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American Combat Planes of the 20th Century is an incredible reference for anyone who is interested in any American Combat Plane History. There are 758 pages and 1700 b/w photos in this substantial labor of love by Ray Wagner, who has been passionately researching and writing about aircraft for over 50 years. Whether you are already familiar with his past works, or just discovering this accomplished author for the first time... This is the book that you've been waiting for!

If you'd like to see the book's Table of Contents ... Click here. You can also browse the entire Index Section to get an idea of the extensive amount of information that is covered within this book.

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P-38

Page 3

Delivery went ahead with 210 P-38Es and 100 F-4 photo models, which replaced the guns with four K-17 cameras. The first two F-4s were delivered in December 1941, giving the Air Force its first high-speed reconnaissance capability. The first Lightnings deployed to a war theater were F-4s shipped to Australia, where they flew their first missions for the Fifth Air Force April 16, 1942.

LOCKHEED P-38G

To increase the Lightning’s range, Lockheed attached a pair of 75-gallon drop tanks to a P-38E on January 15, 1942, and these were standardized on all F-4s going overseas and on the P-38E’s issued to the squadron dispatched to Alaska. This was much more practical than a still-born project to carry gas for transoceanic deliveries in twin floats, which would require the upswept tail tested on one P-38E in March 1942.

As the first fighter fast enough to encounter compressibility, the P-38 suffered buffeting when diving too steeply, and the first YP-38 lost its tail pulling out of a dive. With a basic airframe speed limit of Mach .73, various fixes had small effect. Deployment into combat was delayed until this problem was alleviated with wing fillets, and until the range could be extended for offensive missions.

The P-38F introduced new Allison F-5s (V-1710-49/53) with B-13 turbos and 1,325 hp for 15 minutes at takeoff, although military power available for 15 minutes at altitude was limited to 1,150 hp by the Lightning’s inadequate engine cooling system. A pair of 165-gallon drop tanks,* or 1,000-pound bombs could be carried. Delivery of 527 P-38F and 20 F-4A models began in March 1942, and maneuvering flaps were introduced with the P-38F-15 block. LOCKHEED P-38J with F-5B

They were followed after June 1942 by 1,082 P-38G-l to G-15 series aircraft with the Allison F-10 (-51/55) engines and under-wing racks for 300-gallon ferry tanks or 1,600-pound bombs.

More power became available with the Allison F-15 (-89/91) yielding 1,425 hp for takeoff, with military power limited to 1,240 hp by the inadequate engine cooling. This power plant was tested on a pre-production P-38H-1 in September 1942, beginning a series known as Model 422, with also introduced a flat 35-pound armor-glass windshield and 182 pounds of cockpit armor.

The cooling limit was overcome by the P-38J, which was distinguished from older models by a new chin intake below the engine, with core-type intercoolers. These allowed the V-1710-89/-91 engines full 1,425-hp military power or a five-minute war-emergency power boost (WE) of 1,600 hp. Ten P-38J-ls were completed, but until more of the new intercoolers were made, Lockheed built 225 P-38H-ls beginning in April 1943, followed by 375 P-38H-5 models whose B-33 turbos with higher manifold pressures raised critical altitude.

Then the assembly line turned, in August 1943, to build 2,960 P-38J-5 to J-25s with the last model adding dive flaps to allow recovery from faster dives. A 55-gallon leading edge fuel tank added in each wing, with two 300-gallon external tanks, increased Lightning ferry range to 2,600 miles at 198 mph. On combat missions, two 165-gallon drop tanks gave the P-38J a radius of 795 miles for fighter sweeps or medium bomber escort. Two 1,000-pound bombs instead of tanks could be carried out to a radius of 375 miles. Two 1,600-pound armor-piercing bombs could also be carried. LOCKHEED P-38H-5

One Lightning was completed as the XP-38K, with 1,425 hp V-1710-75/77 Allisons and larger, 12-foot 6-inch, propellers. In June 1944, the P-38L appeared with 1,475-hp Allison F-30 engines, and could add fittings under the wing for ten 5-inch rockets. Before the war’s end halted Lightning production in August 1945, 3,810 P-38L-LOs had been built at the Burbank factory. Two thousand P-38L-VNs had been ordered June 26, 1944, from Consolidated-Vultee’s Nashville plant, but this contract was canceled after 113 were accepted between January and June 1945.

As the fastest strategic reconnaissance type available, unarmed Lightnings also operated on every front. Five K-17 cameras replaced guns in the F-5 series, the first being a single F-5A-2 converted from an F-4 in April 1942, and fitted with two 165-gallon drop tanks. Twenty F-5A-ls preceded the P-38G-1 off the line in June 1942, using the same engine, followed in August by 20 F-5A-3s with B-13 superchargers and by 140 F-5A-l0s beginning in November. Two hundred blue-painted F-5B-ls were essentially P-38J camera versions with an automatic pilot that were delivered from September to December 1943.

All later camera versions were converted at Lockheed’s Modification Center in Dallas, and included 128 F-5Cs with special cameras, a single two-place XF-5D with a Plexiglas nose and three cameras, 205 F-5Es from P-38Js, and some 500 F-5F or F-5Gs from P-38Ls.

Modified Lightnings also tried special attack styles. Two torpedoes were test-dropped from a P-38F-13 in December 1942. The first glazed-nose P-38J “Droop-Snoot”, with a bombardier and Norden bomb sight replacing nose armament, reached the Eighth Air Force on February 28, 1944. They guided formations of conventional P-38Js, each carrying two bombs, on horizontal bombing missions begun April 10, 1944. In 1945, the “Pathfinder” P-38L modification used an APS-15 radar in the nose to guide bomber missions. LOCKHEED P-38J (with “Droop snoot”)

The final Lightning model was the P-38M, a black-painted night fighter with an APS-4 radar under the nose and a radar operator seated behind and above the pilot. This model had been preceded by the modification of two P-38J-20 single-seaters in April 1944 with the radar behind the nose wheel, and a third fitted as a two-seater in September 1944 with the radar on the right wing. A P-38L-5 converted to a night fighter at the Dallas Modification Center was flown February 5, 1945, and 75 similar conversions were ordered as P-38Ms. Weighing 17,646 pounds with combat load, the two-seater’s top speed was reduced from the P-38L’s 414 mph to 391 mph at 27,700 feet for the P-38M. The war ended before the P-38M went overseas, and only four were sent to the 418th FIS on occupation duty in Japan.

By the war’s end, 9,535 fighter and 500 reconnaissance Lightnings had been completed. The average 1944 cost of a P-38 was $97,147 compared to $44,892 for a P-40.

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