France was one of the first customers of the P-40, placing an order of 100 Hawk 81A-1, later increased to 230 aircraft. However, these aircraft were not delivered before France fell in June 1940 and these aircraft never entered French service.

After the invasion of North Africa in late 1942, the groupe de Chasse II/5, a Free French fighter unit, was equipped with P-40Fs transferred from American units. These were later replaced by P-47D Thunderbolts but the P-40 remained as a trainer in French service for some time after the war.

This P-40M-5-CU is operated by Comanche Fighters LLC in the US.

This P-40M-10-CU (s/n 43-5813) is flown and operated by the Tri-State Warbird Museum and carries the colours of NZ3119 of No 2 OTU of the Royal New Zealand Air Force in 1943.

This superb P-40C (s/n 41-13357) belongs to the Fighter Collection in Duxford.

The Jackie C II is a P-40M belonging to the American Airpower Museum in Farmingdale. I made four views of this aircraft for maxFlite, where it is available as a garden windmill or as a prop glider.

Roy Whittaker was the 57th Fighter Group’s top ace, earning 7 victories at the controls of the P-40. This P-40F was one of two aircraft he flew with the group. His most successful combat mission took place during the “Palm Sunday Massacre” on 18 April 1943, when the 57th FG stumbled upon over 100 German Ju 52/3m transports trying to resupply German troops in North Africa. While British Spitfires held the fighter escorts busy, the American pilots engaged the transports and claimed 75 of them. Whittaker’s score during this action was three enemy aircraft shot down.

With 28.5 aerial victories in over 300 operational sorties, Group Captain Clive Robertson Caldwell, DSO, DFC & Bar (28 July 1911 – 5 August 1994) was the leading Australian air ace of World War II.

His score also included six probable victories and 15 damaged enemy aircraft. He was the highest-scoring Tomahawk ace, as well as the highest-scoring Allied pilot in North Africa.

After serving in North Africa in 1941 and 1942, he was given command of No 1 Fighter Wing in the South-West Pacific Area, flying the Spitfire in defense of Australia.

Caldwell flew this Tomahawk IIb (serial number AK498) with No 250 Squadron in North Africa in late 1941. His scoreboard showed victories against German and Italian opponents.

After his transfer to the SWPA, Caldwell flew the Spitfire to score 6.5 victories against the Japanese. Spitfire Mk VII A58-484 was the aircraft assigned to him while he commanded No 80 Wing in early 1945 and showed his updated score.

This profile is one of 5 Kittyhawk profiles created for the book “Squadrons! No.18 – The Curtiss Kittyhawk Mk II” by Phil H. Listemann.

It is with great pride and honour that I would like to introduce my partnership with maxFlite. The concept behind maxFlite’s product is quite simple: we all have fond childhood memories of playing with small foam gliders with propellers. In most cases, these gliders were as much fun as they were flimsy and unrealistic. MaxFlite offers the same type of fun glider – only much more durable and better-looking.

We have worked together to create 14 different glider types, all finely detailed. Fellow illustrator Chris Sandham-Bailey also contributed with an A6M Zero. The types range from major World War II fighters to modern turboprop trainers:

• Col. John Lander’s P-51 Mustang “Big Beautiful Doll”, one of the most colourful Mustangs in the ETO.
• British ace-of-aces Johnnie Johnson’s Spitfire Mk XIV
• Battle of Britain Memorial Flight’s Hurricane Mk II, carrying the colours of Squadron Leader Arthur ‘Darkie’ Clowes’ machine during the Battle of Britain.
• Messerschmitt Bf 109G-6 “Christl” as flown by Major Gerhard Barkhorn, who, with 301 aerial victories, was the second most successful fighter ace of all time.
• Focke-Wulf Fw 190A-8 “Red 19” as flown by Unteroffizier Ernst Schröder, which has the motto of the famous Cologne carnival, “Kölle Alaaf”, painted on the left side, and “Edelgard” on the other—the name of the pilot’s first love.
• Republic P-47 Thunderbolt “No Guts No Glory” as flown  by Captain Benjamin Mayo in 1944.
• Mitsubishi A6M2 Model 21 Zero, JJ170 of the Konoike Kokutai (fighter wing), stationed in the Ibaraki Prefecture in 1944.
• The Curtiss P-40M Warhawk “Jacky C II” warbird. You can admire the original in the American Airpower Museum in New York.
• The Yakovlev Yak-3 of Wing Commander Louis Delfino of the French Fighter Group Normandie-Niémen, which served on the Eastern Front.
• Italian fighter ace Luigi Gorrini’s Macchi MC.205 Veltro.
• An Embraer 312 Tucano the Brazilian Air Force’s air demonstration squadron, popularly known as the ‘Smoke Squadron’ (Portuguese: Esquadrilha da Fumaça).
• Pilatus PC-21 No. 101, HB-HZC, the prototype of the PC-21.
• A Pilatus PC-7 bearing the former orange & black markings of the PC-7 Team.
• French ace of aces Pierre Clostermann’s Hawker Tempest Mk V “Le Grand Charles”.
• Dewoitine D.520 No. 266, flown by Sous-Lieutenant René Pomier-Layrargues, Groupe de Chasse (Fighter Wing) II/7, 5 June 1940, Beauvais. Pilot René Pomier-Layrargues scored two aerial victories over Me 109s on 5 June 1940, one of which was flown by fighter ace Werner Mölders.

If you’re looking for a great Christmas present for kids (or adults ! ) at an affordable price, you’ll find that maxFlite’s gliders are a great combination of fun, art and historical accuracy and detail. The aircraft are roughly 40 cm in length and wingspan. Some people have already adapted the gliders with electric motors and control surfaces to use them as RC models. I’ll be posting more on this later, but I must say that it’s great fun to imagine my illustrations buzzing around the skies !

You can purchase the models directly from the secure maxFlite online shop.

1. The P-40 became the USAAC’s standard fighter shortly before the war. This early P-40 belonged to the 55th Pursuit Squadron of the 20th Pursuit Group, based at Hamilton Field. Note the long nose gun barrels and lacked the armoured windscreen of later versions.

2. When Japanese aircraft attacked Pearl Harbor, a few American pilots were able to take off and fight back. George Welch used this P-40 from the 47th Pursuit Squadron, 15th Pursuit Group, to down 4 enemy aircraft.

3. Early versions of the P-40 were rapidly replaced by more evolved versions early in the war, with many being relegated to training duties. This heavily weathered aircraft was flown at Luke Field for advanced training.

4. This H81-A2 (British export version of the P-40) was diverted to the American Volunteer Group in China, better known as the “Flying Tigers”. P-8127/47 was flown by several pilots before being assigned to R.T. Smith.