| Author | Message | ||
     Crusty |
Two of the most magnificent fighters of WW 2 side by side. Turn up the sound and just listen to those Rolls Royce Merlins hum! http://www.ferociousfrankie.com/video1.html | ||
| Two_seasons |
Oh so sweet. Beautiful fighter airplanes! Excellent videography! We live in Waukesha Wisconsin, close by Crites Field. The Crites brother were some of the original aviators in the USA. We are blessed to see a local P-51 flying around here. A local doctor owns it from what I'm told. Every year Wisconsin celebrates the EAA Fly-In. Owners and planes from around the world gather to show off their passion---flying. There are many different types of people and planes there. In retrospect, the event reminds me of this board, different views with one passion. Thanks for sharing Crusty. | ||
| Britchri10 |
RE: The recent Royal Wedding: the only piece worth watching was the Battle of Britain flight flyover of the Palace. One Spitfire, one Hurricane & one Lancaster. Six Merlins at once! | ||
| Drkside79 |
I have always dreamed of flying a P51. If i win the lotto one of those will be my first step back to the poor house. | ||
| Xl1200r |
Amazing how, though both beautiful feats of engineering, the Mustang looks as though it could have been designed yesterday. | ||
| Paint_shaker |
Love those old warbirds!!! | ||
| Nobuell |
In my bicycle racing days, we were lined up for the start of a road race near Wright Patterson AFB. We had 3 mustangs do a very low, amazing high speed fly over for the start of the race. I will never forget the sound of those machines going overhead. Scary and amazing at the same time. Think about the fear they would incite during a full bore strafe during WW2. I did lousy in the race but it is one of my fondest race memories. | ||
| Harleyms |
beautiful machines....I'm with you Drkside, lotto winnings would be used toward enough land for a private airstrip, and a warbird. One can dream huh? (Message edited by harleyms on May 05, 2011) | ||
| Blake |
The Spitfire is pure art. | ||
| Ted |
wow they really haul ass. not a tame fly-by like you see at most shows. sweet thanks | ||
| Brumbear |
wow | ||
| Cpeg |
There is an annual airshow here in the summer. Last year a Mustang flew low into the little valley I live in, did a couple real low passes, then did a couple circles over somebodies house on the golf course, stood it on it's tail and hauled potatoes out of here. Sounded hot. Thanks for that video. | ||
| Sifo |
Both are great examples of WWII enginering. The P51 to me is just timeless though. That and the SR-71 are probably my favorite aircraft of all time. | ||
| Jumbo_petite |
I remember the first time I saw a P51in flight. I was riding my Old Triumph out to a warbird fly-in at a local airport,I heard it overhead and could just barely make the silohette from the glare of the sun. It disappeared for a while but later as I was walking on the taxiway t did a low level pass and circled in to land. The sound of that engine as it was taxiing in was pure music. | ||
| Boogiman1981 |
I'm with Sifo... | ||
| Sifo |
I know the P51 has in it's history shot down jet airplanes in it's history. I wonder if any other prop driven airplane can make that claim. | ||
| Gregtonn |
If you are a fan of WWII planes you really should go to the Reno Air Races at least once in your life. They are awesome! http://www.airrace.org/index.php G | ||
| Birdy |
AD-1 Skyraiders were credited with 2 MIG kills. Both were head on passes, NEVER try and outgun someone with 4 20MMs and when they are in a pair you're toast! I read that the P51 got jets in WW2 BUT for the most part the jets had to be "Low & Slow" on take off or landing as they simply were too fast for ANY prop plane to keep up with, about 150 MPH faster. | ||
| Brother_in_buells |
Thanks for posting these beautiful machines Crusty ! They are oh so fricking great! | ||
| Buellboiler |
why didn't they supercharge the Allison engine to match the high altitude performance of the RR engine? | ||
| Birdy |
They did, ever hear of the P38, had the longest range and shot down 75% of all the jap plane in the war. | ||
| Cpeg |
My personnel favorite plane, had several Lightenings at the local show.  Here is an interesting Spitfire.  | ||
| Hughlysses |
Both "normal" Allisons and RR Merlins were supercharged. The superchargers were gear-driven and some of the engines even had 2-speed superchargers. The Allisons in the P-38 were "turbo-supercharged" (what we call turbocharged today). In the photo above, those round things on top of the engine nacelles just at the rear edge of the wing are the turbo's. They're about 3 feet in diameter. | ||
| Hughlysses |
I'm really looking forward to seeing this thing when it's completed:  It's a P-61 Black Widow night fighter. This one was recovered off the side of a mountain in Indonesia (where it had crashed during WWII), and is one of 4 known to exist. There's one at the museum at Wright-Patterson AFB, one in the Smithsonian's collection, and one in China (left from WWII). None of them will ever fly, but these guys plan to fly this one when it's finished. Here's what it'll look like put together:  Read all about the restoration here: http://www.maam.org/p61/p61_rest.htm | ||
| Bluzm2 |
Thanks John, that was awesome. Two of my favorite aircraft ever. The Lightning is also at the top of the list. Our first house after Jan and I got married was right next to a small local airport. It was less than a block away. There was a P51 Mustang and a F4U Corsair hangered right next to the fence closest to my house. It was pure mechanical music when ever they were fired up. Just the sound of either one of them cranking over would about bring me to my knees. The P51 sitting on the hanger apron idling was one of the coolest sounds ever. When it took off, it was quieter than a Cessna! That is until the wheels cleared the ground... then the pilot would hit it. On occasion he would do low high speed passes over the runway. It was amazing how fast they were. And then there was that sound.... V12, open headers... I love the sound of the Spitfire. The aero shriek on a dive is cool. THAT would have scared the hell out of anyone. WWII aircraft were very special.. so were the men that flew them. Brad | ||
| Britchri10 |
WARNING: NOT SUITABLE FOR WORK OR CHILDREN: SWEARING Spitfire on Youtube http://youtu.be/HX629ZjWD68 | ||
| Aesquire |
Pretty much every airplane engine except the flat 4 or 6 cylinder Lycoming & Continental civilian designs had supercharging. What kind determined altitude capability. The Allison had a mechanical super mounted to the rear of the engine. It was designed to use the GE turbochargers to feed the onboard super, but the Turbo took years of development to mature. The P-38 was the only Allison engined fighter to use both the Turbo & the built in Super as originally conceived. The P-63 KingCobra used an Allison with an second mechanical Super drive by a short drive shaft with a fluid coupler. ( to prevent stripping the gears as it was engaged. ) A late war development, not really followed up on. Most were shipped to Russia. All the other Allison engined (production)planes went with just the built in Super, and thus were limited in performance at higher ( over 20,000 feet ) altitudes. Allison never really changed that except for the KingCobras, While Rolls Royce did. The P-39 AiraCobra was originally designed with both Turbo and built in Super, but the Turbo wasn't ready yet, so the Air Corps had it built without the Turbo, and that left it mostly useful in the ground attack role. Which it did very well, especially for the Russians who got the bulk of production. An excellent tank killer, ( 37mm or 20mm cannon in nose ) it also got extensive use in New Guinea and Guadalcanal, where is was fine as an attack plane, but had to struggle to climb fast & high enough to fight Zero's. The P-40's has similar issues, not having the altitude and climb abilities needed, as did the early P-51's ( and A-36 attack versions ). The Merlin engine in the Spitfire had at first one built in mechanical Super, then Rolls Royce added another Super with an intercooler, and THEN it had the altitude power needed. It equipped in various versions the Spitfire, Hurricane, Lancaster Bomber, ( and several other more or less successful planes ) and most famously for Americans, the later P-51 Mustang, Giving it the speed and altitude abilities that made it the epitome of American fighters. The Brits tried Turbo charging during WW2 but for the Merlin decided to go with the simpler, lighter system of exhaust pipes shaped to give jet thrust, recovering as much as 200hp at speed. How you supercharged your engines, had a direct effect on altitude and speed performance. Only the P-38 and P-47 fighters used Turbos on production fighter planes, and were the altitude kings of the U.S. fighters. The B-17, B-24, B-29 etc. all used Turbos to feed the on board supers to improve high altitude performance, one reason the U.S. planes were used for high altitude bombing, and the RAF planes ( which, except for Mosquito's mostly used single super equipped engines ) bombed at lower altitude at night. Several other planes, F4F Wildcat, F6F Hellcat, F4U Corsair, etc. used 2 supers feeding one another like the Merlin, and had no altitude problems. Cpeg, that clipped wing Spitfire is a late war model with a Rolls Royce Griffon engine. Think Merlin on Steroids. The later Griffon powered Seafire models really needed the counter rotating propellers, since if you had to go around on a carrier landing, the massive torque would pull your nose to the right.....straight toward the Carriers Island. | ||
| Buellboiler |
thank you Aesquire! Very informative summary on something that I should have already known. If they were able to work out the details of a functional turbo on the rotary engines, why not on the Allison? | ||
| Captcaz |
If anyone is in the Norfolk, VA, area ... go to http://www.militaryaviationmuseum.org/ and check out the planes. I've lived in the area for almost 20 years, and never went until a couple months ago. Amazing! And I met the guy who has THE coolest job in the world - the head pilot whose "job" it is to take them out. On top of that, there is an old BMW R-75 with sidecar and one of the folding bikes the paratroopers used in WWII (Corgi, I think). | ||
| Dwardo |
A large number of P-40s were built using the Rolls Royce Merlin engine. You can identify these by the fact that the air scoop above the cowling is missing, if I recall correctly. I think these were the low blower models of the Merlin, but in any case, it didn't really do much for it. The airframe was obsolescent by the start of WW2, having been adapted from an earlier radial engined fighter produced in the mid 1930s. The original "A" model of the Mustang used the same Allison engine with lame supercharger and produced excellent performance at low and medium altitudes due to its superb airframe and radiator design. Ironically, it was designed by a German immigrant named Edgar Schmued. |
