P-51 Mustang and Derivates Ideas and Inspiration

[elmayerle]

Odd thought, the USAAF wanted to get Merlin-powered Mustangs into the air as soon as possible, so commissioned the reworking of P-51s, P-51As, and A-36s along the lines of the XP-78 to produce XP-78As, Bs, and Cs respectively.

Another thought would be an aircraft reclamation center in England gets a P-51 with a trashed fuselage and a P-51B/C with a trashed wing and mates the good portions to produce a cannon-armed, Merlin-powered P-51.  It flies with no serial number and has "Junkyard Dog" nose art.

I wonder if that could have worked in RW.

The XP-78 illustrates that it could be done at the factory as I described and, as for "Junkyard Dog", the wing and control interfaces with the fuselage are identical (the wing mounts to the fuselage with four large bolts, same as the Learjet wing) and I don't see any reason it couldn't be done.

Doing the mod in the field would be more problematical and require significant tin-bashing to get proper cowlings and you would still have the old radiator scoop.  Still, if someone had data on the XP-78/P-51B, you could do it (not sure how well, but you get the fascinating field mods - I know, try using an aircraft returned from the field as a testbed).

[Kerick]

Does this photo resemble the "Junkyard Dog"? Its a re-engined Mustang IA to create an P-78 /XP-51B.

[kitnut617]

As you say it was an XP-51B, the 'bulged' lower cowling created airflow problems to the radiator duct intake though, North Americans solution to that was to lower the wing 3" and straighten out the lower cowling  (from the Rolls Royce Heritage Trust book, 'Rolls Royce and the Mustang')

[elmayerle]

Does this photo resemble the "Junkyard Dog"? Its a re-engined Mustang IA to create an P-78 /XP-51B.

Junkyard Dog would have the deeper fuselage of the P-51B/C but with this wing.  This re-engining, possibly with some fairings added to the bulge for the intake to smooth flow into the radiator would do for some hastily done P-78s to get Merlin-powered Mustangs into action ASAP per my original thought.

[kitnut617]

In the RRHT book Rolls Royce and the Mustang, it says because of the delay getting Packard up to speed, they had made plans to mass produce the Mustang X. They put in place an order with North American to supply Mustang Mk.I airframes (500) sans the engine/cowling/other equipment.  Rolls Royce would have done the conversion at one of their satellite plants and it would have looked like this below

[elmayerle]

Odd thought for post-war; early model Mustangs with the early Allison engine and three-bladed prop replaced by the later Allison engine and four-bladed prop of the F-82, possibly with the P-51B/C radiator installation.  Not sure if 'twould work, but 'twould be attractive.

[The Big Gimper]

Here are some more FTB images:









Source: Facebook World War 2.5 (an alternate 1946/1947)

[FAAMAN]

The FTB Mustang looks brilliant 
Sorta prop powered F-86

[GTX_Admin]

I wish someone would do a 1/48 FTB conversion/kit

[The Big Gimper]

I wish someone would do a 1/48 FTB conversion/kit

Ask Igor at Unicraft, He did the 1/72 conversion.

[GTX_Admin]

Unicraft...

[The Big Gimper]

I know Greg but it is the cross we need to bear if you want it. Maybe Uncle Les or Frank3k can sketch one up for you for resin or 3D print?

[FAAMAN]

There's a 1/72 FTB Mustang available?? COOL  8
Unicraft, I go and have a look for it :)

[kitnut617]

My two I've built, top pics are of the Private Venture Fighter as proposed with three cannon, and the bottom two are of how the Flying Test Bed would have appeared had it gone into production. I've modelled it as having the RR Crecy engine installed with the exhaust augmenter turbine

[The Big Gimper]

Robert:

Pictures of your builds are on the Facebook page World War 2.5. I did not see the source (you) being credited.

[kitnut617]

Thanks Carl for the heads-up, I'll look into it --

Off-topic a bit, but I think someone on one of the forums I frequent is responsible, just recently I was looking for a cut-away or 3-View which shows where the fuel tanks were on a FJ-1. I had looked at whatever wiki had on it's page on the FJ-1 but nothing was there except a note on how much it carried internally and in wingtip tanks, but eventually I found a 3-View after a lot of searching.  I posted it here in the thread I had started, then later I was doing some other searching about the FJ-1, went into the wiki page and low and behold, there's the 3-View I found now on the wiki page ----

[FAAMAN]

Very cool models Kitnut!! Now I wonder what a navalised version with the cockpit raised a bit would look?

[The Big Gimper]

More FTB data:



Source: Facebook The Greatest Planes That Never Were

[GTX_Admin]

More FTB data

Use that term loosely with this drawing...

[kitnut617]

That cutaway has just cropped up on the Secret Projects Forum done by Motorcar.  I don't know where he got the 'cuffed' prop blades from because they don't appear in any photo or sketch of the FTB (or PVF). There is also photos of the actual parts for the forward fuselage and cockpit floor which he could have quite easily incorporated into his cutaway. There's a very good drawing of how the drive shaft was to be made in the RR Heritage Trust book "Rolls Royce and the Mustang", so that could have been done a lot more accurately too. Justo Miranda's 3-View is quite good but even that has weird looking prop blades, which Igor (at Unicraft) had copied.

[KiwiZac]

Unicraft...

Unicraft...

 :) :)

[Rickshaw]

An unusual development of the F-82 Mustang:

When World War II ended, the venerable wartime North American Aviation P-51 Mustang spawned the twin-fuselage F-82 Twin Mustang. But history almost forgot the way the F-82 was in turn reworked in the form of a twin-boom, high tail attack plane, the A-51 Stallion, sort of a cross between a P-38 Lightning and NAA's later Bronco.

Like the string of other attack prototypes that appeared at the same (see the rest of this gallery) the A-51 program was dropped when the attack mission was abandoned by the newly formed U.S. Air Force, and only three YA-51 aircraft were built.

[Source]

[Rickshaw]

[Source]

[finsrin]

A-51.   One of the most credible appearing of the photo art aircraft :)

[perttime]

Oh yes. Stéphane's A-51 is a good one.
I think he still has the main landing gear too much forward. Cannot keep the nose wheel down, as is.

I think there's larger images in his DeviantArt gallery:
http://bispro.deviantart.com/gallery/24200217/Aviation