The P-38J and L in the European theater.

GregP · Oct 23, 2017

Graugeist, ALL combat planes got shot down. That says nothing about either plane. It should not come as a surprise that B-17s shot down Bf 109s. That doesn't mean the B-17 was a fighter or better. Even Coronados shot down fighters.

Any P-38, even the prototype P-3.8, should be able to outroll and out-turn an Me-262. The Me 262 was faster and, if one of his cannon shells hit, you were in real trouble. And the P-38, while not the most agile plane on the planet, wasn't bad at a turning fight. A LOT of Japanese pilots found that out.

DerAdlerIstGelandet · Oct 23, 2017

GregP said:
Graugeist, ALL combat planes got shot down. That says nothing about either plane. It should not come as a surprise that B-17s shout down Bf 109s. That doesn't mean the B-17 was a fighter or better. Even Coronados shot down fighters.

Any P-38, even the prototype P-3.8, should be able to outroll and out-turn an Me-262. The Me 262 was faster and, if one of his cannon shells hit, you were in real trouble. ANd the P-38, while not the most agile plane on the planet, wasn't bad at a turning fight. A LOT of Japanese pilots found that out.

Which post are you responding to?

swampyankee · Oct 24, 2017

Germany had finite resources. What's being given up to get more fighters or to have them cover a smaller area? Do you pull them from air combat on the Eastern Front? Reduce production of night fighters?

GregP · Oct 24, 2017

Sorry, I started reading the post again and responded to post #18. Old news. Please disregard as the reply was overtaken by pages of later posts.

I'm one of the people who thinks the P-38 is very unjustly maligned for a mount that spawned our two top aces. They showed clearly, at least to me, that if you are a decent pilot, know your aircraft and the weakness of your enemy, success is not only possible, but likely.

These tactics are better suited to the PTO where smaller groups of planes fought each other than to the large melees of the ETO on escort missions. But I do not think Bong and McGuire would be meat on the table for anyone had they been flying in the ETO.

Conslaw · Nov 3, 2017

timmy said:
The question that we never really got answered

Can a Good TWIN ENGINE fighter match a Good SINGLE ENGINE fighter ??????

The closest we got was the P-38L. Sadly we never got to see it against quality opposition
No doubt it was devastating when it had a clear performance advantage against its opposition (A6M)
But how would it go against a Dora with the same performance numbers? With the boosted ailerons
could the P38 now dogfight? Or is it a case with physics that something so large and has such a large
target area is always going to be more venerableit
Just another point. I'm sure I read somewhere that the late model P38 had a range as far as 2500 miles
Is this true? If so why didn't they use it to escort the long range B29's

To answer why the P-38 never escorted the B-29, you have to look at the geography. At 1500 miles one-way, the Marianas were too far for any fighter, including the P-38. When the US took Iwo Jima, call it 750 miles away, the P-51 was a better fit for Iwo's small airfield and limited support facilities. You have to remember, that for every P-38 you can devote to bomber escort missions, you could allocate more than two Mustangs. By the time Okinawa and neighboring ie Shima were secure and available (May-June 1945) the P-47N was coming into the theater. The P-47N was

timmy said:

The question that we never really got answered

Can a Good TWIN ENGINE fighter match a Good SINGLE ENGINE fighter ??????

The closest we got was the P-38L. Sadly we never got to see it against quality opposition
No doubt it was devastating when it had a clear performance advantage against its opposition (A6M)
But how would it go against a Dora with the same performance numbers? With the boosted ailerons
could the P38 now dogfight? Or is it a case with physics that something so large and has such a large
target area is always going to be more venerable against single engine fighters?

Just another point. I'm sure I read somewhere that the late model P38 had a range as far as 2500 miles
Is this true? If so why didn't they use it to escort the long range B29's

Click to expand...

To answer why the P-38 never escorted the B-29, you have to look at the geography. At 1500 miles one-way, the Marianas were too far for any fighter, including the P-38. When the US took Iwo Jima, call it 750 miles away, the P-51 was a better fit for Iwo's small airfield and limited support facilities. You have to remember, that for every P-38 you can devote to bomber escort missions, you could allocate more than two Mustangs. By the time Okinawa and neighboring ie Shima were secure and available (May-June 1945) the P-47N was coming into the theater. The P-47N was quite simply a better long-range escort fighter than the P-38. For one thing, it was much more comfortable for the pilot, with more room and better cockpit heating. Secondly, there wasn't a huge sustained demand for fighter esort for the B-29s. By the time Iwo Jima's airfields were ready, Curtis Lemay, had already determined that high altitude day bombing by the B-29 was not very effective, so he switched primarily to night bombing from low level. No escorts were needed for this type of mission.

The P-51s from Iwo Jima had trouble effectively escorting the B-29. The difference in cruise speeds between the fighters and the bombers, combined with the long distance and high-velocity winds aloft made it hard for the P-51s to rendezvous with the bombers. P-38s would have had the same problem.

A small number of P-38s deployed to ie Shima shortly before the end of the war. I believe they had a few tactical missions, but the P-47N did most of the heavy lifting on tactical missions for the last two months of the war.

drgondog · May 14, 2018

GregP said:
Hi Bill, With respect back at you, the P-38 does NOT continue to dive after starting one. I've seen WAY too many P-38 8,000 foot dives to believe that one. Ask Steve Hinton who flies one. The answer is simple to me, don't dive away with the Germans until problems set in ... stay around and fight. We probably will never see this one from the same perspective, Bill, but since it's a "what if," there is no real-world data to corroborate either theory; late model P-38's didn't mix it up in the ETO much. The P-38 needed to get pretty fast to hit critical Mach, so the P-38 pilots, like the Luftwaffe, KNEW when they were approaching the limit or SHOULD have. Your theory (diving with the Luftwaffe fighters) is no doubt correct for the guys who were flying P-51's, and they did quite well at it. Had they been flying P-38's I doubt the same tactics would have been employed. It's OK and not worth much discussion since it's a "what if" anyway. I don't feel like even starting a mild disagreement over the point ... I just feel that, if the situation had occurred, they would have found a way to stay around and fight just as the P-47 guys used different tactics from the P-51 guys. As long as the Germans were diving away from bomber attack, the escort job was done anyway.

Since it IS a "what if," I'd like to have seen a P-38 with 2 - 3% thinner wing and 2-stage Merlins in it, coupled with a serious program to shed weight. But, it never happened, so is a pipe dream. I can draw one, but that won't make it magically appear ...

Hi Greg - Don't know if I responded to this before. The P-38G/H/early J had the major dive control compressibility issue when initiating dive at high speed above 20K. Immediate onset drag rise/compressibility and shock wave creating pitch down moment - not recoverable until well into denser air. Intitiating a dive at 15K did not cause that issue.

The dive flap, while not called a dive brake, changed the CP immediately and much delayed onset compressibility as the P-38 moved into denser air. Ergo - and increased drag to delay the speed increase, smaller pitch down moment was still created - but controllable.

BTW, the P-47 experienced similar issues of pitch down but always more controllable from high to medium altitudes. The Mustang CP was well aft of 25% chord (major advantage of low drag wing) and thus did not have that issue. NAA did design a dive flap similar to P-38 and P-47 but dive tests were not sufficiently favorable to introduce into the production wing for any version of the 51.

drgondog · May 14, 2018

tomo pauk said:
Re #1: By late 1943, the W. Allies were using the same fuel - 100/130 grade? The different fuels were thing of 1938-41 era?

Re #4: The fix was to equip the pilots with electricaly-heated suit, that was helped out with having both engines outfitted with generators? Only one generator per P-38 was in earlier versions. The socket rheostat were provided for the suit. The basic, hot air heating system, was also improved?

Tomo - do you know details regarding the introduction (model, timing of field mods, timing of 1st production release) for the socket rheostat?

tomo pauk · May 14, 2018

drgondog said:
Tomo - do you know details regarding the introduction (model, timing of field mods, timing of 1st production release) for the socket rheostat?

No, unfortunately I don't have the details.

EverKing · Jun 12, 2018

drgondog said:
Tomo - do you know details regarding the introduction (model, timing of field mods, timing of 1st production release) for the socket rheostat?

The pilot's manual simply says "Late airplanes" or "later J Models." As best I can find, this corresponds with the J-15 (which added the second generator on the RH engine as well as other improvements) beginning with #42-103979 and would have reached combat operations in Early '44 (January or February). Bong and Lynch were both flying J-15s of this production block in Feb./March '44 (Lynch was lost in #42-103987 on March 8 and Bong's most famous "Marge" was #42-103993 and was lost in the hands of another pilot shortly thereafter). When the second generator was added they added the plug for the heated flying suit (or perhaps shortly thereafter?) as well as electric gun heaters which allowed them to re-route the LH blast heat from the armament compartment to the cockpit, essentially doubling the available heat (the RH blast heat always went to the cockpit).

And, yes, Tomo, it's me...the same Lightning obsessed EverKing from that other forum. I'm doing research for the next few chapters of the story and stumbled on this thread. Still reading through it, there is a lot of discussion to catch up on.

tomo pauk · Jun 12, 2018

EverKing said:
...

And, yes, Tomo, it's me...the same Lightning obsessed EverKing from that other forum. I'm doing research for the next few chapters of the story and stumbled on this thread. Still reading through it, there is a lot of discussion to catch up on.

Wow! Welcome to the home, man

redcoat · Jun 12, 2018

FLYBOYJ said:
No more than single engine fighters, you just had to do the same thing twice (and at the same time) and this would be typical for any twin engine fighter.

When you are being bounced by enemy fighters having to do things twice is a luxury you don't really have time for.

20th Fighter Group Headquarters APO 637 U.S. Army(E-2)3 June 1944Subject: P-38 Airplane in Combat. To: Commanding General, VIII Fighter Command, APO 637, U.S. Army.1. The following observations are being put in writing by the undersigned at the request of the Commanding General, VII FC. They are intended purely as constructive criticism and are intended in anyway to "low rate" our present equipment.2. After flying the P-38 for a little over one hundred hours on combat missions it is my belief that the airplane, as it stands now, is too complicated for the 'average' pilot. I want to put strong emphasis on the word 'average', taking full consideration just how little combat training our pilots have before going on as operational status.3. As a typical case to demonstrate my point, let us assume that we have a pilot fresh out of flying school with about a total of twenty-five hours in a P-38, starting out on a combat mission. He is on a deep ramrod, penetration and target support to maximum endurance. He is cruising along with his power set at maximum economy. He is pulling 31" Hg and 2100 RPM. He is auto lean and running on external tanks. His gun heater is off to relieve the load on his generator, which frequently gives out (under sustained heavy load). His sight is off to save burning out the bulb. His combat switch may or may not be on. Flying along in this condition, he suddenly gets "bounced", what to do flashes through his mind. He must turn, he must increase power and get rid of those external tanks and get on his main. So, he reaches down and turns two stiff, difficult gas switches {valves} to main - turns on his drop tank switches, presses his release button, puts the mixture to auto rich (two separate and clumsy operations), increases his RPM, increases his manifold pressure, turns on his gun heater switch (which he must feel for and cannot possibly see), turns on his combat switch and he is ready to fight. At this point, he has probably been shot down or he has done one of several things wrong. Most common error is to push the throttles wide open before increasing RPM. This causes detonation and subsequent engine failure. Or, he forgets to switch back to auto rich, and gets excessive cylinder head temperature with subsequent engine failure.4. In my limited experience with a P-38 group, we have lost as least four (4) pilots, who when bounced, took no immediate evasive action. The logical assumption is that they were so busy in the cockpit, trying to get organized that they were shot down before they could get going.5. The question that arises is, what are you going to do about it? It is standard procedure for the group leader to call, five minutes before R/V and tell all the pilots to "prepare for trouble". This is the signal for everyone to get into auto rich, turn drop tank switches on, gun heaters on, combat and sight switches on and to increase RPM and manifold pressure to maximum cruise. This procedure, however, does not help the pilot who is bounced on the way in and who is trying to conserve his gasoline and equipment for the escort job ahead.6. What is the answer to these difficulties? During the past several weeks we have been visited at this station time and time again by Lockheed representatives, Allison representatives and high ranking Army personnel connected with these two companies. They all ask about our troubles and then proceed to tell us about the marvelous mechanisms that they have devised to overcome these troubles that the Air Force has turned down as "unnecessary". Chief among these is a unit power control, incorporating an automatic manifold pressure regulator, which will control power, RPM and mixture by use of a single lever. It is obvious that there is a crying need for a device like that incombat.7. It is easy to understand why test pilots, who have never been in combat, cannot readily appreciate what each split second means when a bounce" occurs. Every last motion when you get bounced is just another nail in your coffin. Any device which would eliminate any of the enumerated above, are obviously very necessary to make the P-38 a really effective combat airplane.8. It is also felt that that much could done to simplify the gas switching system in this airplane. The switches {valve selector handles} are all in awkward positions and extremely hard to turn. The toggle switches for outboard tanks are almost impossible to operate with gloves on.9. My personal feeling about this airplane is that it is a fine piece of equipment, and if properly handled, takes a back seat for nothing that the enemy can produce. But it does need simplifying to bring it within the capabilities of the 'average' pilot. I believe that pilots like Colonel Ben Kelsey and Colonel Cass Huff are among the finest pilots in the world today. But I also believe that it is difficult for men like them to place their thinking and ability on the level of a youngster with a bare 25 hours in the airplane, going into his first combat. That is the sort of thinking that will have to be done, in my opinion, to make the P-38 a first-class all around fighting airplane .HAROLD J. RAUColonel, Air Corps,

drgondog · Jun 13, 2018

EverKing said:
The pilot's manual simply says "Late airplanes" or "later J Models." As best I can find, this corresponds with the J-15 (which added the second generator on the RH engine as well as other improvements) beginning with #42-103979 and would have reached combat operations in Early '44 (January or February). Bong and Lynch were both flying J-15s of this production block in Feb./March '44 (Lynch was lost in #42-103987 on March 8 and Bong's most famous "Marge" was #42-103993 and was lost in the hands of another pilot shortly thereafter). When the second generator was added they added the plug for the heated flying suit (or perhaps shortly thereafter?) as well as electric gun heaters which allowed them to re-route the LH blast heat from the armament compartment to the cockpit, essentially doubling the available heat (the RH blast heat always went to the cockpit).

And, yes, Tomo, it's me...the same Lightning obsessed EverKing from that other forum. I'm doing research for the next few chapters of the story and stumbled on this thread. Still reading through it, there is a lot of discussion to catch up on.

Thanks for the reply. During your research have you managed to uncover either the first Depot mod timing (either US or UK) for the 55 Gallon LE Kits, and 2.) the number of 55 gallon LE kits sent to UK and 3.) the serial number or block to have the 55 gallon tanks installed on Burbank line?

Regards,

Bill

EverKing · Jun 13, 2018

tomo pauk said:
Wow! Welcome to the home, man

Thanks, I think I will enjoy being here. It is right up my alley.

redcoat said:
When you are being bounced by enemy fighters having to do things twice is a luxury you don't really have time for.

Yup, Rau's letter is a bit of the "gold standard" for P-38 researchers trying to understand the contemporary experiences at that time, c. March 1944.

The most interesting bit from that letter was the mention of the "Unit Control" system for the engine. It wasn't unheard of at the time for Fighter aircraft to have these systems. Republic built a simple one for the P-47 which used a simple push-rod interlink to tie the throttle and RPM levers together (which also controlled the turbo-supercharger through the automatic turbo-regulator). Of course, the best system in the early '40's was the one in the FW-190 which had what amounted a to a mechanical computer to tie all the engine controls together into a single lever. From what I have read, the FW system was so reliable, in fact, that they did not even include individual controls for each system. Allison eventually added a similar system to the V-1710-G series engines on the F-82 but that was too late to help the P-38.

drgondog said:
Thanks for the reply. During your research have you managed to uncover either the first Depot mod timing (either US or UK) for the 55 Gallon LE Kits, and 2.) the number of 55 gallon LE kits sent to UK and 3.) the serial number or block to have the 55 gallon tanks installed on Burbank line?

Regards,

Bill

I do not have the specific dates and details for the Outer Wing tank installation but it appears that some of the J-5s received field modification kits and some of the J-10s had them installed at the modification center--in both cases, specific numbers are hard if not impossible to come by. They became standard factory installations with the J-15. It seems around this time is also when they changed the fuel management/tank-switching system to incorporate the OW tanks into the main tank selector valves by installing five position switches with the OW position completing an electrical circuit to activate the tanks; prior to this accessing the fuel in the tanks was handled through an added on switch box to the pilot's left, near the external store (bomb/tank) switch box.

Regarding the central question of the thread: the P-38 was in a strange juxtaposition in Western Europe at the time. It held its greatest advantage over German A/C above 20,000 feet, and was unmatched by LW fighters above about 25,000 (until high-altitude planes like the Ta-152); but, and here's the rub, that is also where the P-38 experienced the most trouble (engine, cockpit, etc.). At high speed and altitude it could turn inside the FW-190 (but prior to the boosted ailerons could still not out-roll it which sometimes made it impossible to "catch up" in a turn even with the smaller radius) but in order to keep that advantage it needed to maintain both speed and altitude. The problem here is that at these high altitudes it was capable of getting close to its .68 Mach critical speed even in level flight. So, it couldn't really go faster but neither could it slow down and hold its advantage. Now, that changed a little with the J-25 and L but the issues of approaching Crit.Mach remained. What the boosted ailerons and Dive Recover Flaps allowed, however, was some ability to follow the E/A down when they tried to Split-S away and escape. Combine that with increased pilot experience and better indoctrination (assuming the 8AF would have done so had they kept the P-38 in wider use) and I see no reason the late model Lightnings wouldn't have been able to own the vertical in Europe the same as they did in the PTO.

It is hard to say how much impact this would have had, other than giving the Lightning a chance to redeem itself slightly and start to dig out of its poor Kill Ratio pit in Western Europe. Of course, even without the improvements, simply sticking around to take on the increasingly fewer and less skilled LW would have helped improve the Kill Ratio. There is a big difference between even December '43, when the 20th FG and 55 FG would often face a highly experienced enemy out numbered as much as 5:1, and June of '44 when the VIII FC groups could out number the enemy in their own airspace, and January '45 when the LW could barely sortie any full groups and they mostly filled by green pilots.

FLYBOYJ · Jun 13, 2018

redcoat said:
When you are being bounced by enemy fighters having to do things twice is a luxury you don't really have time for.

And with training you compensate for that very easily. That memo (the infamous Col. Rau memo) you posted has been flung around this forum for years, I'd invite you to see older comments. It was evident the leadership of that command did not like or want the P-38. With that said I'm sure 9th AF P-38s were "bounced" many times in combat and managed quite well. I don't know if you ever flown an airplane but its obvious a twin is more difficult than a single engine aircraft, but again, if you train and understand the limitations as well as the advantages of your aircraft, those extra controls will be seamless.

I'd invite you to read this article. http://www.historynet.com/p-38-flunked-europe.htm

eagledad · Jun 13, 2018

Drgondog and EverKing,

From Warbird Tech Series Lockheed P-38 Lightning , Vol 2, by Frederick Johnson, pg31, "The inclusion of the leading edge tanks was scheduled to begin on the assembly line with the Lightning bearing Lockheed number 422-3513 (AAF 43-28498). The reference for the previous line is from "Field Service Facts" Lockheed-Vega Customer Service Division, Nov 19, 1943.

From the Mighty Eighth War Manual by Roger Freeman pg 185
42 leading edge tanks were fitted to(P-38) in the last week of the year (1943)and during the next two months 120 P-38Js were processed,

FYI

Eagledad

Tieleader · Jun 13, 2018

FLYBOYJ said:
And with training you compensate for that very easily. That memo (the infamous Col. Rau memo) you posted has been flung around this forum for years, I'd invite you to see older comments. It was evident the leadership of that command did not like or want the P-38. With that said I'm sure 9th AF P-38s were "bounced" many times in combat and managed quite well. I don't know if you ever flown an airplane but its obvious a twin is more difficult than a single engine aircraft, but again, if you train and understand the limitations as well as the advantages of your aircraft, those extra controls will be seamless.

I'd invite you to read this article. http://www.historynet.com/p-38-flunked-europe.htm

Really informative article.Thanks!

GregP · Jun 14, 2018

A lot of the guys who actually flew it in combat don't seem to agree with that article, but some do. The article was written by someone with an agenda. I surmise the P-38 had some issues and whether or not it did bad things while you were flying it had a lot to do with your opinion of it.

I know people who can break a wheelbarrow and ruin hot water soup as well as people who can actually make a bad engine run just right. One might hate the P-38 and the other might like it a lot. I have no dog in the hunt because I have never flown one, but they fly just fine today, with very few engine issues. These are the same engines used in WWII, flown with knowledge of how they like to be operated.

The horror stories can be made to come true or avoided for exceptionally long periods of time ... longer than most Merlins before overhaul, in fact. Depends on how you treat the engines. You can kill 'em or make 'em love you, and can also be "average" and get average engine life.

In the war, Merlins proved themselves tens of thousands of times, with fewer cases of engines coming apart. But the Allison is not a bad engine, by any means. And the P-38 was, in real life, the plane our two top aces flew, so it can't be all bad, and wasn't all good, either. Neither were most other service fighters. Too bad there aren't more surviving and flying today ... only 11 or so committing aviation on a regular basis.

GrauGeist · Jun 14, 2018

redcoat said:
When you are being bounced by enemy fighters having to do things twice is a luxury you don't really have time for.

That didn't seem to be a problem with the Mossie's crews...

drgondog · Jun 14, 2018

GrauGeist said:
That didn't seem to be a problem with the Mossie's crews...

Dave, in fairness to the comparisons, one of the primary issues was the relatively low P-38H and J cruise speeds and that was combined with extremely cold operating environment. Until the J-10 and above the throttle and RPM had to be advanced in a more leisurely time span or risk blowing up the engine. I don't recall the block model J that more or less solved the intercooler and turbo spool up issues

The Mossie, Spit, Mustang operated much closer to combat speeds at 25000 feet in ETO and was able to move from 30+"MP to 61" and 3000 RPM much faster

redcoat · Jun 14, 2018

GrauGeist said:
That didn't seem to be a problem with the Mossie's crews...

Actually it was. If a Mossie got bounced by an enemy single seat fighter in daylight, it had great difficulty in escaping it.
The trick with the Mossie was keeping the speed high and lots of changes in course to prevent interception

The P-38J and L in the European theater.

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