Welchome to my P-40B Show n' Tell.

The names Welch, Taylor, Brown, Rasmussen and Sanders are names commonly known as "the five that got up" on 7 December. What can be lesser known is the details of their aircraft. P-40B "160" is generally regarded as the mount of George Welch, though not conclusively. My OCD is placated by modeling off photos, but a rigid camo and marking specifications and an estimated guess works sometimes.

This is the Airfix kit, painted with Tamiya straight out of the can like a heathen. Finished a few years ago, it's as straight forward as can be. This is one of those aircraft that has a peculiar shape and look, and it seems to be very hard to get. Airfix did a pretty good job and I'm happy with it, but something seems off to me about the nose still. I'm not complaining: I had the Trumpeter kit.

If you want to get technical about it:
-The XP-40 in an early incarnation, in an attempt to reduce drag, had it's carburetor intakes rearranged into fairings around the iconic nose guns. While an intriguing, never before seen idea, the concern over the carburetor ingesting gun blast gasses and particles removed this feature.

-Pre-production P-40s were plagued with ground looping, where a later wing fillet and tail wheel modification were required in-field to adjust, but never fully rid of, the problem.

-Early mark P-40s were severely hampered as a fully maneuverable fighter from certain limitations. It's Allison 1710 was limited to a decreased horsepower rating, and a gravity fed oil tank in the rear prohibited inverted flight, snap rolls, outside loops, and restricted slow rolls.

-Early P-40s had the unique N-2 or 3 reflector gunsight, with the illuminating unit on the cockpit floor and the reflector attached to inside the windscreen. Yes, the problems you can think of with this probably are true.

-The armored glass behind the windscreen was attached at a skewed angle to avoid additional gunsight reflections. This disrupted pilots flight sense, so a line was painted on the glass to show true horizon.

-Early long nose gun blast barrels were plagued by bullets blasting the ends of the barrels, due to engine vibration and flexing barrels. The solution was to... lop the barrels shorter, and reinforced cowlings.

This is another model that shows good references highlight a multitude of details the modeler can add. There's a ton of holes, tabs, wires, data plates, bracers, hinges, rods, doodads and actuators that can be added. Oh, also that wire in the back by the tail wheel is an electrical ground. It kinda just, dangled out there.

Thanks for looking.

8 additional images. Click to enlarge.