The 4th July i had the great pleasure and the big honor to fly on a original P51D! Since fly on a WWII fighter it has been allways my bigger dream, my family offered me that flight. The plane is a P51D wich fought in the 1945 piloted from the Lt. Cd. William B. Bailey (who still alive and has 91 years). The plane is named Double Trouble Two Originally there was a second plane, the Double Trouble One wich unlucky crashed 3 years ago killing the pilot. Both models got imported in Switzerland from the acrobatic pilot Schweitzer which flew with them above the Atlantic and then till here. The only modify they apported to the plane is the radio. The original one was pretty big and heavy, placed behind the pilot. Schweitzer and the actual pilot Buochs Max choosed to leave the old radio and to implement a second place. a place wich, for peaple of 194cm like me are a little bit tightened My head was really close to the cockpit and you can immagine the situation above Swiss Alps with all the thermical tourbolences... and that's me in "dumbostyle" Engine on...(i was quite intoxicated with all that smoke.. ) Taxy out.. The feeling is just..incredible. You can feel the engine power anytime, + the torque of the spinner wich, anytimes the thr get near the zero, shakes all the structure. Breacks out and roll up! I haven't immages of the flight (the only i got are really tiny and all black) but soon i should get a film from a friend with the aerobatics we did above the field. After the Take off whe headed to the alps (The Sud of alps has valleys too tightened to let the pilot fly a "little bit" more fast ). All the flight was above mountains, the pilot needed to see streets to keep the orientation above alps..and damn he was really close to them! the flight was from 30 to 50 meters above the street, the thr was allways from 24 to 26% and with a slow climb the average speed was around 260mph. but, as soon we reached the Vallais (a region just NW of alps) pilot started with tactical flight, what an orgasm! Loopings, Spins, Spins in 4 times, ammerheads, victoryrolls and the more exciting, the hight speed low flight following any little valley on mountains, checking on the left and on the right all you could see was trees..we was quite low lol. After 20 minutes we headed back home with the same great low flight and when above the field pilot did hight speed low pass above the runway, a looping at 380mph, a Cuban eight and again a victory roll beore the landing. The pilot never gad more than 35/37% of power, since he want to preserve the engine, but even if at 1/3 of its power, it could do 380mph passes and all the manouvres. And with the big surprise of all the peaple i came down from the plane without the necessity of vomit I wish you could do the same, a passioned of WWII aircrafts deserve to know what's to fly on one
WAHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO u are a fucking lucky guy!!!!!
Amazing!... btw is it close to WB FH flying experience? :-D I guess you won't ask for anything for next christmas :-D Santa came much early this year.
it's not as far i could see the instruments (quite hard when you'r getting shacked on aerobatics) pilot did all manouvres in a line of 800/1000 meters and he newer gad more than 35/37% of thr....in wb if you try to do the same you would crash after first looping
Hi odi. Are you sure that the "throttle" you were watching wasn't the manifold pressure? (At top right of dashboard) RL planes dont have power shown as % like in WB. MAN 37 is about 65% throttle. (TR p51 gets some 500kmh in quick test at that power.) At maximum throttle manifold pressue shows 60. And with boost slightly more. Looping and such are easily possible with Manifold pressure at 37.
Argh... how did you do it? Damn man, you're such a lucky fuck! Could be illo's right about the throttle though... <Z>
i was just checking the instruments photo, but the throttle isn't visible..it is on the left side next the fuel and oil pressure
If someone wish to fly on it it still possible, P51 field is at Stans (army airport North of Alps) and i can contact the pilot for payments ect.
