Word: kittihawk
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Dates: during 1941-1941
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This speed of the Kittihawk comes from a new Allison engine, the model "F." Turning out 1,150 h.p., it has 100 more horses than the old Allison "C," although smaller in overall dimensions. This engine is also in high-speed production at the Allison plant in Indianapolis. More than 550 were coming off the line every month...
Unlike the superpowered, high-altitude fighters now in the works for the U.S. Army and Navy flying services, the Kittihawk is this year's airplane, will do plenty of fighting before the snow flies. From the Curtiss-Wright plant at Buffalo, better than 250 a month are coming off the line, complete to the last machine gun. They start to grow in an older and smaller (827,000 sq. ft.) plant across town at Tonawanda where fuselages are built, engines and armor are installed. At the new airport plant wings and landing gear are added before they are flown...
...fire of the dedication, pilots hurtled the old Tomahawk and the new Kittihawk across the field leaving behind them a sound like the ripping of a canvas tent. They did vertical slow rolls, snapped null over on their backs and back again to demonstrate fighting maneuverability. While their workmen-builders shouted applause they sent their speedsters straight up thousands of feet, looped, did soaring Immelmann turns, flew on their backs...
Eventually it will probably be powered by a still newer 1,350-h.p. Allison. By the time it flies in battle it will almost certainly have vastly more fire power than today's Kittihawk-perhaps twice as much...
Best news of all is that when the P46 is ready for service it will call for no long wait in production. Most of its parts are like the parts that now go into the Kittihawk. To get its new 1,350-h.p. engine into production, Allison has only minor changes to make in its assembly line...