Recognition: Field Manual, FM 30-30 - Identification of U.S. Governement Aircraft (1942) - Table of Contents

War Department Basic Field Manual, FM 30-30, Military Intelligence. Identification of U.S. Government Aircraft, February 21, 1942. Prepared under direction of the Chief of Staff, Washington, February 21, 1942

As most  30 series recognition manuals, this is a general purpose pamphlet as well. Since this is a fairly early edition, all technical data - and in some cases even the designations - must be treated with great caution. Close inspection will reveal a number of errors.

Military recognition is based on the typical aspects of an object, not on the many small details, which may be present in "spotters guides" or similar. (see FM 21-80). Since this is a manual for all services, technical information on the types is kept to a minimum. The publication of technical information, including detailed performance data, used a different kind of pamphlet in the 40 series. (example: Intelligence Summary 43-33 German Aircraft and Armament., Office Of Chief of Air Staff, Intelligence, Washington (1943)  ).

A chracteristic page of this manual looks like this:

Since most of the information in this manual is based on graphical representations of aircraft, it is published as a downloadable PDF file.

( A small comment on PDFs: The Manual is presented as is. Any errors are by the original print. The quality of text and pictures are below the general standard of this web site by purpose and design. The reason is simple. This site offers numerous documents free of charge. Some of the original documents are cheap - some incure several hundred $$. Of course there are other sites. And some sites will ask you, as the reader, for money to obtain a CD or the likes. To discourage copying of site content from airfronts, reproduction quality in PDFs is kept low. Each page has a "watermark" as unobtrusive as possible. These marks are put in place to discourage any "leeching" of your wallet. Apologies for any distractions caused by this. If you, as a  reader need higher quality reproductions, feel free to e-mail the web-master)

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Aircraft Presented:

UNITED STATES ARMY

Pursuit.

P-35 (Seversky) 

P-36 (Curtiss)  

P-38 (Lockheed) 

P-39 (Bell)     

P-39C, P-39D (Bell)     

P-40 (Curtiss)  

P-40E (Curtiss) 

P--43 (Republic)    

P-47B (Republic)    

Light bombardment.

A-20 (Douglas)  .   

A-24 (Douglas)  

Medium bombardment.

B-10, B-10B (Martin)    

B-18 (Douglas)  

B-18A (Douglas) 

B-23 (Douglas)  

B-25,  B-25A, B-25B, B-25C (North American)     

B-26, B-26A, B-26B (Martin)     

Heavy bombardment.

B-17 (Boeing)   

B-17C (Boeing)  

B-17E and F (Boeing)    

XB-19 (Douglas) 

B-24 (Consolidated)     

Observation.

O-46A (Douglas) 

0-47A (North American)  

0-49, 0-49A (Stinson)

0-52 (Curtiss)  

Observation amphibians.

OA-9 (Grumman)  

OA-10 (Consolidated)_

Reconnaissance (photographic).

F-2 (Beech)     

Transport.

C-40 (Lockheed)

C-42 (Douglas)  

C-45, C-45A (Beech)

C-56 (Lockheed) 

Primary training.

PT-17, PT-18 (Stearman) 

PT-19, PT-19A (Fairchild)

PT-21 (Ryan)    

Basic training.

BT-9 (North American)

BT-9D, BT-14 (North American)

BT-13 (Vultee)

BT-15 (Vultee)

Advanced training.

BC–1 (North American)   

BC–1A, AT–1 (North American)

AT–6A (North American)

AT–7 (Beech)    

AT–8 (Cessna)   

AT–9 (Curtiss-Wright)

AT–10 (Beech)

AT–12 (Republic)

UNITED STATES NAVY

Fighters.

F2A (Brewster) —"Buffalo"

F4F (Grumman )—"Wildcat"

F4U (Vought)—"Corsair"  

Scout observation.

OS2U (Vought) —"Kingfisher"_

SO3C (Curtiss) —"Seagull" (Amphibian) SO3C (Curtiss) —"Seagull" (Landplane)     

Torpedo bombers.

TBD (Douglas)—"Devastator"

TBF (Grumman) —"Avenger"    

Scout bombers.

SB2U (Vought)—"Vindicator"

SBD (Douglas) —"Dauntless"

SB2A (Brewster)—"Buccaneer"

SB2C (Curtiss) —"Helldiver" SBC (Curtiss)

Patrol bombers.

PBM–1 (Martin)—"Mariner"

PBY (Consolidated)—"Catalina"   

PB2Y (Consolidated) —"Coronado"