World Famous Flying Tigers

Historical Background

Curtiss' P-40 (Hawk 81) was developed from their earlier P-36 Hawk (Hawk 75). In fact the first prototype XP-40 was the 10th production P-36 with the original Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp air-cooled radial engine being replaced with a liquid-cooled, supercharged Allison V-1710 V-12 inline engine and was first flown in October 1938. The original prototype had the coolant radiator placed in the underbelly of the plane, just aft of the wing trailing edge. This however caused a large drag. Curtiss engineers, using data obtained from the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), moved the radiator to the chin position with the air scoop also incorporating the intake for the oil cooler. Improvements to the landing gear fairings and exhaust manifolds also improved the performance and further tests in December 1939 proved that the aircraft could reach 366 mph ( the original prototype can only flew at around 315mph). The Allison V-1710 engine produced around 1,040hp at sea level and at 4,300m, pretty average by the standards of the time and the single-stage supercharger means that it cannot compete with contemporary fighters such as the Bf 109 and was considered unsuitable for the Northwest European Theatre. Consequently, climb performance was also poor for the early P-40s. Later variants which have a more powerful version of the V-1710 engine did however have better capability. However dive acceleration and speed was good, which, in combat, allowed the P-40s to escape the weaker Japanese fighters by simply diving away.

The early P-40s were armed with two 12.7mm M2 machine guns in the nose and two 7.62mm Browning machine guns in each wing. This was later modified to four (and later still, six) 12.7mm M2 machineguns in the wings. The wings are strong, being built from a five-spar structure allowing survival from medium-calibre flak damage and ramming (accidentally or otherwise). Operational range was also superior to the Spitfire and Bf 109 although still short of the Japanese A6M and Ki-43 and Lockheed's P-38. In the Mediterranean and North African theatre, it was considered roughly equal, if not slightly superior, to the Bf 109 and clearly superior against the Italian Fiat G.50 Freccia and Macchi MC.200 Saetta. Against the nimble Japanese fighters, the P-40 cannot match them in a low speed turning dogfight and are best utilised in the 'boom and zoom' tactics, using their superior dive speed, excellent rate of roll and sturdiness. All versions of the P-40 was given the name Warhawk by the USAAC while the British called the early (versions B to C) P-40s as the Tomahawk and the D version onwards as the Kittyhawk.

The early versions of the P-40 can be distinguished from the later versions by having two guns in the nose, with a smaller engine cowling. It was used by the USAAF in defending Pearl Harbor and The Philippines, many being destroyed on the ground. It was also used by the British Desert Air Force in North Africa and Soviet Voyenno-Vosdushnye Sily (VVS) on the Eastern Front. But arguably, the most famous operator of the the P-40, especially the early versions, was the 1st American Volunteer Group (AVG) of the Chinese Air Force, nicknamed The Flying Tigers. The main architect and leader of this group was Colonel Claire Lee Chennault, a former USAAC officer who had worked in China since 1937. Since the United States was not at war with Japan prior to Pearl Harbor, an unpublished Executive Order was signed by President Roosevelt on 15 April 1941 authorising the establishment of an American fighting force within the Chinese Air Force. Pilots, ground crew and administrative personnel were drawn from the USAAC, USN, USMC and some private citizens. Their P-40s were taken from a batch of British orders, convincing the latter to take a later batch of more advanced P-40 variants. The AVG consisted of three squadrons: 1st ('Adam and Eve'), 2nd ('Panda Bears') and 3rd ('Hell's Angels').The P-40s were painted with a shark face on the front of the fuselage, after one of the AVG pilots, Erik Shilling, saw a photograph of a Bf 110 of Zerstorergeschwader 76 in a British magazine. He chalked up a drawing of the shark face on his P-40 to see how it might look and asked for Chennault's permission to use it as his squadron's (3rd Pursuit Squadron) insignia. Chennault instead approved it for use by the whole group, thus cementing the connection between the Flying Tigers and the shark face motif forever.   

The AVG first saw combat on 23 December 1941 when it defended Rangoon, Burma together with Brewster Buffalos of the RAF. The AVG remained in Burma until 27 February 1942 when it pulled back to China, where continued to fight against the Japanese until disbanded and absorbed into the USAAF as the 23rd Fighter Group in Spring 1942. Throughout their existence, the AVG was credited with 229 air-to-air kills, while having 14 pilots KIA, captured or missing. The AVG had better kill/loss ratio than contemporary Allied units mainly due to the use of 'boom-and-zoom' tactics against the more nimble Japanese fighters and also the general obsolescence of the main Japanese fighter at the theatre, the Nakajima Ki-27 'Nate'. In various guises the Flying Tigers survive to this day as the 23rd Wing of the USAF, flying Fairchild Republic A/OA-10 Thunderbolt II attack aircraft and HH-60G Pave Hawk CSAR helicopter and Lockheed HC-130P Combat King CSAR command aircraft.

The Kit

Academy's P-40C kit, released in 2000 is actually a rebox of Hobbycraft's P-40 dating back to 1996. It consists of 65 light grey parts (not all used for the B/C version), 5 clear parts plus the usual decal and instruction sheets. Upon first inspection, the kit features fine recessed panel lines and looks like an easy build. However, online review stated that the the kit contains some mistakes, a few of them major. The windshield is more of the later variants of the P-40; the wings have wrong angle of attack, the underbelly is also not appropriate for early variants of the P-40 and not to mention that the cockpit has rather sparse details. On the other hand, the decals are finely printed but I'm wary about the quality of Academy decals. Although not mentioned in the instructions, the markings are for White 7, Squadron Leader Robert Neale, 1st Pursuit Squadron 'Adam and Eves', American Volunteer Group and White 68, Charles Older, 3rd Pursuit Squadron 'Hell's Angels', American Volunteer Group.

Construction

Before starting with the construction, I checked out some of my favourite modelling websites and found that some helpful souls have pointed out the inaccuracies of the Hobbycraft/Academy kit and offered their solutions to the problem. While extremely helpful, my modelling skills was such that I might end up with a ruined kit, so I decided to just continue with my usual OOB policy. As usual, construction began at the cockpit. I started by painting the sidewalls and the cockpit parts Interior Green using the Tamiya recipe for it with the detail parts picked up in Flat black. The detail for the cockpit is adequate, especially with the canopy closed. Once the paint had dried, I assembled the interior parts but set it aside for a while. In the meantime, the fuselage halves were mated together with the prop shaft between the halves. The actual instructions however have you add the whole of the propeller assembly at this time - a sure recipe for disaster.

The chin radiator was next and thankfully, there was no fit problems here. The completed cockpit interior was then fixed into place through the bottom, together with the instrument panel and what passed for the M2 breeches. The fuselage gun fairings and the horizontal tails were also added at his time. Next, the wings. The wing assembly was a rather simple affair, consisting of just the one-piece lower wing and separate upper parts. The wheel well was moulded together with the lower wing half. Nevertheless, surface detail was petite and crisp. I joined the halves but left the gun barrels and the pitot tube for later. When the wing assembly was joined to the fuselage, the undersized belly became apparent. Consequently the gap at the radiator outlet was also bigger than it should. Anyway, I halted the construction at this juncture and proceeded to the painting process.

Painting and Decaling

The AVG P-40s were taken from a British order so it would be painted in the American equivalent of  RAF Dark Green, RAF Dark Earth and RAF Sky, or in my case, anything on hand! For the Dark Green I actually used Tamiya XF-13 JA Green (as a substitute for FS 34079; oh, the irony!) and Dark Earth is Tamiya XF-52. While Academy listed the bottom colour as 'Sky Grey' (Tamiya XF-19), I believed that the colour is actually British Sky (Tamiya XF-21) and was painted accordingly. It should also be noted that the decision for aircraft markings should be made before painting as the marking options feature different camouflage patterns and shark faces (Erik Shilling personally chalked the shark face motif on each of the AVG's P-40s before painting, hence no two are the same). I originally wanted to do Charles Older's aircraft but eventually settled for Robert Neale's, for the same reason I chose VMFA-333's markings for my F-8E Crusader. The decals, as expected, were of the same quality as other Academy decals of the same vintage. They have good colour density and register (except perhaps for the fuselage band and individual aircraft numbers, which were quite translucent) with the flying tiger insignia, squadron insignia and kill markings (for Older's plane) having a separate white backing to avoid colour bleed-through. They were however almost decisively stubborn against decal setting solutions, even the 'heavy artillery' Mr. Mark Softer. I ended up using a burnishing tool to 'persuade' the decals to settle over the panel lines. For the national insignia, there are two choices : normal or 'faded'. Not having any reference available, I ended using the 'faded' insignia for the upper wing surface.

Finishing

I started off by cementing the exhausts into place. They were painted steel and I decided not to weather them as per usual. The landing gears were next. As the main wheels incorporate weighted tyres, I decided to cement the tailwheel first, so that I can get a proper sit for the flat section of the mainwheel tyres. This was followed by the wing machine gun barrels and the pitot tube.  The kit includes the bead-and post sight but I end up using neither as they were overscale. The post however was replaced with a 0.3mm copper wire. The propeller and the cockpit glazing were then fitted, finishing the actual build. Then I subjected the model to a sludge wash. I think that I had made the solution too thick, as the excess was quite hard to remove. Finally, a spray of Tamiya Flat Clear finishes the work on this model.

Conclusion

With the number of inaccuracies, the Academy/Hobbycraft P-40C kit is definitely not a perfect kit and a lot of work is needed to bring it to actual P-40C standard. To the less initiated (or who don't mind) it does look like an early P-40 and in many respects was better than it's Monogram contemporary (I can't comment about the Trumpeter version as I haven't seen or build one).