Note to the armchair quarterbacks whom are
expert P-51 pilots despite knowing nothing
about them: it bleeds airspeed badly when
the G comes on, which frankly sucks. It is
not a very good turning machine, compared
to other aircraft I have flown.
Also, I suspect that the rate of change of G
(dee cubed ess by dee tee cubed) might be
involved, too. The third derivative.
The following shows complete and utter ignorance
of entirely too much of the "warbird scene"
Surely someone who has been allowed to take the
controls of such a priceless masterpiece should be able to take
it to the limits of its performance envelope safely
I nearly peed my pants laughing so hard, when I read that.
The people who fly warbirds are the people who can
afford to fly them. Rarely are they good sticks, which
is why they crash so often.
I will try to explain this with small words.
People only have 24 hours in the day. They need to sleep,
eat, drink, sh1t which is all overhead. So, they only have
so much time awake.
Some people spend all their time earning money. They
get very good at it (wall st, movies, rock stars). However
these people, who have money, are generally horrible
pilots. A guy I know - wall st money - wrecked a P-51
simply by trying to land it twice in one day. Endless sad
tales of woe result from excessive money-to-brains ratio.
Some people spend all their time learning how to fly well.
However, these people have no money and cannot afford
to buy and fly expensive warbirds.
Time for a Venn diagram.
There is a tiny overlap of the two groups - people with
money, and people with piloting skills. They are very very
rare indeed - Kermit Weeks comes to mind. These are
the people who should be flying the warbirds. However,
the club is open to anyone who can write a big cheque.
If you think everyone that flies an expensive warbird
has the skills of Bob Hoover, you really have no knowledge
of how warbirds are operated. The training and mentoring
of the rich guys is probably more important than parts
availability.