Photo: Spirit in the Sky
Vintage World War II fighter planes are some of the most magnificent machines ever to jump from the drawing board into the moral realm. Even so, we doubt most people would want to bother taking a P-51 Mustang that’s in a million and one-pieces and painstakingly piece them back together. If you’re the psychopath that would love that kind of a challenge, well, here you go, weirdo.
It’d be a bit of a stretch to call this collection of metal parts an aircraft, but we’ll refer to it as such, just because we can. It’s a bit tricky to determine exactly which version of the Mustang this specimen belongs to. The photo of the completed Mustang shown in the advertisement appears to be either the P-51C or P-51D, examples that sported the iconic Rolls Royce-Packard Merlin V12, also found in the British Spitfire.
Where that engine might have wound up in anybody’s guess, frankly, though, there’s so much work to be done just to make this Mustang a serviceable glider, let alone a fully airworthy warplane. Even so, it’s still a heck of a thrill seeing all these minute components of the Mustang photographed in all their glory without the rest of the plane distracting us from the brilliance of the engineering.
According to the official listing on behalf of an anonymous private seller on spiritinthesky.co.uk, this Mustang served with the 357th fighter group in the skies over Western Europe. Believe it or not, the current owner has logged over 1500 man-hours just getting the plane into the state it is today. We’d probably be terrified at the condition it was in before he got his hands on it.
The North American Aviation emblems molded into the parking brake release pedals is an exciting touch that might have gone entirely unnoticed had this Mustang not wound up reduced to an unrecognizable pile of 70-plus-year-old aluminum.
What’s the price for an iconic American warbird in more pieces than there are episodes of Top Gear in all 30 seasons? Well, the answer is whatever the heck some absolute mad-lad is willing to pay in cash to take everything home. We imagine you’d need more than a man with a van to fit everything.
Where that engine might have wound up in anybody’s guess, frankly, though, there’s so much work to be done just to make this Mustang a serviceable glider, let alone a fully airworthy warplane. Even so, it’s still a heck of a thrill seeing all these minute components of the Mustang photographed in all their glory without the rest of the plane distracting us from the brilliance of the engineering.
According to the official listing on behalf of an anonymous private seller on spiritinthesky.co.uk, this Mustang served with the 357th fighter group in the skies over Western Europe. Believe it or not, the current owner has logged over 1500 man-hours just getting the plane into the state it is today. We’d probably be terrified at the condition it was in before he got his hands on it.
The North American Aviation emblems molded into the parking brake release pedals is an exciting touch that might have gone entirely unnoticed had this Mustang not wound up reduced to an unrecognizable pile of 70-plus-year-old aluminum.
What’s the price for an iconic American warbird in more pieces than there are episodes of Top Gear in all 30 seasons? Well, the answer is whatever the heck some absolute mad-lad is willing to pay in cash to take everything home. We imagine you’d need more than a man with a van to fit everything.
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