 With the disbandment of the wartime AFC, Lukis joined the short-lived Australian Air Corps early in 1920. He transferred to the newly formed Royal Australian Air Force in March the following year. Ranked flying officer (honorary flight lieutenant), he was one of the original twenty-one officers on the Air Force's strength at its formation, and became popularly known as "Luke". In February 1922, he surveyed the air route between Perth and Port Augusta, South Australia. He took part in one of the embryonic service's earliest public flying displays in May that year, when he and another pilot flew Airco DH.9s in mock dogfights with four Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.5s during the New South Wales Aerial Pageant at Victoria Park, Sydney. On 21 January 1925, he married Florence St Aubyn Allen at St Mary's Anglican Church, West Perth; the couple later had two sons. The previous year, Lukis had been best man at the wedding of Squadron Leader Frank McNamara, the AFC's only Victoria Cross recipient in World War I.
