Quote:
Originally Posted by kach22i
I thought that was Photoshopped at first, the lack of exhaust manifolds for one thing.
Found this, they re-routed the exhaust.
Boeing XB-38 | World War Photos
Perhaps flash suppression for night missions?
Then why vent at the bottom and not the top?
Might also be designed to vent/suck the exhaust away faster, or something to do with noise detection.
What if you could go into an acoustic stealth mode over the target?
Not totally quiet, just harder to track at night or with heavy cloud cover.
Looks like the below the engine exhaust vents are closed during flight, or slightly cracked open.
The two 90 degree exhaust bends would certainly quite things down even without a muffler.
The radiator inlets in the wings would not want side discharge exhaust going into them, so the re-routing make sense there.
Lots more room to play around with than in a small fighter. |
It's turbocharged...Check out a pic of the P-38 with the same Allisons, it's turbocharged, too, so the exhaust must be routed to the Tubocharger, Not open, like all the supercharged Merlins were.
The P-40 with open exhausts had an Allison also, but not turbocharged.