Flying Warbirds: An Illustrated Profile of the Flying Heritage Collection's Rare WWII-Era Aircraft by Cory Graff

Author:Cory Graff [Graff, Cory]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Zenith Press
Published: 2014-11-01T04:00:00+00:00

performance fighter aircraft before. They said they could make a better plane than the P-40, and would design and build the first one in less than 120 days. Amazingly, NAA rolled the plane out the factory 117 days later—never mind the fact that it had borrowed wheels and no engine. Six weeks later, on October 29, 1940, the new plane flew for the first time with an Allison V-1710 engine.

The prototype Mustang, called the NA-73X, had an incredibly clean, yet simple,

airframe. North American did away with many of the rounded shapes common to aircraft

of the era, shapes that would take too long to tool and build. Instead, the plane had

squared-off wings and tail surfaces.

The Mustang is considered one of the prettiest and most capable aircraft of World War II. Able to escort American bombers over long distances and take on the Luftwaffe’s best aircraft, the P-51’s war record was second to none.

The plane also flew with a distinctive cooling scoop designed with data acquired from

Curtiss and NACA, and perfected by NAA engineers. The scoop contained the coolant

radiator and supercharger aftercooler combined, as well as a separate cooler for oil.

Possibly the most impactful trait was the new fighter’s laminar flow wing, also a result of NACA studies. The NACA number 66 airfoil was designed as symmetrically as

possible by moving the thickest part of the wing aft. This allowed the air passing over the wing to maintain adhesion to the surface for as long as possible. It translated into less turbulence and drag on the wing, which led to a fighter that could fly faster and longer than the norm.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.