In a futile effort to find decent reference top-down drawings of PBY-5s, I have found this:
My take on the Catalina, of any variant (I'm NOT a member of the Unofficial Stats Committee):
The above drawing shows three variants of the PBY-5(A), and I can't determine from these how the firing arcs are wider? There could be different firing arcs, and depending on the plane, and the service (RAF, RAAF, RCAF, RNZAF, USN, etc...) different weapons (single and twin gun mountings), but most would only be 'A' mountings, even with twin .30 cals (.303 Vickers), or single .50 cals. You could, depending on your reference, widen the nose arc?
The image above seems to show a ventral hatch in the tail of all PBY-5(A)s, for a tail gun, but how many were used, and how effectively? In game terms, this would add a ventral firing arc to the tail. Not hard to add, really.
I don't have enough info, nor decent images, to determine why the change was made to the bubble turret on late PBY-5As. The early PBY-5s could have had a low profile flat-top turret, as I have seen some 1939 images with them. This drawing perhaps shows that flat-top turret:
Note: I think the above image actually shows the late model PBY-5A engine nacelles with air scoops, so I have no idea how accurate this.
Pub crawl at the Comox Air Force Museum on Wednesday...
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