Consolidated XA-11

The Consolidated XA-11 was a two seat single engined attack aircraft developed from the Detroit/ Lockheed P-24, but only a handful of aircraft were produced.

The P-24 was developed by the Lockheed subsidiary of the Detroit Aircraft Company, and was based on the successful Lockheed Altair. On 23 September 1931, after early tests with the YP-24, the Army ordered four more fighters and four Y1A-9 attack aircraft. However the design appeared to be doomed after the prototype YP-24 crashed on 19 October 1931 and the Detroit Aircraft company went bankrupt on 27 October 1931.  

Work on the design resumed after Consolidated hired Robert J Woods, the designer of the P-24. He produced an improved design, with a new tail, a supercharged engine and metal wings to replace the wooden wings of the P-24. The Air Corps ordered two prototypes in March 1932, one Y1P-25 and one that emerged as the XA-11 (Model 27). The first prototype was delivered on 9 December 1932, but lost in a crash on 13 January 1933. The XA-11 was lost in a second crash a week later. Despite these losses on 1 March 1933 another eight aircraft were ordered, four of each type. The fighter was ordered as the P-30, the attack version as the A-11. These were the last A-11s to be ordered, so the total remained at five - one prototype and four production aircraft.

The A-11 was a low wing monoplane, powered by a Curtiss V-1570-59 engine without a supercharger, driving a two blade propeller. It had metal wings and a metal fuselage, and a crew of two carried in a long cockpit. The second crewman sat facing backwards under the open end of the cockpit canopy and was armed with a single flexibly mounted 0.3in machine gun. The A-11 carried four fixed forward firing 0.3in guns (the P-30 only carried two) and could carry up to 400lb of bombs.

One of the A-11s was given a 1,000hp Allison XV-1710-7 engine, and became the XA-11A.

Engine: Curtiss V-1570-59 engine
Power: 675hp
Crew: 2
Span: 43ft 11in
Length: 30ft 0in
Height: 8ft 3in
Guns: Four fixed forward firing and one flexibly mounted 0.3in machine guns
Bomb load: 400lb

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How to cite this article: Rickard, J (28 September 2017), Consolidated XA-11 , http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/weapons_consolidated_XA-11.html

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