70056 P-39N Airacobra
Assembly plastic model kit P-39N Airacobra, 1/72 scale.
Kit content:
- Plastic parts
- Canopy and wheel masks
- Decals (13x11 cm!) with three marking options (Soviet, US, and French)
- Steel balls for nose weight
Colours and Markings Options:
- P-39N Airacobra 42-9033 „White 01”. 100th Guards Fighter Regiment, pilots: Ivan Babak and Grigoriy Dol’nikov, 1943-1945 (two wariants).
- P-39N Airacobra 42-18354. 345th Fighter Squadron, Sardinia-Corsica, spring 1944.
- P-39N Airacobra 42-18736. Cdt. Jean Machet de la Martinière, GC 1/4 Navarre commander. Reghaia airbase, Algeria, March 1944.
P-39N Airacobra Fighter
The P-39 Airacobra is one of the most interesting and innovative fighters of World War II - Bell designers equipped it with a front wheel, an engine in the centre of gravity of the airframe and a solid 37 mm cannon. The engine was originally equipped with a turbo-supercharger, which provided the prototype flown in the spring of 1939 with excellent performance at high altitudes. However, US aviation officials preferred less-complex propulsion, fit to operate at a lower altitude. The implementation of Airacobra into mass production and combat units coincided with the rapidly changing circumstances related to the outbreak of war in Europe, and then on the Eastern and Pacific fronts. The first orders for France and Great Britain were not fully delivered, some of them were transferred directly to the US forces fighting in the Pacific and North Africa. With the advent of more effective aircraft types, more than half of the 9,558 produced Cobras were sent under Lend-Lease to the Soviet Union, where the aircraft performed excellently: battles were fought at the low altitude for which the Airacobra was best suited. Of the top 10 Soviet aces, half flew Airacobras.
Due to constant modifications resulting from both operational and purely technological needs, the first truly mass-produced version of the aircraft was only the P-39N. Over 2,000 Airacobras N were built, and used by the US Air Force in the Pacific, Africa and Europe, the French and Italians, but more than half went to the USSR, where the most outstanding aces of the elite Guards regiments flew them and achieved victories. The US Air Force replaced operational P-39N Airacobra fighters with newer types in late 1943 and early 1944, but in other countries, they remained in active frontline service until the end of the war.