Bell P-39 Airacobra

Does anyone have pictures of P39 training at Harris Neck, Ga?

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I saw the first takeoff of the P-39 as a youth in 1939. It was in Dayton, Ohio at (I believe) Patterson Field, the predecessor of Wright-Patterson Field.

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Eaglefeather, you are absolutely correct on the weight. Also,Soviet pilots were generally more experienced than their American counterparts in mid-1942 having been in combat with the Luftwaffe for a year. Mid-'42 was the first air combat for the Army Air Force, virtually all the flyers in New Guinea being brand new 200 hour pilots fresh out of flying school.

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I'm going to shoot from the hip with some actual vs calculated knowledge and educated SWAGing. The reason the P-39 was so popular with VVS pilots was that the USSR versions were lightened. Wing guns came off and equipment that they deemed superfluous was removed. These changes enhanced the performance considerably. Coupled with the fact that they boosted the early Allison engines to 66" and even 70" in some cases. They boosted the later versions of Allisons to 57" when they could get U.S. fuel. This jumped horse power as much as 500 ponies. The figures I posted earlier for the P-39N reaching 397mph and 399mph were from U.S. military and factory documents. Now amagine what these figures would be if the plane was 500 lbs. lighter and had 500 more horses kicking it around the sky. I haven't seen any documents that say so,,,,,,YET, but it wouldn't supprise me if the Russian pilots had pushed their N and Q models to 410mph+ at 13,000ft. and pushed maximum climb to over 4,600fpm. Just something to think about. Now I,m heading over to the USSR sight to post some facts on the Lavochkin fighters. Hopefully get to the Yakovlev sight in the near future also.

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Hmmm, 14,500 Yak-9s built during WWII, less than 5,000 P-39s sent to Russia. Yet three of the top 4 Russian aces flew the P-39, and 40 more aces with 20+ victories. I'll take the P-39, thanks.

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About midway through the war, the Russians built their own equivalent, the Yak-9T. With an engine designed to use a hub gun (the M-105, derived from the Hispano-Suiza 12Y) it not surprisingly turned out rather better. Although intended for ground attack, the Yak-9T was quite successful in air combat as well. The 37mm gun was more powerful and had a higher rate of fire than the P-39's M-4. It would reward a good shot with the discipline to fire the necessarily short (2-3 rounds) burst before the recoil knocked the aim off target. See Yefim Gordon's book on Russian WWII fighters.

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Some P-39Qs in the dash 20-25 range had four blade propellers as standard factory equipment.

Regarding the supercharger, turbochargers were not yet reliable when the P-39 (and P-40) was in prototype stage, and the installation in the P-39 was less than optimal. In short the turbo was never going to work properly in the P-39 and America needed fighter planes desperately in 1941 so the turbo was deleted to get the P-39 (and P-40)into production. The P-39N which was first delivered in December 1942 was the equal of the FW190 and Me109G6 in all performance categories according to Soviet pilots in books released since the fall of the old Soviet Union. The Russians did get substantial extra performance by deleting the useless 30 caliber wing guns and some radio equipment.

While the turbocharger was doomed from the beginning in the P-39, Allison had developed a second stage mechanical supercharger that later powered the P-63 Kingcobra to 422mph at 25,000', comparable to P-47s and P-51s. This mechanical supercharger was tested in the P-39E and did produce higher top speed, but the P-39E was way to heavy for a production contract and served as testbed for the new supercharger to be installed in the P-63. I have never figured out why the AAF didn't just install one in a standard P-39. It would fit and the P-39 would have had P-63 performance in mid 1942 instead of late 1943 when the P-63 started production.

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Ken,
Brad is probably right. The P-39Q-21 /25 had four blade props but I do not know if any of that version are still flying.

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This craft was way underused by the US. It had some of the best potential that we have thrown away. Keeping it operational would have given America a close-support /ground attack /bomber destroyer (Big Russian factor) to rival the Hawker Typhoon /Tempest series. The Kingcobra would have been a huge advance over the Airacobra, but production and design was slowed because of the rejection given to the latter.

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The plane you saw was probably the follow-on version called the P-63 King Cobra. It had the 4 bladed Aeroproducts propeller

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Note to Ken.... I flew P-39Qs and Ns back in 1944 out of
Las Vegas Army Air Field. We were flying attack patterns against 3-ship B-17 formations, loaded with gunnery students.
At that time I do not recall seeing even one P-39 with other than a 3-bladed prop. I think the Red Star P-39 you saw belongs to the Commemorative Air force, and is based in Texas.

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Hey guys, This weekend I saw what I determined was a Bell P39 with the Russian red star. The only thing that I can't sseem to match is that this aircraft had a 4 blade prop. Was this a configuration of later (or earlier) models?

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There seems to be quite a bit of controversy as to why this otherwise excellent aircraft was denied a supercharger. I wonder if supercharger technology was something that the president and his military advisors decided to keep from the Russians. If the Soviets had a U.S. built supercharger to examine they might be able to reverse engineer it and start building their own as they did with the damaged B-29's that landed in Russia after bombing Japan.

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I have an interest in one particular P-39, one of the first over Guadalcanal, named "Whistlin'Britches" #66,based in New Guinea flown by col. Charles Allard + two or three other pilots.
It was last seen when Col. Allard brought it back as a recruitment tour showpiece but he fell ill with malaria and when he was released the tour, and the plane, were "decommissioned". The plane had dissappeared. I had some personal phone and mail correspondence with Allard some years ago but lost touch and doubt he is still living. He made it his "project" to to find the plane but all I have heard is he was only able to find a similar plane now in a museum and painted in Pacific theater markings somewhere in an air museum in the Midwest??? Anyone care to comment

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Flew the "D" model many hundreds of hours..Dependable..37 cannon no good..got the Aussie version with 20 mm cannon and it performed reasonably well but no altitude capability..our entire squadron of 39's was lost in two months(New Guinea)..thirteen pilots shot down..some trwice..including me..for it's time not so bad..P-38's replaced the 39 and changed the complextion of the Pacific air war..

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Consolidated moved to San Diago in 1935. Laurence Dale Bell, Robert J. Woods and Ray Whitman stayed in Buffalo and formed Bell Aircraft. The plant at 2050 Elmood Ave. in Buffalo, NY. was built shortly after. The first military aircraft built at this plant was the XFM-1 Airacuda in 1937. In 1938 they began manufacturing the P-39.
Larry Bell was an excellent salesman. In 1913 he was working for Martin. Bell convinced Martin to put on an exhibition that he called "THE BATTLE OF THE CLOUDS". The show included a parachute jump, balloons and exhibition flying, but the main attraction was the aerial bombing of a make-believe battlefield-complete with a fort, cannon and soldiers. Bell wanted to give the crowd its money's worth. Martin flew over the painted cloth and wood fort, throwing out oranges, while Bell set off dynamite charges on the ground. Martin Company employees, armed with rifles, fired off blank cartridges. The cannon also made of cloth and wood, caught fire, and as bell set off his last charges and ran for cover, the entire battlefield went up in flames.
Two interested spectators sought out Bell and Martin as they counted the day's receipts. Pedro and Juan Alcaldez were representatives of Pancho Villa. At a cost of $10,000 Bell and Martin built the world's first combat bomber for "Pancho Villa's Air Force".

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Ray Wagner, in his books, list the performance of the P-39N with the V-1710-85 (1,420hp /9,000ft. WE)as such: Max speed: 399mph /9700ft. 15,000ft /3.8min.(3947fpm /avg.) Service Ceiling: 36.500ft. Maximum range (ferry):1,250mls. This at a test weight of 7,400lbs. These figures are very close to the test figures I posted earlier and well within the norm of aircraft to aircraft variances.

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I really like the p - 39 and the King Cobra also I have heard the octane in the gas was very important on the allison and merlin engines. I dont understand why the three stage turb charger wasnt given on the p - 39 which would hve made it comparible to all the 40`s fighters.

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Ron,
You are absolutely right. In an interview with Nikolay Golodnikov (a WW2 Soviet pilot who became a high ranking officer after the war) he states that early USSR Airacobras were pushed so that the Allisons did not even reach 1 /2 life. They were good for optimum performance for about 50hrs, usually 10-15 sorties. They would use two power settings depending on the fuel they had available. If they used Soviet B-95 fuel that was pink in color, they would use up to 51" of boost. If they had US B-100 fuel (dark blue) they would push it up to 57". But Nikolay admits that there was some times that he would break the limiting wire on the throttle to access more power. He continued by saying the later Allisons would deliver 100hrs. Nikolay said by pushing past these limits the engine bearings would melt and the engine would seize up.

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It's so refreshing to see bloggers having an "honest" discussion about the P-39, rather than simple hacking out old, tired myths and sound bites that have little merit. I've always been in the minority, it seems, that believes that the P-39 has been treated most unfairly by Western historians and WW2 veterans alike that never flew it, or flew it only in training, or at best, flew it only in the Southwest Pacific against the best that the Japanese had, in conditions (no ground search radar, terrible weather & dust conditions, inexperienced pilots & ground crews, etc. Most US pilots that actually flew it a lot seem to have really thought well of the AiraCobra, and those that didn't usually single out something like its short range, or lack of high-altitude performance (or inability to turn with a Japanese Zero!) as why they didn't like it. But I do have a question: According to some reports by Lend-Lease ferry pilots in the 1943-44 time frame I've read, upon taking delivery of their AiraCobras, the Soviets usually removed the wing guns (even the later .50 cal guns of the -Q model) immediately, to achieve less overall weight and a higher roll rate than US versions that retained them. However, I have a question (actually many questions, but I'll just keep it at one tonight)-- one of tollkeeper123' posts alludes to Soviet replacement of the AiraCobra's weapons with their (much better) Soviet analogues. --How often did this occur, and what Soviet weapon fits were used? I too have often wondered how much we could've improved our fighters' performance had we adopted some of the Soviets' very impressive aircraft guns!

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