Unlike other fighters, the P-63 model planes did not have a hinged or sliding canopy. The pilot entered the cockpit via a car-type door on the port side. Twin 12.7-mm (.50 cal.) machine-guns were mounted in the upper nose.
The powerful rose armament was completed by the 37-mm (1.46-in.) cannon which fired through the spinner. Sub-types up to the P-63A-8 carried only thirty 37-mm rounds.
Streamlined fairings covered the under wing machine-guns, starting with the P-63A-6, under wing hard points were fitted.
An Allison V-1710 engine drove the four-bladed propeller of the P-63A via a long extension shaft. This ran forwards through the cockpit and between the pilot’s legs.
This large intake above the rear fuselage fed air to the carburetor. Placing the engine behind the pilot seemed, on paper, to offer many advantages. Instead it created a number of engineering problems and did not provide the hoped-for performance benefits.
Aircraft fitted with only the center line hard point could carry a single 237-kg (520-lb.) bomb. Alternatively, a 341-litre (90-gal.) on 796-litre (200-gal.) fuel tank could be fitted. Later aircraft carried more weapons: the A-9 and A-10 variants complementing this with 28 extra rounds of 37-mm (1.46-in.) ammunition.
The P-63 had a taller, more angular tail than the P-39 Airacobra model airplanes. The P-63's configuration, including its laminar flow wing, was largely tested on the experimental XP-39E.
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