Jul 272010
Via the SDAM (by way of Mark Nankivil), an illustration of the North American Aviation P-82 Twin Mustang. While the Germans may have had all kinds of designs for twin-fuselage fighters… it was the US that actually went and put one into production.
Pbththblt!!!
9 Responses to “North American Aviation P-82 Cutaway”
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
I used to have the 1/72 scale Monogram model of one of those.
Considering that it was pretty successful, it’s surprising so few people know of that aircraft. Fairly exotic approach for an American versus German design.
It would be interesting to speculate on how successful the twin-fuselaged Bf-109Z fighter would have been if it had been flown, but it was destroyed in an air raid before the Germans could test-fly it.
I love the pissed off look on the face of the righter, it just screams, “let me have my turn on the stick.”
> I love the pissed off look on the face of the righter…
Every now and then, aerospace illustrators working for the government or major contractors managed to slip in some bit of humor. Such as here: http://up-ship.com/blog/blog/?p=1032
I’ve another piece of NAA artwork showing a B-25 cutaway (might be the same artist, I’ll have to check) that I’ll post at some point that shows a waist gunner clearly amped up on a double-dose of rage.
> I love the pissed off look on the face of the righter…
Never noticed that till now….
>http://up-ship.com/blog/blog/?p=1032
Thats. the. best. one. EVAR…..
Although the idea was to take two pretty much stock P-51s and stick them together, by the time it was finished the P-82 was almost a whole new aircraft with not much parts interchangeability with the P-51.
I can see one thing that can go wrong with this set-up… if the communications system between the cockpits breaks down the crew is going to have a hard time doing any coordinated action.
I seem to recall that a few of these stationed in Japan saw action early in the Korean War.
This, along with the Bell XFM-1 Aircuda are my favorite airplanes ever! Thanks Very Much Scott!
Siergen wrote:
“I seem to recall that a few of these stationed in Japan saw action early in the Korean War.”
And achieved several kills also in the night fighter role, with a big radar pod mounted below the center wing section:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/70/F-82C_Twin_Mustang_1.jpg
I assume the radar pod was pretty light in weight, as otherwise it looks like it would tear off of the aircraft the first time it tried to do any sort of hard maneuver.
Hey, my father was a patent attorney for North American Aviation so ALL of their planes are the best! LOL (but look at the X-15)