Editing Curtiss B-2 Condor (section)

==Development==
The B-2 was a large fabric-covered [[biplane]] aircraft. Its two engines sat in [[nacelle]]s between the wings, flanking the [[fuselage]]. It had a twin set of rudders with twin [[Tailplane|horizontal stabilizers]], a configuration which was becoming obsolete by that time. At the rear of each nacelle was a gunner position. In previous planes, the back-facing gunners had been in the fuselage, but their view there was obstructed. A similar arrangement (using nacelle-mounted gun platforms) was adopted in the competing [[Huff-Daland XB-1|Keystone XB-1]] aircraft.

The XB-2 competed for a [[United States Army Air Corps]] production contract with the similar Keystone XB-1, [[Sikorsky S-37]], and [[Fokker XLB-2]]. The other three were immediately ruled out, but the Army board appointed to make the contracts was strongly supportive of the smaller [[Keystone LB-6|Keystone XLB-6]], which cost a third as much as the B-2. Furthermore, the B-2 was large for the time and difficult to fit into existing [[hangar]]s. However, the superior performance of the XB-2 soon wrought a policy change, and in [[1928 in aviation|1928]] a production run of 12 was ordered.

One modified B-2, dubbed the '''B-2A''', featured dual controls for both the pilot and the copilot. Previously, the control wheel and the pitch controls could only be handled by one person at a time. This "dual control" setup became standard on all bombers by the 1930s. There was no production line for the B-2A. The B-2 design was also used as a transport.

The B-2 was quickly made obsolete by technological advances of the 1930s, and served only briefly with the Army Air Corps, being removed from service by [[1934 in aviation|1934]]. Following production of the B-2, Curtiss Aircraft left the bomber business, and concentrated on the ''[[Curtiss Hawk|Hawk]]'' series of [[Fighter aircraft|pursuit aircraft]] in the 1930s.