COBI Lockheed P-38 Lightning Set 5882

COBI's Lockheed P-38 Lightning is a 1:48 model built from 332 blocks, 24.5 cm long with a 32 cm wingspan, produced under licence from Lockheed Martin. The propellers rotate and all markings are printed — no stickers.

The cockpit was freezing

Every other fighter of the period had an engine directly in front of the pilot, and a great deal of waste heat came back through the firewall. The P-38's engines are out in the booms, a couple of metres to either side.

Over Europe at 8,000 metres, where the outside air is around minus 50 degrees, pilots were dangerously cold. Cockpit heating was inadequate for years and men landed with frostbite, unable to feel the controls. In the Pacific, where escort missions were flown lower and warmer, the aircraft was loved; in the Eighth Air Force it was not, and the P-38 was largely replaced there by the P-51.

The dive problem

The other difficulty was compressibility. In a steep dive the P-38 approached speeds at which airflow over the wing goes supersonic locally, the centre of pressure shifts, and the nose tucks further down — with the controls locking solid because the elevator is in disturbed air.

Several pilots were killed before the phenomenon was understood; nobody had met it before, because no earlier aircraft was clean enough to get there. The eventual fix was a set of dive recovery flaps under the wings. It is one of the first encounters aviation had with the edge of the sound barrier, and it happened by accident.

In the COBI range

Set 5763 is the P-38H at the larger 1:32 scale with 650 pieces, a pilot figure and a display stand.

Specifications

Pieces: 332 · Scale: 1:48 · Licensed by Lockheed Martin · No stickers
Model dimensions: 24.5 × 32 × 8 cm (9.6 × 12.6 × 3.1 in)