The Helldiver’s poor manufacturing was a superficial problem relative to its fundamentally flawed design. The aircraft was simply built wrong. The Curtiss SB2C Helldiver was built to replace the ...

Between 1943 and 1945, over 7,000 SB2C Helldivers were built. Initially, the aircraft displayed poor handling characteristics—earning a damning report from the waste-focused Truman Committee and ...