Hobby Master 1:48 Air Power Series Diecast Model

Republic Aviation P-47D Thunderbolt – "Hairless Joe", Col. David Schilling, C/O 56th FG, USAAF, England, June 1944

1:48 Scale.  Length: 9".  Wingspan: 10.25”

By the end of World War II Col. David Schilling was the third highest ranking ace of the 56th FG “Zemke’s Wolf Pack” having flown 132 combat missions with 22.5 air victories and 10.5 ground victories. On December 23, 1944, during the Battle of the Bulge, he was credited with downing three Messerschmitt Bf-109s and two Focke-Wulf Fw-190s when the USAAF encountered over 100 German aircraft. The nose art on his P-47D, 42-26641, was a popular cartoon character of the time; “Hairless Joe” from Al Capp’s “Dogpatch”.

The Republic P-47 Thunderbolt was a single-seat fighter aircraft used by the U.S. and Allied air forces during World War II. It was one of the largest, heaviest, most expensive fighter aircraft in history to be powered by a single piston engine. First flown on May 6, 1941, the first production P-47 was delivered in May 1942. The Thunderbolt was very effective as a short-to-medium range escort fighter and, as a fighter-bomber, proved especially suited at ground attack. The aircrafts eight .50 cal. (12.7mm) machine guns could inflict severe damage on lightly armored targets. In the fighter-bomber ground-attack role it could carry up to ten five-inch rockets or a bomb load of up to 2,500 pounds.

The first P-47 combat mission took place on March 10, 1943 when the 4th FG took their aircraft on a fighter sweep over France. By 1944, the P-47 Thunderbolt was in service with the USAAF in all of its operational theaters, except Alaska. Although the P-51 Mustang eventually replaced the P-47 in the long-range escort role in Europe, the P-47 still ended the war with 3752 air-to-air victories claimed in over 746,000 sorties. A total of 15,678 P-47s of all types were built, the last being a P-47N, which rolled off the Republic Aviation production line in October 1945. The P-47 Thunderbolt served with the U.S. Army Air Force (U.S. Air Force after 1947) until 1949 and the Air National Guard until 1953.


Hobby Master offers a wide selection of quality, pre-assembled, diecast model airplanes. Each model is crafted to a high level of accuracy using specifications of the original aircraft. They are constructed with precision-made diecast metal and some plastic components.

This model of a P-47 Thunderbolt features: