RAAF Lockheed F-4 Lightning Photo Recon

I've completed my build of the photo reconnaissance version of the P-38E Lightning. The particular version I built was an F-4 Lightning (versus F-4A as often seen) used by The Royal Australian Air Force in 1943.

This has been a fun project that I originally started in 2019 when attempting to build a herd of P-38 kits in 1/48. That effort got as far as completing HobbyBoss's P-38L as a conversion to the P-38M Night Lightning which I completed last year. I had also started this Academy P-38E kit and a Monogram P-38J kit conversion to the Droop Snoot Lightning, both in 2019. The Droop Snoot is still in work. The other three Lightnings have not been started yet except for some minor cockpit work.

I finally came back to this late last year, then switched gears for a while to complete my Airfix Lockheed Hudson project after about a month of working on it.

The Aircraft And A Brief History:
This aircraft started life as P-38E Lightning serial number 41-2144. I am not sure when the conversion to a photo recon bird occurred but it would have been in 1942. Due to the RAAF being woefully short of aircraft at the beginning of the Pacific war, the US Army Air Force at Eagle Farm in Brisbane transferred two F-4 Lightnings to the RAAF #1 PRU Squadron in early 1943 or possibly late 1942.

Serviceability issues with these two aircraft (designated A55-1 and A55-2) led to the request for a third aircraft which is the subject of this build and this was designated A55-3. There is a bit of confusion about the serial number of this aircraft as the status card for A55-3 states it was 41-2122, however there is enough evidence shown in the article on https://www.adastron.com/lockheed/lightning/serials.htm that I believe the 41-2144 serial is the correct number.

A55-3 was transferred to Coomalie Creek, Northwest Territories on March 16, 1943 and test flown four days later. Photo recon missions began immediately after that, but by March 22, there were indications of serviceability issues with the intercooler system. This is believed to have been a problem with all the early Lightnings due in part to their complex nature and requirements and the poor conditions at Coomalie Creek.

RAAF HQ had signaled that the intercooler system was unserviceable after only 16 hours of flight time on March 22. I am not sure what happened in the immediate aftermath of this as additional flights were made during the remainder of the month and into April when A55-3 was grounded for leaking intercoolers.

From available evidence, it is believed that this is when the starboard wing leading edge intercooler was replaced. Photographs taken of A55-3 in May show the wing leading edge has been replaced with what is a darker color part. It is believed this leading edge intercooler was sent from USAAF stock in Eagle Farm and retained the original Olive Drab coloring. You can see in the photos that the Australian national insignia was not resprayed after this replacement.

After this repair, the aircraft continued flying missions as well as other flights (including several test flights indicating other maintenance issues) from May 8 through September 20 including a photoshoot from a Wirraway trainer in late May. This photoshoot is where all the great shots of this aircraft come from.

On September 20, the aircraft was transferred to Townsville for repairs and returned on November 2. Material available on the Internet has led to some confusion about a possible belly landing on Nov 1, however more recent evidence as well as the fact that the aircraft flew operationally on November 5 has more or less proven that false.

Additional missions were flown until December 10 when the aircraft was forced to belly land due to a hydraulic failure not allowing the gear to extend down and lock. The crash damaged the aircraft beyond the ability of the facility to repair and it was designated as a component aircraft, to be used to keep other aircraft serviceable.

On February 8, 1944, the aircraft was condemned and salvaged. Supposedly, the wreckage had been transferred to the Darwin Aviation Museum, however, I wrote them and have not been able to verify this.

The Kit:
I built this project from the Academy 1/48 scale P-38E Lightning, using the CMK F-4 Lightning PR nose conversion for the Tamiya P-38F kit. An Aires cockpit was substituted for the kit cockpit which was weak on detail. Quickboost turbochargers and small boom intakes replaced the kit parts as well.

Because the aircraft is displayed in flight with the gear doors closed, the weakly detailed landing gear wells were not a problem. The boom oil cooler intakes below the propellers are simple depressions on the model. There is no detail in the boom radiator housings.

Surface detail is limited to panel lines and a few fasteners. The model is fairly easy to assemble and except for a lack of detail, fairly accurate.

The Build:
I wanted to depict this Lightning in the final stages of its last flight as the pilot is attempting the belly landing. The starboard engine has just stopped after the prop has hit the ground and the blades have begun to bend at the tips. I took a bit of artistic liberty here because I do not know the actual circumstances of the crash other than what I relate here.

The maintenance manual states that the main canopy top should be jettisoned prior to landing and the windows rolled down to aid in egress from the aircraft after it has stopped moving. It also calls for dropping the belly tanks but photographic evidence shows that the drop tanks are still in place on the downed aircraft.

Because the aircraft is landing, I had to modify the model to have extended Fowler flaps. The lack of external detail on the kit caused me to want to add riveting which was accomplished using scans of rivet decals made for the Tamiya P-38F as a measurement guide for laying out the patterns and then performing the riveting using a rivet wheel.

The oil cooler intakes were opened up and screens added to better detail this area. The radiator housings on the booms were given some detailing on the inside to spruce them up. The Tamiya pilot from my recent P-51B Mustang kit was modified to fit in the Aires cockpit. To give the appearance of flight, the port propeller was modified to simulate spinning blades using clear acetate and lightly sprayed with black and yellow.

Getting the Aires cockpit to fit, like most Aires cockpit sets, was a challenge requiring lots of grinding away of the resin and the kit nose gear well. The CMK resin nose fit fairly well, but a few shims were needed to get it to align on the Academy fuselage and some shaping of the nose to blend into the fuselage. The mounting surface on the resin was different from the matching area on the kit, but represented a better opening for the nose compartment access, so some plastic was added to the kit to fill in the empty spaces.

For the base, I glued two pieces of pink insulation foam together and then from that cut out the final size of the base. The edges were sanded square on a bench belt sander and covered with balsa sheeting after the top landscaping was added, painted, and weathered.

The landscaping was added by covering first with Sculptamold (probably unnecessary, but I am new to dioramas). Then AK landscaping acrylic pastes (Light Earth and Concrete) were added. After these dried, I covered the dirt area with thinned PVA glue and used a sandy medium I found at Michael's Art Store. All of this was painted with Mr Surfacer 1500 black and then painted with various brown and gray Tamiya paints. This was overcoated with a gloss clear and the oil washes were used to enhance details. A flat clear finished it off and then a small amount of dry brushing with lighter colors. Finally, I added some tufts of grass from various supplies I had on hand as well as a few small stones from my yard.

Because the model is supported by a brass rod, I had to first embed a piece of wood in the foam before doing the landscaping. This provides the necessary strength to properly support the model. Milliput was added behind the cockpit in the model for the other end of the brass rod. This was done before the fuselage was closed up.

Additional photos of this project can be found in the Pacific Theater group at https://imodeler.com/groups/the-80th-anniversary-of-the-attack-on-pearl-harbor/forum/topic/raaf-lockheed-f-4-lightning/

I hope you all enjoy the photos of the build.

13 additional images. Click to enlarge.