What You Should Know About The P-51H Mustang

The P-51H is the ultimate version of the Mustang. The variant has a new wing, a narrower fuselage as well as an upgraded Merlin engine compared to previous models.

Here’s what you need to know about this awesome version of the Mustang:

1. It was a considerably lightened Mustang

The P-51H has an impressive top speed of 487 mph which is 50 mph faster than the P-51 D. Whereas the P-51D can only consistently reach 450mph in a dive, the P-51H can manage this even in level flight, or in a mild climb.

2. The P-51H didn’t see the front-line units in time to see combat during WWII

While it was in production before the war ended, it simply didn’t reach the front-line units in time. The last P-51Hs were completed in 1946, and by the time the production run of the Mustang ended, over 15,000 of all types were built.

3. At first glance, the P-51H looks pretty much the same as any P-51D you’d come across

However, it’s entirely a separate airframe. The P-51H has a relatively longer fuselage and a shorter landing gear. It’s also a much more refined version of North America’s iconic laminar flow wing. The P-51 uses a new wing design which is the NACA 66 Series.

This wing, combined with North American’s great build quality, gave the plane very low amounts of drag, making it quite fast given the amount of horsepower and fuel flow.

4. In the P-51H, the air cooler was located in the engine compartment and cooled through a coolant-to-oil heat exchanger and not an air-to-oil

The coolant to oil heat exchanger shared coolant with the aftercooler. One advantage of this is that it places the oil cooler in a safer location. The system is less likely to be taken out by a single bullet. If a bullet did hit the heat exchanger for the aftercooler, the engine loses both after cooling and oil cooling.

However, without cooling, the engine will have to run at reduced power so the oil cooler is less important at this point. In this case, the plane could easily make it home in this situation with reduced power.

5. Today, only five P-51H airframes are known to still exist

Two of these are on permanent museum static display, while two are still deemed airworthy. Another airframe is also currently undergoing full restoration so that it can be airworthy again.