TheCurtiss Fledgling, known internally to Curtiss as theModel 48 andModel 51 is a trainer aircraft developed for theUnited States Navy in the late 1920s and known in that service as theN2C.
The Fledgling was designed in response to a 1927 Navy requirement for a new primary trainer, and was selected after evaluation in competition with fourteen other submissions. The Fledgling was a conventional biplane design with two-bay, staggered wings of equal span braced with N-struts. The pilot and instructor sat in tandem, open cockpits, and the fixed tailskid undercarriage could be easily swapped for a large central pontoon and outrigger floats under the wings for seaplane training. The Navy ordered two batches of the Fledgling, each powered by different versions of theWright Whirlwind engine, both of which were built under the Curtiss designationModel 48.
Believing the design to have commercial potential, Curtiss developed theModel 51 as a civil equivalent powered by the less powerfulCurtiss Challenger engine. The company operated 109 of these aircraft in its own air taxi service, theCurtiss Flying Service during the 1930s. A number of these aircraft were experimentally fitted with the same Wright engines used in their military counterparts as theJ-1 andJ-2, but these were not produced in quantity. Another experimental variant, the reduced-wingspanFledgling Junior was produced to the extent of a single prototype only. A number of Model 51s were exported to foreign military services for evaluation: four to Canada and one to Czechoslovakia, but these did not lead to any purchases. Curtiss also delivered at least seven N2C-1 kits to Turkey in 1933, as part of an agreement to produce theCurtiss Hawk Model 35 under licence in Turkey. These N2C-1s were used as trainers and liaison aircraft by the Turkish Air Force until 1945. At least one N2C-1 is thought to have been given to Iran as a gift from the Turkish Air Force.
Andersson, Lennart (July 1998). "Histoire de l'aéronautique persane, 1921–1941: La première aviation du Chah d'Iran" [History of the Persian Air Force, 1921–1941: The First Aircraft of the Shah of Iran].Avions: Toute l'aéronautique et son histoire (in French) (76):2–12.ISSN1243-8650.
Hagedorn, Dan (March–May 1992). "Curtiss Types in Latin America".Air Enthusiast. No. 45. pp. 61–77.ISSN0143-5450.
