Air Weapons

Heavy Bomber (1945)

Consolidated

B-32 Dominator

B-32 Dominator

The Consolidated B-32 Dominator was developed for the same Hemispheric Defense Weapon to which the B-29 was designed for, built in the event that the Superfortress prove unsuccessful. As such, the B-32 featured many of the same innovations as its counterpart such as a pressurized cabin and remote-controlled turrets and superficially resembled the company's earlier B-24 with a high wing and the large tail found on later versions of the Liberator. Unfortunately, operational problems required the plane to fly unpressurized and the remote controlled turrets were replaced by manual gunners. Added to the eventually success of the B-29 in the Pacific, the B-32 was only fielded in limited numbers by two squadrons at the very last months of the war flying only two combat missions and whose only notable distinction was being the last Allied aircraft to engage the enemy during World War II.

First flight of the XB-32 took place on 7 September 1942 after being ordered almost exactly two years earlier (barely one month after the B-29). The aircraft entered service simply as the B-32 with no additional variants built and with over 1,500 examples cancelled at the end of the war.

Preceded by:

B-24 Liberator (1941)

Succeeded by:

B-36 Peacemaker (1948)

Datafile

DesignB-32
NameDominator
TypeHeavy Bomber
Year1944
Crew10
Dimensions
Length25.32 m
Height9.982 m
Wing Span41.15 m
Wing Arean/a
Weight
Empty27,339 kg
Maximum54,432 kg
Wing Loading406.3 kg/m²
Performance
Speed587 km/h
Ceiling10,668 m
Range1,287-6,115 km
Powerplant
Engine4 x R-3350-23
Wright
1,715 kW
Thrust/Weight0.31
Armament
Guns10 x .50-in
M2 Browning
Payload9,072 kg
Production
Built112
Total115

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