Talk:P-38 Lightning

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[edit] Turbo/supercharger

Anyone know if the p-38 was super or turbocharged?

It had a mechanically-driven supercharger combined with a turbosupercharger, so you could say "both". This was common practice with WW2 turbo engines. --172.178.71.38 19:52, 3 May 2004 (UTC)

Technically, a supercharger derives its boost via an electrical motor, while a turbocharger is powered by a turbine spun by the exhaust gasses. Certain aircraft such as the Spitfire have a supercharger, alternatively called a "blower" that is powered by an electric motor. The P-38's charger is powered by an exhaust-driven turbine. Hence, it has a turbocharger, not a supercharger. Esoterically, in aviation motors, there is enough of a difference that using the term "supercharger" alone will cause confusion.

Close but incorrect. In a modern definition (which I think is a source of much confusion for aviation enthusiasts), the supercharger is driven by the engine (not by an electrical motor) while the turbocharger is driven by exhaust gas. However, the original definition of supercharging simply meant that the air pressure in the intake manifold was above atmospheric pressure. The superchargers themselves could be gear-driven (modern "supercharger") and exhaust-driven (modern "turbocharger"). Most WWII aircraft engines called "turbosupercharged" (including Allison V-1710, if I'm not mistaken) actually had both a gear-driven supercharger and an exhaust-driven turbosupercharger. For a good contemporary discussion of this, see http://rwebs.net/avhistory/opsman/geturbo/geturbo.htm - Emt147 Burninate! 03:57, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
Probably the easiest way to tell if an aircraft is using a geared supercharger only or a turbosupercharger is to examine the exhaust stacks. Turbosupercharged engines route all exhaust gases through the turbo and usually have only one or two exhausts per engine or no obvious exhausts at all (e.g. B-17, P-38, P-47). Aircraft with only gear-driven superchargers have multiple exhausts, often one per cylinder (e.g. Spitfire, P-51, Bf 109, Fw 190, Yak-1/3/9, and so on... much more common in WWII). Another (albeit more subjective) method is to note the loudness of the exhaust because the turbo acts as a muffler while gear supercharged-only aircraft often have straight exhaust with pipe length measured in inches. From personal experience, I can vouch that a B-17 with four turbosupercharged engines is significantly quieter than a single-engined trainer like a T-6. - Emt147 Burninate! 04:39, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Glacier girl

memo (to myself?): this article would benefit from adding the story of the "Glacier girl". BACbKA 17:49, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

The '38 is commonly said to be turbosupercharged, or turbocharged... Also, shouldn't the ref to the Army can opener and Walther be on a disambiguation page...? --squadfifteen 3/10/05

[edit] Atalanta

Disambig page "Atlanta" links here, but doesn't mention Lockheed's original name, Atalanta... Trekphiler 08:10, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Lots of detail, but the article could use a clean up

Hi:

Great article and thanks to all the people who contributed a wealth of detail. The article could use a general neatening up to make it an easier read as there are an unending string of two sentence paragraphs in the middle.

[edit] Model 222 turbo intercooler flaws

Article: "However, the turbocharger intercooler system that had been housed in the leading edges of the wings had proven vulnerable to combat damage, and could explode if the wrong series of controls were mistakenly activated. Ultimately, they were inefficient, and so engine fit was rethought."

I haven't heard anything on how the wing-mounted intercoolers could explode under improper use. The turbos in the P-38 prior to the "H" model did have a danger in overspeeding, but this danger applied to the turbine itself, not the intercoolers in the wings. What I have heard, however, is that a severe backfire (a somewhat common occurance in the plane) could deform the leading edge of the wing as the blast went through the intercooler.
Yeah, that makes more sense. An intercooler is just a fancy radiator. - Emt147 Burninate! 02:37, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] (USAAF, as the designation USAAC had been changed in the interim)?

I don't understand what changed. The Air Corps was planes, pilots, etc. The Air Force included also support such as doctors, similar to the present-day service of that name. David R. Ingham 23:45, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

The Air Corps became a combat arm (such as infantry and artillery) in 1941 but had no organizations after June 20, 1941. Flying units were part of the US Army Air Forces. Similarly, the infantry had no organizations per se--those were part of the US Army Ground Forces. Between 1935 and 1941 the Air Corps had actually split in two as a precursor to this--the GHQ Air Force (later called Air Force Combat Command) had all the combat planes, units and pilots. It reported directly to the Chief of Staff. The Chief of the Air Corps had all the bases, and procurement-supply-training responsibilities but no control over the combat units.

[edit] Compressability

The Germans seem to have understood compressibility at this time. The Messerschmitt Me 262 was designed not much later and looked like a modern jet. The Messerschmitt Me 163 apparently had high speed stability problems, but that was at higher speed than it was designed for. It, also, had swept wings and a pointed nose. David R. Ingham 23:58, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

From the article on the 262: "The production Me 262 had a leading edge sweep of 18.5° primarily to properly position the center of lift relative to the center of mass and not for the aerodynamic benefit of increasing the critical Mach number of the wing (the sweep was too slight to achieve any significant advantage)" -- early 262-related design work featured a more dramatic sweep, but it's not clear from the article whether the Germans understood compressibility at the time.

[edit] Descendants

Descendants

Direct descendants of the Lockheed P-38, each at the cutting edge of technology in their time, are:

This is a POV unsupported claim. Please explain how any of these aircraft are direct descendants of the P-38. - Emt147 Burninate! 03:41, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

I believe this claim can only be applied to three aircraft:
  • XP-49
  • XP-50
  • Constellation
—Joseph/N328KF (Talk) 05:35, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

The Prototype of the F-22, the YF-22 was called the Lightning II so one could argue that, at least in spirit, it is a descendant of the P-38. The only other link between those aircraft is that they were all designed at the Skunk Works. 70.80.107.221 22:01, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

That's not what "Related aircraft" means. XP-58 was a direct development of the P-38 design. Unless F-22 is a two-boom-and-pod escort fighter powered by turbosupercharged engines, it doesn't count. - Emt147 Burninate! 03:31, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] P-38 and engine failures

Some anon user added this bit:

though the most popular belief states that the P-38 enigines could not handle the European, rain-soaked, low-grade fuel.

The implication is that engines were damaged by detonation. Is there any evidence for this? US aircraft in Soviet service (and later in the war Soviet aircraft as well) used exclusively 100-grade fuel provided by the United States. British aircraft also used high-octane fuels. The only ones who did not were Soviets (early in the war) and Germans (hence their huge-displacement engines).

Anyway, since this claim is unsupported by references and uses weasel words, I pulled it. - Emt147 Burninate! 19:16, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

What may be referenced here is that the ethyl lead in British avgas had a tendency to precipitate out of solution, fouling valves and promoting backfires and detonation.

Has anyone heard of attempts at refitting the aircraft with Rolls Royce Merlin engines, as was done with the Mustang? Seems Merlin equipped Lightnings could have been a winning combination for the 8th Air Force high altitude bomber escort mission. Gjs238 17:20, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

That would be the non-existent P-38K. It demanded too much a change in the airframe to be economical. The production line would have to been shut down an re-tooled to create what would essentially be a new airplane, and wartime urgency prevented that.
The article describes the P-38K differently: There were two P-38Ks developed in 1942-1943. The first was a modified P-38E with the Hamilton Standard propellers being fitted to the P-47 and the new intercoolers being developed for the P-38J, its performance led to the development on the second aircraft. A modified P-38G (re-designated P-38K-1-LO) was fitted with the propellers and a new Allison engine with 100 more bhp than even the later P-38L. In tests it was rated at 432MPH in Military Power and predicted to exceed 450MPH in War Emergency Power with a similar increase in rate of climb, load, ceiling and range. However, the War board refused the change due to the 2-3 week shutdown of the Lightning production line needed to redesign the cowlings to fit the new engine. Gjs238 10:05, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Yet there is an external link at the foot of the article titled "What Ever Happened to the P-38K?" that describes the Rolls-Royce Merlin XX proposal.
Thanks  :-) Gjs238 22:42, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Dead link

During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!

maru (talk) contribs 00:16, 14 June 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Fork-Tailed Devil

Luftwaffe did not call the P-38 a fork-tailed devil. They called it a preferred target, thanks to it's size and lack of maneuverability. P-38 was a much feared ground attack plane, and it's possible German ground forces called it that, but not Luftwaffe. The term first appears in a Stars And Stripes article about P-38Gs in North Africa, so it's possible the term has been coined for propaganda purposes by a journalist working for the magazine, or it has been heard from a German POW.

Please state your surname. Both the Germans and the Japanese had names that refered to hatred toward the Lightning, because of its effectiveness and speed. I dunno about "fortailed devil". Oyo321 23:48, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hideous

If there's an award for most ugly, long-winded, unformatted article, this is a candidate.

Someone should reformat it, at the very least. --Kaz 01:51, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, having glanced at the P-51 article, I noticed it's similarly ugly (not quite as bad, but along the same lines), and I'm suspecting that this is a trend with these aircraft articles. If so, perhaps a new format which still allows all of the data to be presented could be invented. Or more sub-articles created, for whatever info couldn't be formatted more prettily than endless long paragraphs. --Kaz 17:41, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bailout procedures

One of the contributing factors to the P-38's somewhat spotty reputation among new pilots was the rumor that you couldn't successfully bail out of a P-38. While the traditional jump out of the seat would indeed have been fatal, bailing out of a P-38 is no more difficult than other planes (it was just a bit different). This information isn't in the article, and I'd feel it should be included. Problem is, looking over the article, I can't find an appropriate place to mention this.

I would think somewhere under 'Design and development': from what I remember of the WWII Lightning training film I saw some time back the recommendations were to either turn upside down and drop out, or climb out onto the inner wing and slide off the back; the airflow then carried the pilot down below the tail. Mark Grant 02:06, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
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