Yup, that's it.
B-18 Bolo
History
In 1934, the United States Army Air Corps put out a request for a bomber with double the bomb load and range of the Martin B-10, then the Army's standard bomber. In the evaluation at Wright Field the following year, Douglas showed its DB-1. It competed with the Boeing Model 299 (later the B-17 Flying Fortress) and Martin Model 146. While the Boeing design was clearly superior, the crash of the B-17 prototype (caused by taking off with the controls locked) removed it from consideration. The Douglas design was ordered into immediate production in January 1936 as the B-18.
The DB-1 design was essentially the same as the DC-2, with several modifications. The wingspan was 4.5 ft (1.4 m) greater. The fuselage was deeper, to better accommodate bombs and the six-member crew; the wings were fixed in the middle of the cross-section rather than to the bottom, but this was due to the deeper fuselage. Added armament included nose, dorsal, and ventral gun turrets. The bomber used two Wright R-1820-45 ‘Cyclone 9’s, of 930 hp (694 kW) each.
The initial contract called for 133 B-18s (including DB-1), using Wright radials. The last B-18 of the run, designated DB-2 by the company, had a power-operated nose turret. This design did not become standard. Additional contracts in 1937 (177 aircraft) and 1938 (40 aircraft) were for the B-18A, which had the bombardier’s position further forward over the nose-gunner's station. The B-18A also used more powerful Wright R-1820-53 engines of 1,000 hp (746 kW).
By 1940, most Army bomber squadrons were equipped with B-18s or B-18As. Many of those in the 5th Bomb Group and 11th Bomb Group in Hawaii were destroyed in the attack on Pearl Harbor.
B-17s supplanted B-18s in first-line service in 1942. Following this, 122 B-18As were modified for anti-submarine warfare. The bombardier was replaced by a search radar with a large radome. Magnetic anomaly detection (MAD) equipment was sometimes housed in a tail boom. These aircraft, designated B-18B, were used in the Caribbean on anti-submarine patrol. The Royal Canadian Air Force acquired 20 B-18As (designated the Douglas Digby Mark I), and used them for patrols also.
General Characteristics
Crew: 6
Length: 57 ft 10 in (17.6 m)
Wingspan: 89 ft 6 in (27.3 m)
Height: 15 ft 2 in (4.6 m)
Wing area: 959 ft² (89.1 m²)
Empty: 16,321 lb (7,400 kg)
Loaded: 22,123 lb (10,030 kg)
Maximum takeoff: 27,500 lb (12,600 kg)
Powerplant: 2× Wright R-1820-53, 1,000 hp (750 kW)
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Performance
Maximum speed: 215 mph (346 km/h)
Combat Range: 1,150 miles (1,850 km)
Ferry Range: 2,100 miles (3,400 km)
Service ceiling: 23,900 ft (7,280 m)
Rate of climb: 1,030 ft/min (310 m/min)
Wing loading: 23.1 lb/ft² (113 kg/m²)
Power/Mass: .090 hp/lb (.15 kW/kg)
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Armament
3× .30-calibre machine guns
4,500 lb (2,200 kg) of bombs
The 23rd Bomb Squadron Patch commemorates the pecasetome use of their bombs to divert the flow of lava when Mauna Loa erupted and threatened Hilo!
The 23rd flew B-17Es during the first two years of WWII then converted to B-24s.
Woo hoo, I did it!