The Mustang Wings
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The Mustang Wings...
One of the most important features of the Mustang was a wing designed using laminar flow airfoils which were developed co-operatively by North American Aviation and the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). These airfoils generated very low drag at high speeds. During the development of the NA-73X, a wind tunnel test of two wings, one using NACA 5-digit airfoils and the other using the new NAA/NACA 45–100 airfoils, was performed in the University of Washington Kirsten Wind Tunnel. The results of this test showed the superiority of the wing designed with the NAA/NACA 45–100 airfoils.
P-51D on the Inglewood assembly line
In the photo above we can notice that all panel lines on the upper wings have been carefully filled, smoothed and primed before application of (on natural metal Mustangs) final coats of high speed silver lacquer. Even small flaws on the surface of P-51 wings could cut performance.
Another photo from the book P-51 Mustang in Action (Squadron - Aircraft
