"Bob Matthews" wrote in message
news:bEBNi.119918$Xa3.77553@attbi_s22...
Daryl Hunt wrote:
"The Amaurotean Capitalist" wrote in
message ...
On Wed, 03 Oct 2007 08:31:19 -0700, "Scott M. Kozel"
wrote:

The critical improvement to the Mustang was the fitting of the RR
Merlin engine
which was an RAF idea.
Given that over 15,000 P-51s were built by North American Aviation in
the U.S. and paid for by the U.S. government, it was predominently a
U.S. aircraft. Like you said, the later models did use the Merlin
engine.
The critical point is that the P-51 would not have been sustained in
production without the RAF championing the type on the basis of the
Merlin installation in mid-1942. It was never a part of USAAF
procurement until October 1942, and it took substantive British
efforts to get the USAAF to accept it as a major production type.

So it's certainly a US aircraft, but it wouldn't have existed without
substantial British input both in technological terms, and production
advocacy from the initial Allison-engined British purchase contracts
to the Merlin conversion.

Gavin Bailey

Keeping it in the whatif department. Whatif they had installed decent
Turbos and Supers on the Allisons. What would that have done for even
the
P-40. Afterall, later productions on the P-38 and the P-47 would have
had
equal or more range and speed of the P-51C and the P-40 would have had
near
identical performance and speed.

Really? Seems like the P40's wing and overall aerodynamics made it less
efficient therefore slower with the same power.

And the P-40 was a winner near the ground even as it was.

An F-5 camera ship was jumped by an FW-190. The pilot did all the things
that made the 38 real hard to follow including dropping to about 20 feet on
the deck and power out. The FW followed the F-5 knowing he had a kill. He
spread his airplane all over the countryside because he had one hell of a
torque factor near the ground. Just using ONE small flight characteristic
to say that X is better than Y never has made sense. But we are in the
What-ifs and not the how it was.