Der Gabelschwanz Teufel

[Minotaur]

For some of you with voyeuristic interests...

A look under the "Tail Skirting"  
 

Mino

[Minotaur]

This version is for dropping "Anti-109 Leaflets:
 

Now this is cool:
 

Oops, just like when I do it:
 

Mino

[Tern]

Here, try this link for an affordable P-38 http://www.team-38.com/
Or this one for an affordable high performance 51 http://www.thundermustang.com/

Enjoy the views  

[Minotaur]

Terne;

Thanks, but this prabably more what I can afford: http://www.kendickson.com/%7Epanzrldr/p38light.htm

This guy got home.  Apperently a B-24, using full flaps, escorted its "Little Friend" home.  It looks like the left engine is out also.
 

Mino

[Minotaur]

This is what happens with if you are not careful applying "SPF-30 Sun Tan Lotion".  Fish belly tan syndrome.  
         


I am sure alot of you have read this, but if you have not and have some time do so.  It is a three part series and a pretty good read.  

Der Gabelschwanz Teufel: http://home.att.net/~ww2aviation/P-38.html

Arthur Heiden, regardly electrical and mechanical failures.  He stated earlier that most of the pre 38L(J) losses were self inflicted.
 

"Every one of these problems was solved with the introduction of the P-38L."

"Let me repeat this again and again. It can never be emphasized too strongly. It makes up the Gospel Word. The P-38L. Now there was the airplane."

"Nothing, to these pilots, after the hard winter of 1943-44 could be more beautiful than a P-38L outrolling and tailgating a German fighter straight down, following a spin or split-S or whatever gyration a startled, panicked and doomed German might attempt to initiate. You just couldn't get away from the P-38L. Whatever the German could do, the American in the P-38L could do better." (cited from [8] with permission from Arthur W. Heiden).

And to whom ever it might concern...
   

The first Lightnings to see combat operations were the photorecce F-4s of the 8th Photo Group, based in Australia, flying recce sorties over New Guinea and the Coral Sea. Initial deployments of P-38D and E models saw units stationed in the Aleutians and Iceland, with the first combat kill credited to a P-38E in the Aleutians in August 1942, downing a H6K Mavis recce aircraft, soon followed by the killing of a Fw200 Condor off Iceland, by a P-38D.

Mino

[This message has been edited by Minotaur (edited 01-18-2000).]

[Minotaur]

     

Dolmite: It was called the "Chain Lightning". Designated P-58, it was powered by two 2,100 hp Allison turbo-charged engines. Max speed was 436mph, take-off weight 39,200lbs. Armament listed in my book was four 37mm fixed forward firing cannon and four 0.5-in guns in two turrets. That is quite a punch!

I have also heard that it might have had 12 50's as one armorment configuration.

Check it out:  http://www.aero-web.org/aircraft/xp58.html
 

This is not the P-58, but an unusual picture of a P-38 model, with rockets attached.

Putt Putt Maru
         
 http://www.seagifts.com/seagifts/p38ligputwro.html

Mino

[This message has been edited by Minotaur (edited 01-19-2000).]

[dolomite]

Here is a pic of the P-58 Chain Lightning:

   

[juzz]

Found your 12-gun Lightning:

P-38L-1-LO serial number 44-24649 was modified as a specialized ground strafing version with eight 0.50-inch guns in the nose and two underwing pods each carrying two more 0.50-in machine guns.

[Bad Omen]

What I would love to see as a hypothetical a/c a P-38 fitted with twin Merlins as proposed by Lockheed and denied by the Army as too expensive. That would have been an airplane!

Just let us have that for a few days against those Spits!!!

[This message has been edited by Bad Omen (edited 01-19-2000).]