The North American P-51D requires little if any introduction, however reference material for it is always sought after. This book is intended to cover all bubbletop variants: -D, -K, CAC production and Cavalier production.
The book is broken down in a logical way, having a 2-page introduction to the type (as I said, it does not need much introduction). Then it goes into the production series, with the –D and –K series as the main versions covered while the CAC (Australian) and Cavalier production are also covered, but not as in depth as the previous versions. You get many 1/72nd scale drawings of all the different production series.
A really interesting section is a comparison of performance with other fighters of the same time: Bf-109G, Mc.202, Fw-190, P-47 and Spitfire. Let’s be clear, this is not a “how will win a dogfight”, but rather a comparison on climb rates, weight, speed, ceiling and such.
Finally the book has an exhaustive section “In Detail”, which includes close-up pictures of surviving examples, drawings from maintenance manuals and some artistic depictions of the airplane interior, including a great drawing of the instrument panel.
The bibliography for the P-51 Mustang is ample so it is difficult to say if this book is “the best” of its type. However I have no doubts this book is an excellent reference book on the late mark Mustangs. Profusely illustrated with B&W and color pictures and 30+ color profiles this book is a source of inspiration for modelers
Highly recommended.
I would like to thank Model Mushroom Publisher and IPMS/USA for the review sample.
The info sheet that came with this book states that it is a second edition and revision of a previous book. The book itself is a large hardbound edition and covers the design and development of the P-51D Mustang. It does not include the earlier A/B/C versions other than in just passing and does include the P-51K and mentions the P-51H at the end of the book.
