The Boeing B-9 bomber and the P-26 Peashooter

ADVENT OF THE ALL-METAL AIRPLANE
By the early 1930s, aircraft design and construction technology throughout the world had advanced to the point where it was possible to mass-produce all-metal airplanes. There had been an all-metal plane as early as World War I, but it was an exception.

Most airplanes of the WWI period and the 1920s had been primarily of wood and fabric construction, although many later ones had tubular steel fuselage frameworks.

The Air Corps' first all-metal monoplane bomber was the Boeing B-9. Produced from 1932 to 1933, the B-9 was outclassed by its contemporary all-metal Martin B-10 and only seven were purchased. The Air Corps' first all-metal fighter was the Consolidated P-25 of 1933.

Although only two were procured, the P-25 design was modified into the P-30, later redesignated the PB-2, of which 54 were purchased in 1935. The first all-metal fighter ordered in quantity was the Boeing P-26; 139 were purchased from 1932-1936.

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The Martin B-10 was the first all-metal monoplane bomber to go into regular use by the United States Army Air Corps, entering service in June 1934. It was also the first mass-produced bomber whose performance was superior to that of the Army's pursuit aircraft of the time.

The B-10 began a revolution in bomber design. Its all-metal monoplane build, along with its features of closed cockpits, rotating gun turrets, retractable landing gear, internal bomb bay, and full engine cowlings, would become the standard for decades. It made all existing bombers completely obsolete.

In 1932 the prototype of one of the last bombers of the interwar generation, the Martin B-10, appeared as an aircraft which incorporated the best technology of the time.

What's more, in 1932, Martin received the Collier Trophy for designing the XB-10.

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	These two beauties (same on actually), were sent in by designer, Rob Carleen photographed at his home in Florida
HARLEY-FAIRFAX K-55 AIR-PAL TRAINER "You can't send those nineteen kids up in a crate like that!" .. Bandied the wags whenever a near score of student pilots filed aboard this controversial Army Air Corps ship in the late Thirties; and as the Senate hearing later confirmed, they were chillingly close to the truth. The 19 neophytes could be sent up, all right; it was a matter of how suddenly and how violently they came back down. Trouble started with the pilot and worked its way back to the man at the rear. Conceived as "an economical flying trainer", the Air-Pal was so economical that it lacked any intercom system among instructor and pupils. No problem in a two- or even three-seater-but with 19 sets of controls? Elaborate pre briefings, hand signals, screaming all were tried but all fell short of the desired result, unanimity of action, as in "Bank left!" Happily for all concerned, a further economy move halted production altogether only five months after it began. But those who flew or tried to fly her are not likely to ever forget this stillborn regent of the cloud lanes-memories shared by those on the ground lucky and sharp-eyed enough to catch a necessarily brief glimpse of an Air-Pal cart wheeling across the sky while 19 plucky, if somewhat perplexed students tried outguessing one another, their teacher and fate itself.

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