WI: the Grumman FF designed as a monoplane

It should be remembered that not all monoplane types are equal. While a cantilever wing would potentially give a significant boost in speed braced wings such as were common in the early 30's would have much less of an effect. The P26 Peashooter was hardly a rocket ship, neither was the PZL 7 both of which were contemporary to the Grumman FF.
 
It should be remembered that not all monoplane types are equal. While a cantilever wing would potentially give a significant boost in speed braced wings such as were common in the early 30's would have much less of an effect. The P26 Peashooter was hardly a rocket ship, neither was the PZL 7 both of which were contemporary to the Grumman FF.

I was going specifically after the Grumman biplane series here, since those also featured retractable undercarriage, unlike either of the P-26 or P.7. BTW - lets recall that P.7s of the time have had 25% less power than the FF.
The P-26 was 10% faster than the FF, despite having 100 HP less, open cockpit, and fixed U/C.

As for the next-gen development - the early I-16s with M-25 engine (Cyclone licence), contemporaries of the F2F, were 70-80 km/h faster than the F2F, so there is a lot of gain to achieve when going monoplane.
 
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