P-Weapon Assembly

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Lore & Background

The Lockheed Corporation designed the P-38 in response to a February 1937 specification from the United States Army Air Corps. Circular Proposal X-608 was a set of aircraft performance goals authored by First Lieutenants Benjamin S. Kelsey and Gordon P. Saville for a twin-engined, high-altitude 'interceptor' having 'the tactical mission of interception and attack of hostile aircraft at high altitude.' Forty years later, Kelsey explained that Saville and he drew up the specification using the word 'interceptor' as a way to bypass the inflexible Army Air Corps requirement for pursuit aircraft to carry no more than 500 lb of armament including ammunition, and to bypass the USAAC restriction of single-seat aircraft to one engine. Kelsey was looking for a minimum of 1,000 lb of armament. Kelsey and Saville aimed to get a more capable fighter, better at dog fighting and at high-altitude combat. Specifications called for a maximum airspeed of at least 360 mph at altitude, and a climb to 20,000 ft within six minutes, the toughest set of specifications USAAC had ever presented. Lockheed formed a secretive engineering team to implement the project apart from the main factory; this approach later became known as Skunk Works. The Lockheed design team, under the direction of Hall Hibbard and Clarence 'Kelly' Johnson, considered a range of twin-engined configurations, including both engines in a central fuselage with push–pull propellers. The eventual configuration was rare in contemporary production fighter aircraft design, with the Dutch Fokker G.I heavy fighter, and the later Northrop P-61 Black Widow night fighter and Swedish SAAB 21 having a similar planform. The Lockheed team chose twin booms to accommodate the tail assembly, engines, and turbosuperchargers, with a central nacelle for the pilot and armament.

In Their Own Story

The XP-38 first flew on 27 January 1939 at the hands of Ben Kelsey. Kelsey then proposed a speed dash to Wright Field on 11 February 1939 to relocate the aircraft for further testing. General Henry 'Hap' Arnold, commander of the USAAC, approved of the record attempt and recommended a cross-country flight to New York. The flight set a speed record by flying from California to New York in seven hours and two minutes, not counting two refueling stops. Kelsey flew conservatively for most of the way, working the engines gently, even throttling back during descent to remove the associated speed advantage. Bundled up against the cold, Arnold congratulated Kelsey at Wright Field during his final refueling stop, and said, 'don't spare the horses' on the next leg. After climbing out of Wright Field and reaching altitude, Kelsey pushed the XP-38 to 420 miles per hour. Nearing his destination, Kelsey was ordered by Mitchel Field tower into a slow landing pattern behind other aircraft. Carburetor icing caused it to be brought down short of the Mitchel runway, and it was wrecked. On the basis of the record flight, though, the USAAC ordered 13 YP-38s on 27 April 1939 for US$134,284 each. Lockheed's chief test pilot, Tony LeVier, angrily characterized the accident as an unnecessary publicity stunt, but according to Kelsey, the loss of the prototype, rather than...

Reader's Guide

The P-38 was used most successfully in the Asiatic-Pacific and China Burma India theaters of operation as the aircraft of America's top flying aces: Richard Bong (40 victories), Thomas McGuire (38 victories), and Charles H. MacDonald (27 victories). In the South West Pacific theatre, the P-38 was the primary long-range fighter of United States Army Air Forces until the introduction of large numbers of P-51D Mustangs toward the end of the war. Unusually for an early-war fighter design, both engines were supplemented by turbocharger, making it one of the earliest Allied fighters capable of performing well at high altitudes. The turbosuperchargers also muffled the exhaust, making the P-38's operation relatively quiet. The Lightning was extremely forgiving in flight and could be mishandled without incident in many ways, but the initial rate of roll in early versions was low relative to other contemporary fighters; this was addressed in later variants with the introduction of hydraulically boosted ailerons. The smaller and more streamlined P-51 was significantly faster in a dive, which led to the P-51 replacing the P-38 in most European fighter groups by mid-1944. The P-38 was the only American fighter aircraft in large-scale production throughout American involvement in the war, from the Attack on Pearl Harbor to Victory over Japan Day. Some 1200 Lightnings, about one of every nine, were assigned to aerial reconnaissance, with cameras replacing weapons to become the F‑4 or F‑5 model; in this role, it was one of the most prolific reconnaissance airplanes in the war.

Did You Know?

• The P-38 was the first American fighter to fly faster than 400 mph in level flight.
• The P-38 was the only American fighter aircraft in large-scale production throughout American involvement in the war, from the Attack on Pearl Harbor to Victory over Japan Day.
• The P-38's armament was clustered in the nose, allowing pilots to reliably hit targets at any range up to 1,000 yards, whereas wing guns of other fighters were optimized for a specific range.
• The XP-38 set a speed record by flying from California to New York in seven hours and two minutes, not counting two refueling stops.
• The Lockheed design team worked in a secretive facility that later became known as Skunk Works.