What if...
They gave you a lightning and gave you a free hand to modify it.
Ze succubbus came to me last night with this question.
1) Remove Allisons & put 2000HP counter-rotating Merlins on it.
2) Remove The 20mm and the 4 .50 cals & their ammo feed systems
3) Remove intercoolers & engine stuff placed on the tail booms.
4) Use Hamilton props on it.
5) Fuel & Streamlining: The 38 had rather thick wings because its gas was stored in the wings, giving the plane more drag. And I THINK it also contributed a lot to compression problems. So, by removing the outboard fuel tanks and putting them instead inside the now hollow tail booms and making the inboard fuel tanks slimmer (now that they can "spread out" a bit more), the wing thickness could be decreased by a good bit. Since its using Merlins, there's no need for complicated intercoolers or radiators that were needed with the Allisons. The result may be a higher speed to compress, increased top speed (now that plane is much lighter and streamlined) and perhaps a decreased internal fuel capacity (but what the heck, there's DTs).
6) Put a .303 caliber, long barreled gatling gun firing long-cased cartridged with API/HE ammo in the nose. 6000+ rnds of ammo (since the gatling is smaller than the mount for 4X .50 cals and a 20mm cannon and their associated ammo feeds, there's much more space avaliable to put a lot of 303 ammo on the plane).
7) Longer piss tube (pilots will get hardons just flying the thing).
8) Redesign of cockpit controls. Install a 1-switch system to turn on the gunsight bulb+set engines to combat settings & stuff. (this system was actually developed for the 38 during the war).
9) Weapon packages: Design strap-on gun pods composed of 2X .50 cals with 400 rnds of ammoto be fitted on the external hardpoint (actually developed and tested)
10) Increase structural toughness in the fowler flaps to allow them to deploy at higher speeds.
Succubbus be GONE!
