[rotorwrench]

The B-24 was an aircraft that got little attention during the war. It was a more complex aircraft than the earlier designs like the B-17. It had larger engines and was a good bit faster than the B-17 especially after it had left a little deposit for Adolph. Most of the guys I've known that flew and crewed those old birds actually liked them pretty much. B-17s were known to take more battle damage but they were sitting ducks for the Luftwaffe with their FW 190s and flack. When the B-17s were on a run into a target they had several occasions to wave the middle finger salute at the B-24 crews already on their way back to base. The Navy had a straight tail version called the PBY4-2 Privateer. They would go on long missions looking for subs and had a good service record too. Some served as fire bombers clear up into the early 80s.

Ford had the same problems getting a big complex airplane produced as GM did making the TBF Avengers. Both were trying to do the best they could with what they had to work with. They had to train folks to work on them that had never worked on anything like them before. If people wonder why Edsel died young, this was probably one of the reasons. I can only imagine what that headache of tooling up for the war effort would have been like. The Ford family and factory team had some aviation experience but no where near what they had to gain to get that job done.