine Corps. Of the 900 operated by the US Army none were used in combat and were in fact used as trainers and target tugs.

On 21 December 1941 the prototype lost its wings and tail during a terminal velocity dive. The first production machine (Bu Aer 00001) was lost when it failed to pull out of a dive in January 1943. Plagued by problems, the type eventually entered service on board US aircraft carriers, including the ‘USS Essex’, ‘USS Yorktown’, ‘USS Independence’, ‘USS Monterrey’ and ‘USS Bunker Hill’. They saw combat in the Marianas campaign in 1944 and were instrumental in the sinking of the Japanese aircraft carriers ‘Hiyo’ and ‘Zuikaku’.

In addition to production by Curtiss-Wright at Colombus in Ohio, where 978 SB2C-1s, 200 SB2C-1Bs and 778 SB2C-1CS were built, the Helldiver was manufactured by the Canadian Car & Foundry as the SBW-1 (835), and by Fairchild Aircraft in Canada as the SBF-1 (300). Some 26 Helldivers were assigned to the RN Fleet Air Arm under Lend-Lease, these being SBW-1Bs from the Canadian production line, these being equivalent to the Curtiss-built SB2C-1C. The latter differed in having two 20 mm cannon in the wing instead of the SB2C-1s four 12.7 mm (0.50 in) machine-guns. Some 5,106 Helldivers had been completed by the Curtiss-Wright Colombus and St Louis facilities when production ended in 1945. A total of 1,194 was completed in Canada as the SBF and SBW.

The Helldiver had a very complicated hydraulic system operating the undercarriage, flaps, dive brakes, cowl flaps, oil-cooler doors, bomb-bay doors and wing folding mechanism, and had two systems in order to isolate combat damage.

The SB2C-2 was a floatplane variant, fitted with Edo floats, the idea being to increase the mobility of the type. A total of 350 was ordered but only one was completed.

Orders were placed for 150 examples of the A-25A Shrike for the RAAF, as the Helldiver was known by the US Marine Corps, early in World War II, and the first ten aircraft (A69-1 to A69-10 – Bu Aer Nos 43-79683 to 43-79692) arrived in November 1943. These aircraft differed in not having folding wings and arrester hooks for carrier operations; and the aircraft had no provision for wing slats and rudder trim tabs as were installed on USN aircraft. However, by this time the requirement for a land-based dive-bomber was waning and the rest of the order was cancelled.

American reports indicated that General George Kennedy was critical of the aircraft, and stated that the RAAF did not have enough crews for the type. Be that as it may, by January 1944 all of the ten but one had been handed over to US forces in Australia and it seems they received little use in RAAF service. One (A69-4) remained for test purposes and was initially attached to No 1 Aircraft Depot (AD) for a short time before being transferred to No 1 Aircraft Performance Unit (APU) for assessment. Later it went to No 5 AD for storage until it too was handed over to the US forces. A number carried gun cameras mounted in a clear perspex housing just ahead of the front cockpit windscreen.

American forces used the type in this region and early model SB2C-1s were used by VB-17 on board ‘USS Bunker Hill‘ in dive-bombing operations in the Rabaul area of New Britain in November 1943. In addition to operating with the US Navy, the Helldiver was supplied in SB2C-5 form to the French Navy, some 24 aircraft being in action in Vietnam in the 1950s. SB2C-5s were also supplied to the Royal Thai Air Force and these were used operationally in Indochina up until 1955. A number were also operated by the Italian Navy. A few survived in US Navy service to 1949, being used for training and research, attached to the Naval Air Maintenance Unit at Johnsonville in Pennsylvania.

A few examples have survived in museums in the United States. One SB2C-5 (Bu Aer 83589 – N92879) was made airworthy with the Commemorative Air Force. Another has been placed on display with the Museum of Naval Aviation at Pensacola, Florida; another with the Yanks Air Museum in Chino, California; and a replica on board the aircraft carrier ‘USS Intrepid’ in New York. In recent years a number have been recovered from crash sites in Lake Washington.

One SB2C-5 has been displayed at the Hellenic Air Force Museum in Athens, Greece; and another SB2C-5 has been displayed at the Royal Thai Air Force Museum in Bangkok.