P-38 Data Plate Question

[Jack Cook]

What's the value of a mint P-38L (F-5) data plate???
Danke!
Jack the curious

[Matt Gunsch]

Depends if the P-38 is still attached to the plate.

[Jack Cook]

A P-38 can opener or pistol

[Matt Gunsch]

A P-38 can opener or pistol

then it is between .50 cents and $1000, depending on condition and if it has matching numbers.

[bdk]

Is this a blank or off of an actual aircaft? Any registration paperwork?

[John Dupre]

I thought that Lockheed didn't use data plates? Or is that another manufacturer?

[Jack Cook]

taken off the real mccoy I assume right before scrapping.

[tulsaboy]

Jack's inquiry raises an intersting question that maybe someone out there with some legal knowledge can answer...

So if I were an enterprising young former Navy type, with an impressive collection of photos that I loved sharing with fellow airplane nuts, and I just happened to have a beautiful P-38 dataplate, and I fell into a few million dollars and wanted to have my very own P-38, how would the process work?

Assuming all issues of actually making the P-38 appear were workable and there was an essentially infinite source of funds, what are the legal/technical requirements?

Would I need to talk with the FAA in OKC, get quiet title to the P-38, establish an N-number by registering the "aircraft?" At that point, would I essentially "own" a P-38? Being an ex-military aircraft, how does that complicate things?

If this were a civilian aircraft (say a wrecked ex-military P-38 that had been purchased by a civilian and flown/registered, where the data plate was literally the only recognizable piece left wouldn't I just be able to update the aircraft's registration and commence the rebuild? If I had the data plate to an old strictly civilian aircraft, say an old WACO that had rotted away in a barn or been the unfortunate victim of a hangar fire, and now wanted to build an aircraft around the data plate, again, wouldn't I just need to make sure that I had clear title and then re-register the aircraft with the FAA?

Just curious, no specific need for information...

kevin

[P-Screamer]

Show us a picture of the plate Jack. We find it is from one of the airplanes that exist today. Then is is a Seller's Market.

[jcw]

easy kevin, i'm not giving up my secrets that easy

jcw

[Jack Cook]

I'm darn near buying this for not much. I have the serial at home.
It for a P-38L converted to a F-5 and (I'm thinking scrapped).

[tom d. friedman]

from a collectables standpoint i'd say it's worth anywhere between $50.00 & $125.00 bucks, but in this economy to sell it/ buy it i feel it would fetch around $75.00. the problem is nobody has expendable income now days with the question do i buy a cool historical data plate?? or groceries?? i think you know what will prevail. i haven't bought / sold a thing in damned near a year!!

[tulsaboy]

jcw-



Now why would you say that???

You know too much.

Any other folks out there want to share in a very general sense? I'm just wondering, as there are periodically data plates that do change hands. I know of a few collectors who have them from various aircraft, some rare and some pretty common. I am just wondering if we're rapidly approaching the point (some would argue that we're already there) where the data plate becomes valuable as a way to attach some genuine history to a new-built airframe. I know that this is already being done. I just wonder when (and if it's possible) some of the dataplate collectors will become the most valuable resource for the next Mustang/B-17/Corsair "restoration." Why go to PNG and fight the local government for the remains of a P-47 that is essentially good for nothing but patterns when the dataplate collector down the street will sell you his P-47 dataplate for $250?

There has to be something more difficult to it than that. If aircraft that were ditched/crashed at sea are worth nothing in terms of their structure, why not go on a dataplate hunt, go right to the location on the airframe where the dataplate is, scavenge the dataplate, and then do what you were going to do in the first place- build a new aircraft around it?
With what the Ezell folks and others have aptly demonstrated, it's very, very possible with modern technology and skills to do this. I know that it's a matter of money, but if you had the dataplates to a half dozen Mustangs, in a better economy wouldn't that allow you through the economies of scale to build and sell 6 "genuine" Mustangs?

kevin

[Jack Cook]

Gee Tom there must be a ton of P-38 data plates flooding the market
I have the Britich DFC awarded to a 15 kill P-51B ace who was KIA. Maybe that's worth at least a buck and a quarter?

Last edited by Jack Cook on Thu Feb 19, 2009 1:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[Sully]

A data plate in itself is a collectors item. It does not constitute an aircraft.
Data plates can be manufactured.

Sully