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F-35's Costs Climb Along With Concerns
Ricardo wrote in
: DeepSea wrote: Ricardo wrote in .uk: buff82driver wrote: http://www.military.com/features/0,1...html?ESRC=dod- bz. nl How were they able to design and bring the P-51 into production within one year back during WW2? Why is it so expensive and take so long now? You didn't really just ask that question, did you? Ah maybe b/c they did not deal with highly complex technology that has thousands of ways of failing and a few critical failures of very tiny parts that don't even move can cause the plane to crash into the ground. With WWII era planes about the most complex things were the big ol' piston engines, retractable landing gear, bomb sights...etc...today a few whiz kids could probably develop a WWII era technology fighter plane better than any seen in WWII. All you need is metal workers, engine mechanics/builders, and some pretty solid aerodynamic students. If it was so easy now then the U.S. would not make everyone else's air force into target practice. And having a very reliable and tested British designed engine made one hell of a contribution... IIRC, the British engine had nothing to do with the design/inception of the P-51. As designed and originally produced, the P51 was a rather lackluster, VERY average fighter for its day. It wasn't until the later addition of the British engine and a couple of (supporting) airframe modifications that made it great. DS Agreed, but it is interesting to note that the original Mustang, with its Allison F3R engine, only came into being as a result of the British Purchasing Commission's earlier contact with NAA and the purchase of the Harvard trainer. NAA's wish to 'break into' the fighter market was frustrated by the US Army Air Corps lack of interest in NAA's ideas on the subject and the offer of the NA-73 fitted a British need at that time. In the event, as you point out, this original design was VERY average, the main concern from the British point of view being performance above 15,000 feet - decidedly poor, although the aircraft had considerable merit at low altitude. That is interesting - I had no idea that British interest is what gave the P-51 its start. The RAF bombers didn't do high altitude stuff, most of the bombing against England was dive bombing, and the Brits already had an outstanding all-around fighter in the Spitfire. What was the Ministry's concern over high altitude performance? DS |
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