Official FlightLine RC 1600mm P-38 Lightning Thread

[rifleman_btx]

You're right, he was suspose to be there as a strictly observer status. But talked his way into going on missions, from other sources I've also seen he had more than the one mission in the south Pacific. 50 may be a close number however he was to hang back and not join in combat. But when he did and got the kill, that's when the brass said nope sorry time to go home buddy. I've seen that in the history series battle stations, and a documentary called a personal story, the P38 Lightning. And Yeah I did pull that from a Wikipedia page on Lindbergh.

[rifleman_btx]

Charles Lindbergh's involvement with the P-38 is so interesting. I mean, the dude literally doubled the range of the P-38 from 900 miles (round trip) to 1,800 miles. That's so nuts! And when he outlined this to them, the pilots and crew chiefs were in an uproar because they thought those settings would make the engines explode. He shut them all up pretty instantly when he said he was going to be flying alongside them with the new settings. The doubling of any vehicle's range is a massive upgrade, but especially in the situations where the P-38 was expected to perform: the vast expanses of the Pacific and round trips into Germany with the bombers.

Another funny anecdote I remember about Lindbergh and the P-38 was that soon after he arrived in the Pacific he accidentally ran out of fuel in a P-38 on the taxiway. A pilot was furious about this as he was returning from a mission and sucking fumes out of his gas tanks while trying to land. So he storms into the CP and demands to know which idiot (I'm pretty sure he actually used a profanity but can't remember) parked a P-38 on the taxiway, and Charles Lindbergh stood up and took responsibility. The pilot damn near had a heart attack haha.

Yeah I really started liking that paint idea so I mocked it up. I also moved the skull from the radiator to the rudder, and moved "BSM" to the radiator. I think this one might be it. It's much less busy, and uses less black to more effect. Thanks for the help.

That looks good!

[SoLongSidekick]

That looks good!

Thanks! I never like an option that just so happens to also be much less work than other ideas, super lucky. Since I'm going with the yellow instead of the red I think I might keep the engine covers yellow. Actually, since I'm using anti-glare patches and shark mouths there's hardly any of the engine covers visible. I think if it was bright yellow it would look super funky. I haven't really inspected my plane yet, how easy is it to remove the engine covers? Also, what about the nose cone and canopy? The black nose cone will hide the camera I'm putting inside it much better, so that's a nice bonus. I think until I can set up my head tracking system I'll just stuff a temporary vTx in there as well and fly it that way. Eventually I'm going to install a video switch so I can swap between the head tracking view and the nose cone view. Should make landings much easier. This is the only time I've really wished I had a Connex hi-def FPV system. I was planning on waiting until the second generation of the technology came out, especially since I have a massive amount of 5.8 GHz gear. But how amazing would it be to have a 1080p head tracking FPV view?

Final mockup (ha!) posted, changed the spinners just a bit.

[rifleman_btx]

Engine covers come off easy just unscrew the 2 screws and they slide right off. The plastic nose piece is glued so might be a problem if you don't have a way to debond it from the front of the nose. Here's a pic with how deep the glue line goes and the arrangement from the inside. Hope that helps. As for the mockup, very nice indeed, you got a winner there

[SoLongSidekick]

Thanks for the help. Yeah that's a bummer, I definitely want to install a camera in there.

Anyone have any experience or tips as to how to get the nose cap off the easiest?

[rifleman_btx]

Yeah that's one thing I can't help with, as mine blew off in a crash

[SoLongSidekick]

Was it a nose-to-ground impact? Was the foam around it damaged as well?

Sometimes a sharp rap on one end of the item can do the trick.

[rifleman_btx]

Yeah, lost power and she stalled headed in nose first and the front end blew apart

[SoLongSidekick]

So Motion R/C to the rescue, they mentioned a method that my brain just glossed right over. I purchased an extra nose cone with my plane. I wasn't sure exactly why at the time, I just felt like I should. Thank god I did because now that I have an extra one I can cut the existing installed cone in half and then split it to remove it from the plane without damaging it. Then just glue the new one on when I've got the camera installed.

One pretty neat thing is that even though most P-38s had gun cameras installed onto the left drop tank pylon, I have seen quite a few that had them installed in the exact same place I'm mounting one of my FPV cameras. So that's kind of nifty.

My next imminent decision is what kind of camera to put there. I do want to have an HD camera on this setup, and my original plan was to just stick a Mobius on the horizontal stabilizer like I've seen a few of you guys do. But then I thought it might be a good idea to install a Runcam Split in the nose. Then I could reduce my total camera count from 3 to 2, meaning less potential failures. Because I'm gonna have a head tracking camera in the cockpit, a standard FPV camera in the nose (with a switch so I can swap between the two views), and an HD camera on the tail. But if I remove the tail camera I won't get those epic shots with the plane in view. Maybe I'll go nuts and install a Split in the cockpit, and for some flights also mount the tail camera. Would be pretty cool being able to edit an HD video with those two views together. Thoughts?

[SoLongSidekick]

Also, to those of you guys who've added weathering and other paint details to your plane: did you feel the need to completely repaint your plane to get a solid and perfectly smooth base? Depending on how much "gatoring" an individual plane has, I could imagine it would completely negate the realism that weathering adds.

[Arycon]

Also, to those of you guys who've added weathering and other paint details to your plane: did you feel the need to completely repaint your plane to get a solid and perfectly smooth base? Depending on how much "gatoring" an individual plane has, I could imagine it would completely negate the realism that weathering adds.

Nope. I used one coat of polycrylic and worked on top of that once dry. I use chalk pastels for the shading and seal it with Krylon matte clear. The paint wear/chipping is done using Testors Model Master Chrome Silver. I lightly drag it over seam lines in areas, varying the line. I put breaks or spaces in the strokes so it looks more natural. I add larger patches of chrome silver along seam joints. The supercharger exhaust trails are applebarrel black paint thinned and shot through an airbrush.

Good luck with your weathering! Let me know if you have questions.

[OV10]

The supercharger exhaust trails are applebarrel black paint thinned and shot through an airbrush.

The Apple Barrel paint from Walmart is really a pretty decent acrylic paint and not stupid priced like some well known brand name model paints.
I've got about 30 or so 2 ounce bottles covering the military rainbow of colors.:Cool:

[handyman220]

The Apple Barrel paint from Walmart is really a pretty decent acrylic paint and not stupid priced like some well known brand name model paints.
I've got about 30 or so 2 ounce bottles covering the military rainbow of colors.:Cool:

That is the same paints I use, some of the colors are a perfect match for touch up on the out of box paint schemes. :)

[rifleman_btx]

Nice! I'll have to pick up some

[SoLongSidekick]

Just thought I'd share this as I think it's really cool. Gun camera footage of a P-38 raid into Germany, and at 1:30 there is an incredibly impressive display of aerial gunnery. In a left banking turn the P-38 pilot manages to walk hits from the tip of the left wing of a German plane, all the way to the right wing and back. Check it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CP-oDzhBUq8

[crxmanpat]

And the guy at 2:15 went home with some shrubbery! :)

[rifleman_btx]

Yes! Very cool

[SoLongSidekick]

I have really found some amazing things combing through obscure documentaries and stock footage. In fact, it's often repeated that this one shot of Japanese running out of the giant sand bunker on Tarawa is the only footage of the Pacific Campaign that shows both our troops and Japanese troops in the same frame, but I found another clip that also clearly shows close quarters fighting. I really wish I would have kept notes on the really interesting finds.

[SoLongSidekick]

Speaking of something somewhat interesting, see this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x73LJhbrgrU at 8:10

I was under the impression that turning into a dead engine in the P-38 was suicide, much less at such an extreme bank angle.

**EDIT** Also in that same video at 24:00 you can see the dive recovery flaps added to late J models and onward. I had no idea they were mounted under the main wing spar. They're kind of goofy looking haha.

[rifleman_btx]

Yes they were, and the reason was to keep it from pushing them down and damaging the wings or the units, if they were setup like dive bomber brakes, they would have the holes to keep them from being ripped off just as the dive brakes were. If it were me, just seem like the logical place for them. And the man knew what he was doing, because they fixed the serious issues :)