Grumman Alley Cat?

Has anyone else heard of the Grumman Alley Cat?
A mock-up was rumoured to have been built in 1945, but production was cancelled when Japan surrendered.
We know that it only had one seat, was carrier-capable and was designed primarily as a ground-attack airplane.
Any additional specifications or illustrations would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
 
Corky Meyer, Grumman test pilot, wrote a book called Flight Journal, and in it, called the F-10F Jaguar Grumman's only alley cat. It was a term of derision, for a very bad airplane. It wasn't official or anything.
 
They were bought by Northrop back in '94 and became Northrop Grumman. They are still around. Alley Cat sounds like an unofficial name since a lot of their planes had "cat" names.
 
Grumman was working on two aircraft that were just about ready for deployment when World War II ended. They were the F8F Bearcat and the F7F Tigercat.

The Bearcat was designed as a relatively short-range, high-performance interceptor with exceptional climb and maneuverability; its first operational squadron was on board a carrier (I think it was on the Langley) bound for the Western Pacific when the war ended.

The Tigercat was a twin-engined long-range fighter. It had high performance and a ground-attack capability. It entered production in the summer of 1944, but could not pass the carrier-qualification tests for the Navy. I believe there were plans to let the Marines use them from land-based sites if Operation Downfall had proceeded. The original name for the F7F was the "Tomcat" but was changed to the "Tigercat" because it was thought that Tomcat was too suggestive.

I tend to think that the Grumman Alley-cat was probably alluding to the Tigercat.
 
One notable feature of the F8 Bearcat was it had wing tips which could be jettisoned in flight if the aircraft became overstressed. It was an entirely automatic system which operated via explosive bolts.

Unfortunately, it sometimes worked with one wing and not both resulting in the sort of problems which no pilot needed or wanted. Ultimately the explosive bolts were removed and the wing tips were altered so they were permanently attached.
 
I have a book that says Alley Cat was a working nickname for the F14 project until they settled on Tomcat, partly because of it's 'mongrel' nature of parts collected from the F111B.
 
I have a book that says Alley Cat was a working nickname for the F14 project until they settled on Tomcat, partly because of it's 'mongrel' nature of parts collected from the F111B.


It was, after all, the greatest thing they ever made:

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As a bonus, they apparently considered repeating history:

a31ocYel.jpg
 
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