Production

With the Testing complete, the belief was that all major issues were addressed during. The US Army selected 2 of the 3 prototypes for service. The XA-26B would become the A-26B. The XA-26 would become the A-26C. The Army passed on the XA-26A feeling that the plane’s role and specifications were not enough of an improvement over the P-61 that was currently in production to justify the expense.

Initially Douglas opted to build both the B and C models concurrently at two plants, Douglas Long Beach (DL) and Douglas Tulsa (DT). The Long Beach plant was the first to get under way and produced a small number of both types of planes. However, it was eventually discovered that even though the planes were essentially identical except for the nose, the process would be streamlined by building them separately. Long Beach was assigned to produce the A-26B exclusively, and Tulsa would make the A-26C.

Douglas selected a number of contractors and vendors to supply parts for the Invader. Alcoa Aluminum supplied the raw materials. Bendix Aviation’s Pacific Division supplied 8 different hydraulic components for the Invader under the Altair brand name. Marquette Metal Products produced wiper blades that were fitted to the class C-model noses. The Cleveland Pneumatic Tool Company produced tail bumpers for the plane. Electronic Laboratories, Inc. was also brought in to help with the manufacturing process. As war-time demand increased, Beech Aircraft was brought in to produce complete wing assemblies, with the engine nacelles. Beech produced more than 1,000 pairs of wings that were married to the fuselages at Douglas plants.

Despite all of these companies coming together, production was still hampered and hopes of a quick rush to production were dashed. One problem was the lack of engineers that Douglas had available to put on this project. Douglas was already producing several other warplanes under contract, including the Boeing-designed B-17, and Douglas’ C-47 Skytrain, A-20 Havoc/Boston, and the SBD Dauntless dive bomber. This left a shortage of engineers to be assigned to the Invader. This also meant that there was a shorting of manufacturing equipment.

The problems were not completely Douglas’ however. Douglas designed the A-26B to have several options for nose armament. Perhaps the Army had too many choices, but they waffled back and forth over what kind of Armament the plane would have.