My 1/48 Hasegawa P-40E is basically finished. I was looking over my directions to make sure I didn’t miss anything when I noticed that there are two very small gunsite pieces that attach on front of the front canopy on the top of the cowling. [%-)]
I know the Flying Tigers had to scrounge for gunsights for their aircraft so there was a hodge podge of different gunsights used especially with their first models, the P-40B (Hawk 87A-1) some being the internal sights and some outside. I even read where they improvised and installed their own scratch built sights on a few of the aircraft. [wow]
I mounted the gunsight inside the cockpit but am wondering if I should also add the external parts. I would imagine in real life you would use one or the other, and not both. What confuses me though is that I have pictures and profiles in my references that show both, and some that only show one or the other.
Are there any experts out there that could clarify the issues with the gun sights? Should I use both? I built my P-40E as one flown by Ed Rector with the 23rd FG after the Flying Tigers were “absorbed” by the USAAC, if that makes a difference. [:-^]
If my memeory is correct, a lot of the early planes had both in the years when the electronic ones were still fairly new - the idea being if the electronic one failed, you had the manual one as a backup. IIRC, some of the early P-47’s had a small manual one built on to the side of the electronic one for just that pupose.
I agree from what I read the iron sights were a backup if the electronic sight failed. Here’s a P-40K I built that has both sights the iron sight should be offset slightly to the right.
The same concept is still used today. A pilot will take a grease pencil and make a mark on the HUD, gunsite or windshield to use if the system fails. In SEA, I was always wiping marks off of the gun site of my F-4D, until a pilot told me why it was there.
In “American Volunteer Group Colors and Markings”, there is a color photo of a line-up of the P-40Es. Of the 5 nearest the camera, none have the iron sights. The only ID number that can be clearly seen is 126, but none of the aircraft in the line up have it. The internal sights are definetly there. A shot of #107 is also without the external sights.
I also checked “Curtiss P-40 in Action”, there’s a black and white of #104 and #112 together, and neither have the external sites. You can see the internal sights in that pic though.
In the above referenced book, there is only one example of an E model with the iron sights, a Curtiss publicity photos of E’s in in British markings.
Also the AVG book says the -E’s that arrived to replace the -Bs were in OD/grey, and the pic of #107, though b&w, seems to confirm this. The other pics, of #104 and #126, are a little harder to see and are kinda open to interpretation. There’s also a pic of one of the Es prior to receiving AVG marks, and it’s OD/grey.
Hope that helps! Let me know if you’d like a scan of the pics.
Thanks for all the info guys. JWB, I have that same book. In two other of my books I found some that had just the internal gun sight, and many with both. I do know that the AVG had to scrounge for parts as many of their aircraft came without radios, gunsights, seatbelts etc. which makes for a serious hodge-podge of inconsistant goodies which makes the research on a specific aircraft very difficult.
Here is one of the profiles I have for Ed’s P-40E, it’s the 2nd one down.
As noted, the external gun sights were not present on all aircraft. I always install them on my P-40 models, unless I have convincing photo evidence to the contrary.
I have to admit they are kinda cool looking. Those external gunsights seem to spiritually tie these early monoplanes to their bi-plane roots, if you know what I mean. [8D]
Thus preventing our enemies from having constant, up to date intelligence on air base locations, ammunition dumps, equipment, quantities, tactics etc. [:O] [swg]
I wish reporters would think about the ramifications of divulging sensitive information. Now our enemies just have to watch CNN and they can find out anything they want to know.
