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Brewster F2A/B239/B339 Buffalo 

The Brewster F2A Buffalo was a shoulder-mounted-wing monoplane fighter developed by the Brewser Aeronautical Corporation prior to WWII.  Per Reference [8] first flight for the F2A was on 2 December 1937 wih the type entering service in April 1939.  A total of 509 of all variants were produced.

Overall variants of the Buffalo family of aircraft served not only with the US Navy, the US Marine Corps, the UK Royal Air Force, the UK Royal Navy (in very small numbers), the Royal Australian Air Force, the Air Forces of the Netherland East Indies, and the Finnish Air Force.  In addition this type was ordered by Beligium but only two were delivered before Belgium was over run, and additional aircraft was ordered by Poland but production didn't start befroe that country was over run.

The primary variants analyzed at this website include:
 The XF2A-1 was the initially fitted with a relatively small spade shaped vertical tail, whose shape was increased resulting in a more triangular shape.  The production F2A aircraft were originally part of a 54 plane order by the US Navy, but part way into the prodcution run, a proposal was accepted to declare 43 of this variant surplus to Navy needs, which were to be replaced by an improved F2A-2 variant.  This allowed the 43 surplus F2A-1 orders (plus one additional aircraft) to be reconfigured and sold to Finland, as the demilitarized commercial variant B239.   The XF2A-2 was a modified F2A fitted with additional guns, and a revised engine cowling, among other modifications.  The production run of the F2A consisted of 43 aircraft to replace the 43 F2A-1 aircraft previously declared surplus.

The B339B/C/D/ & E variants were export versions of the aircraft based of the F2A-2 design but modified for use by different foreign customers. The Beligan B339B was for 40 aircraft but only two appeared to have been delivered to Europe before the fall of Belgium and France. Six of these remainder of that order appear to have been off loaded on the French Caribbean island of Martinique when their naval transport was interred, while the remainder appear to have been taken over by the UK with some serving in various roles in the Mediteranenan with the Royal Navy, from land bases.

The Netherland East Indies ordered 24 B339C and 48 B339D aircraft, for use in Java and the surrounding area.  The UK ended up ordering 170 aircraft primarily for use by the Royal Air Force and Royal Australian Forces in Singapore, Malaysia and Burma, with Royal New Zealand Pilots many many of the Royal Air Force aircraft.

The F2A-3 was a revised variant of the F2A-2 aircraft with a more powerful engine, more self-protection, and a lengthened fuselage (to improve the weight balance die to the heavier engine).  After the Battle of Midway the F2A-3 was withdrawn from combat and used as an advanced trainer.  The Netherlands East Indies also ordered about 20 B339-23 export variant aircraft that were nominally based on the F2A-3 design, but with a less powerful commercial engine, som of which got diverted to Australia with the fall of Java and the surrounding Netherlands East Indies territories.  A few of these aircraft eventually found there way into Royal Australian Air Force or USAAC service in small numbers.  Unfortunately weight data is not currently available for this variant for analyses.

As shown in the images below distinguishing features of this aircraft including;
Export Buffalos
F2A
[Image Sources: Public Domain via Ref [8] - as annotated by this site]

Notes: This website has been developed with a number of low cost or free programs including Hot Metal Pro, KompoZer, MicroSoft Designer and Da Button Factory.com

Rev 3-3-25

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