A question for P51 Mustang enthusiasts

DonL · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:05 am

I have a Golden Age of Flight calender on my desk at work. On a day where the mustang is featured the author of this calender frequently mentions that mustangs have a habit of falling apart in thunder storms. Compared to other fighters of the day were mustangs any more fragile in a thunder storm? I know there was a group in the south pacific that was almost wiped out by a severe storm but i thought that was just an extreme example of a tstorm.

DenverWarbirdFan · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:25 am

This is funny....I'm looking at the exact same calendar on my desk right now and wondering the same thing. Where is "Sunny VIII" now anyway?

drgondog · **Joined:** Mon Nov 21, 2005 10:50 am **Posts:** 237

The 51B/C/D/K was stressed at 8G limit/12G Ultimate at 8000 pounds. At a higher gross weight the load threshole is less.

Nobody wants to be caught in a bad thunderstorm cell but having a fighter with that kind of structural integrity is a whole lot better than a Transport or Bomber stressed at 4G/6G (or 3/4.5) depending on genre.

Holedigger · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:37 am

I am reading fatal crash/destroyed in 95 for sunny VIII

DonL · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 11:00 am

It bothers me that he only has a few lines to describe an airplane and he focuses on this one issue. Wow so many of the planes on this calender are gone!

Bill Greenwood · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 12:30 pm

A thunderstorm may have extreme turbulence, the defintion of extreme is that the plane is just thrown about and is out of the pilot's control.

A Mustang is streamlined, if you get it pointed down it accelerates and can soon get away from you. The other point is that it is not as stable as an airliner type and easier to lose control of. Once stalled it may be harder to make a recovery and same if in a spin. You can pull a lot of g if you overdo it when pushed to the limit.

Other than that, I don't see anything that is much different from other planes. A Spitfire like my MK IX is designed to 9g positive, 8g negative; pretty darn strong. Yet, I know some were lost in Pacific storms, don't know if they broke up or just dove or spun in.

51fixer · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 12:32 pm

DonL wrote:

Compared to other fighters of the day were mustangs any more fragile in a thunder storm? I know there was a group in the south pacific that was almost wiped out by a severe storm but i thought that was just an extreme example of a tstorm.

The losses that mission were significant.
Beyond an in flight breakup other factors can influence aircraft not returning from that event.
1.- Loss of control due to being tossed around in the sky and being unable to recover due to being in IFR conditions.
2.- Getting lost and not being able to find the home island after the storm has blown you off course.
I don't think anyone can consider the structure of the Mustang as being fragile.
Rich

mlenoch · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 12:32 pm

The only two Mustang 'break-apart' incidents that come to mind are the early P-51D wing failures due to the landing gear retracted design and the other, the large loss of P-51s in the Pacific typhoon enroute during a mission. (A minor thunderstorm loss would have been the 2 aircraft lost that penetrated a storm enroute to Texas back in the 1970s). Not enough to label the Mustang as having a propensity of wing failures.
VL

hang the expense · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 9:38 pm

Mustang wings are pretty danged tough.Not as tough as kittyhawk but still tough enough.There,I complimented a mustang.

A2C · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 9:47 pm

I've got a book about a unit in Italy flying P-51B's, and according to that book way over half the mustangs in the unit were lost to accidents. Very many were lost, because they exceeded VNE. Others were lost from inflight breakup (It didn't say exactly what) and bad weather. Many more were lost than is usually mentioned.

I don't usually memorize books, but I recall it mentioned out of 30-40 pilots starting out in the unit on a combat tour, around 6 were left! The year was 1943. That's 4/5 losses.

Jack Cook · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:08 pm

The answer is razorback and powder blue on top.
Wait what was the question :shock:

RyanShort1 · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:43 pm

I've lost some valuable information on a hard-drive that crashed recently, but I am pretty sure that one of the instances you may be referring to is covered in this link:

http://www.506thfightergroup.org/missio ... friday.asp

I've met Lt. Burry who's mentioned on the page! It was one INCREDIBLE storm.

Ryan

51fixer · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:48 pm

Much stiffening and re-enforcing was done over time to the horizontal stab on the P-51 after the Merlin was installed.
This has been discussed in several prior threads.
Besides mods to the horizontal changes were made to the Rudder trim tab operation and adding the triangle shaped fairing fwd of the vertical. This reduced excessive rudder inputs in certain maneuvers.
Rich

51fixer · **Posted:** Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:49 pm

Jack Cook wrote:

The answer is razorback and powder blue on top.
Wait what was the question :shock:

I know!
I know!
Pick Me!
Rich

drgondog · **Joined:** Mon Nov 21, 2005 10:50 am **Posts:** 237

vlado wrote:

The only two Mustang 'break-apart' incidents that come to mind are the early P-51D wing failures due to the landing gear retracted design and the other, the large loss of P-51s in the Pacific typhoon enroute during a mission. (A minor thunderstorm loss would have been the 2 aircraft lost that penetrated a storm enroute to Texas back in the 1970s). Not enough to label the Mustang as having a propensity of wing failures.
VL

IIRC the P-51B/C wheel door covers uplocks were redesigned to fix the 'door open/gear drop' issue encountered a couple of times for 51B in a dive pullout and/or high G turn manuevers -

As P51fixer said, there were several changes made to tail after 85 gallon tank was installed. In sequence the tailplane incidence was changed, elevator control bob-weight, metal elevators, dorsal fin, reverse boost tab to name a few.

There was a period in mid 1944 when about 15 Mustangs were lost due to apparent structural failure - In almost every case with enough data to evaluate, the a/c was simply put into extremely high stress manuevers - usually at too high a speed. The biggest single culprit was asymmetrical loads imposed by rolling manuevers in say a dive - which affected both aft attach structure of eppenage or the the wheel door fairing popping open.

The complete re-design of the P-51H solved the issues across the board

Warbird Information Exchange

A question for P51 Mustang enthusiasts

Who is online