The story of P-51 Mustang 2 of 6

The story took its beginning when Britain had trouble finding suitable use for their P-40s which were inadequate for the european airwar. With the upcoming "Lend an lease"-law the british hoped to take advantage of USAs enormous production capacity and in April 1940 they contacted their earlier supplyer of aircraft, North American Aviation, and presented the specifications for a new fighter.
NAA were well informed of the needs to a fighter for the european arena and promised to produce an even better fighter than specified by the british. 1 months later the british placed an order of 320 stk of the new fighter, but the prototype had to be finished within 3 months, so big were their needs!
117 days later the first prototype, NA-73, rolled out of the assembling hall however without a motor and with weels borrowed from AT-6 Harvard!
Six weeks later the prototype flew without complications. Britain placed a initial order of 300 fighters which they gave the name Mustang. The Mustang had a new profiled wing with less drag than the conventional wing and a very clever cooler/exaust port which too reduced the drag.
Although fitted with an Allison V-1710-39 1100 hp-engine the fighter had very fine performance in low and low/medium heights, except its climbing capabilities were poor. Nevertheless the british orders climbed to almost 1000 examples.
In USA there initially were very limited interest for NAAs fighter and only willingness to accept two free examples under the designation XP-51. Later was eventually placed an order for 150 examples of P-51 named Apache.
In Britain many experiments with the Mustang took place and a quantum-leap in the performance of the Mustang came, when they in the fall 1942 mixed what they saw as the hitherto best fighter design, the Mustang, with the best fighter engine, the Rolls-Royce Merlin.
Four fighters were equipped with Merlin 61 and 65 engines and four-bladed propellers to manage the extra power, and then the testing went on.
When North American received the test data, the way immediately lay open for the mass production of the Mustang as everyone know it . . . . . WW2s best longrange escortfighter, which took the pants of the germans! (the videos sadly enough skips most of these details).
Carl Vendler

[@emforty2]

0:27
Allison is a dog engine
without the Brithis Rolls Royce Merlin and its cheap copies this plane will be just another low level dive bomber

[@richardlahan7068]

I can do without the music too.

[@tammiea8552]

My great uncle was shot down over Burma, April 9, 1944. He flew a P-38. He was KIA and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. Thank you Great uncle Fred for your ultimate sacrifice for my freedom.

[@1951timbo]

Awful music

[@barfyspitz]

Ya...History channel as well. Pawn stars cajun pawn stars hard core pawn storage wars baggage wars etc.....History channel and discovery have followed the path of MTV and gone ALL REALITY ALL DAY.

[@jaymoe67]

A few things I'd like to correct on my previous statements(1) It's the Allison V 1710, not the 1701 (typo at 2:00am in the morning).(2) The Allison is not back into production, but since there were more than 70,000 engines built, there is a thriving rebuild industry in place and for a price, rebuilt Allisons are available and sought after(my fault, I made the freshman mistake of only using one source of reference).

[@jaymoe67]

@emforty2 There's great misunderstanding when it comes to the allison v1701, its actually a very good engine, so good it's currently gone back into production. At altitudes that the forced induction systems were designed for U.s. planes were as fast or faster than european counterparts. US planes were designed to handle much higher g's than opposing aircraft with better protection for the pilot and systems and were conurrently heavier. I'd be happy to answer any relative questions

[@jaymoe67]

@emforty2 There's great misunderstanding when it comes to the allison v1701, its actually a very good engine, so good it's currently gone back into production. At altitudes that the forced induction systems were designed for U.s. planes were as fast or faster than european counterparts. US planes were designed to handle much higher g's than opposing aircraft with better protection for the pilot and systems and were concurrently heavier. I'd be happy to answer any relative questions

[@deadwood83]

"Responsive and urgent but very controllable and well-behaved." Sounds like a BMW 3 series...

[@mossmusic8370]

or my dog! LOL great plane and documentary all the same!

[@pmharl]

or a japanese girl!
great documentary!

[@TheXOoftheRO]

p51 is top 10 list but there are atleast 5 better ww2 fighters

[@facethefaceandmore44]

"As the allies fought their bloody way across Burma" lol

[@wilburfinnigan2142]

you toob I would assume your reference to a cheap copy of the RR Merlin you are refering to the Packard built versions?? The Packard built versions were made with better more available material by better craftsmen and faster than the British version. Packard went on to further develop and improve the Merlin. Even RR Engineers "were Amassed" at the quality of the Packard built engines. After all Packard had been building aero engines for years

[@billycaspersghost7528]

Rubbish

[@rogernicholls2079]

@@billycaspersghost7528 RAF bomber pilots used to worry if a Packard was put in their Lancaster's as they were not as reliable as ones from RR, this was because america could afford to make them as a throw away component.

[@billycaspersghost7528]

@@rogernicholls2079 Rubbish