"Scott M. Kozel" wrote:

The Amaurotean Capitalist wrote:

"Scott M. Kozel" wrote:

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.

Given that with the Allison engine that the P-51 on the balance had
significantly better performance than previous U.S. fighters, even
with that engine it most likely would have been built in substantial
quantities and been a useful fighter aircraft.

The RAF didn't really have confidence in it with the Allison. In particular its
high level performance was poor so it wasn't a good fighter choice. IIRC the RAF
used the Allsion engined version for ground attack a bit where the failings
weren't so obvious.

Graham