Like a bullet with wings, the Thunder Mustang “My Miss Lili” dropped out of a gray sky and buzzed the Lawrence Municipal Airport Saturday morning, its propeller only inches from the tarmac.

The nose-heavy aircraft banked, circled and did everything but strafe the crowd of 40 gathered to see the plane in action.

Pilot Lou Meyer, Boise, Idaho, left, looks for potential obstacles pointed out by Ron Renz, president of GUT Works, LLC, as Meyer prepares for take-off in a Thunder Mustang high performance kit plane. Meyer demonstrated the plane's capabilities Saturday morning at the GUT Works hangar at Lawrence Municipal Airport.

It was the first time a Thunder Mustang sped over the skies of Lawrence, but it won’t be the last.

The plane, a three-fourths-scale replica of the World War II fighter P-51D, will soon be in production at Lawrence-based GUT Works, LLC. The company will sell kits for about $285,000, or full-built models for $500,000.

“They are outstanding,” said Travis Atwood, director of sales and marketing for GUT Works. “There’s nothing quite like it out there.”

The carbon-fiber plane has a 640-horsepower V-12 engine, an 8-foot propeller and can reach a top speed of about 400 mph. It’s also one of the most complex and powerful kit aircraft available, Atwood said.

It outperforms the original P-51 and is mostly used for racing, such as the National Championship Air Races each September in Reno, Nev.

“My Miss Lili” and pilot Lou Meyer spent Friday night in Lawrence Meyer is delivering the plane from Boise, Idaho, to Miami. The plane is owned by Ernesto Estrada, an shrimp farmer from Ecuador who also works in South Florida.

Meyer said flying the Thunder Mustang was like making the jump from a regular car at 70 mph to a race car that can top 200 mph.

“No matter what speed you fly it at, it’s solid,” he said. “You just have to get mentally ahead of the airplane.”

	www.thundermustang.com

Development of the Thunder Mustang began about 15 years ago by Papa51 Ltd., of Boise, Idaho. The company spent about $9 million designing and engineering the plane, Atwood said, but folded because of financial difficulties. GUT Works which stands for Grown Up Toys began negotiating for the rights to build the planes in March 2001 and reached an agreement in September.

Atwood said people were interested in the plane because of the mystique of WWII fighter planes. And a new Thunder Mustang is significantly cheaper than a vintage P-51, which can cost $1.5 million to $3.2 million, and can have much higher operating costs.

The Thunder Mustangs take about two years and 5,000 hours to build. GUT Works hopes to eventually produce about 12 a year.

“The market is definitely beginning to increase,” Atwood said. “The interest has been incredible with this aircraft.”

Herbert Hill Jr., a WWII Navy pilot and member of the Lawrence Experimental Aircraft Club, watched the demo flight of the Thunder Mustang Saturday morning. He has no plans to buy one of the planes, but he said he was excited for GUT Works.

“We’re fortunate to have this in Lawrence,” he said. “That means I’ll occasionally get to see one fly, which will be a treat in itself.”