Encyclopedia
The
Supermarine Spitfire was a single-seat
fighter used by the
RAF and many Allied countries in
World War II.
Produced by Supermarine, the Spitfire was designed by
R.J. Mitchell, who continued to refine it until his death from cancer in 1937. The
elliptical wing had a thin cross-section, allowing a higher top speed than the
Hurricane and other contemporary designs; it also resulted in a distinctive appearance. Much loved by its pilots, the Spitfire saw service during the whole of World War II, in all theatres of war, and in many different variants.
More than 20,300 examples of all variants were built, including two-seat
trainers, with some Spitfires remaining in service well into the 1950s. It was the only fighter aircraft to be in continual production before, during and after the war.
The aircraft was dubbed
Spitfire by Sir Robert MacLean, director of Vickers at the time, and on hearing this, Mitchell is reported to have said, "...sort of bloody silly name they would give it." The word dates from
Elizabethan times and refers to a particularly fiery, ferocious type of person, usually a woman. The name had previously been used unofficially for Mitchell's earlier F.7/30 Type 224 design.
Design
Supermarine's Chief Designer,
R.J. Mitchell, had won four
Schneider Trophy seaplane races with his designs , combining powerful
Napier Lion and Rolls-Royce 'R' engines with minute attention to streamlining. These same qualities are equally useful for a fighter design, and in 1931 Mitchell produced such a plane in response to an Air Ministry specification for a new and modern monoplane fighter.
This first attempt at a fighter resulted in an open-cockpit monoplane with gull-wings and a large fixed spatted
undercarriage. The Supermarine Type 224 did not live up to expectations; nor did any of the competing designs, which were also deemed failures.
Mitchell immediately turned his attention to an improved design as a private venture, with the backing of Supermarine's owner Vickers. The new design added gear retraction, an enclosed cockpit, oxygen gear and the much more powerful newly developed Rolls Royce
PV-12 engine, later named the Merlin.
By 1935, the Air Ministry had seen enough advancement in the industry to try the monoplane design again. They eventually rejected the new Supermarine design on the grounds that it did not carry the required eight-gun load, and did not appear to have room to do so.
Once again, Mitchell was able to solve the problem. It has been suggested that by looking at various
Heinkel planes, he settled on the use of an elliptical
planform, which had much more chord to allow for the required eight guns, while still having the low drag of the earlier, simpler wing design. Mitchell's aerodynamicist, Beverley Shenstone, however, has pointed out that Mitchell's wing was not directly copied from the
Heinkel He 70, as some have claimed; the Spitfire wing was much thinner and had a completely different section. In any event, the elliptical wing was enough to sell the Air Ministry on this new Type 300, which they funded by a new specification, F.10/35, drawn up around the Spitfire.
The elliptical wing was chosen for superior aerodynamic attributes but it was a complex wing to construct and the
Messerschmitt Bf-109's angular and easy to construct wing offered similar performance to the Spitfire. It has been reported that the Bf-109 took one-third the man hours to construct as the Spitfire.
One flaw in the thin wing design of the Spitfire manifested itself when the plane was brought up to very high speeds. When the pilot attempted to roll the plane at these speeds, the aerodynamic forces subjected upon the
ailerons were enough to twist the entire wingtip in the direction opposite of the aileron deflection . This so-called aileron reversal resulted in the Spitfire rolling in the opposite direction of the pilot's intention.
The prototype first flew on 5 March 1936, from Eastleigh Aerodrome . Testing continued until 26 May 1936, when Mutt Summers, flew K5054 to Martlesham and handed the aircraft over to Squadron Leader Anderson of the Aeroplane & Armament Experimental Establishment .
The Air Ministry placed an order for 310 of the aircraft on 3rd June 1936, before any formal report had been issued by the A&AEE, interim reports being issued on a piecemeal basis.
A feature of the final Spitfire design that has often been singled out by pilots is its
washout feature, which was unusual at the time. The incidence of the wing is +2° at its root and -½° at its tip. This twist means that the wing roots will
stall before the tips, reducing the potentially dangerous rolling moment in the stall known as a spin. Many pilots have benefited from this feature in combat when doing tight turns close to the aircraft's limits, because when the wing root stalled it made the control column shudder, giving the pilot a warning that he was about to reach the limit of the aircraft's performance.
Production
To build the Spitfires in the numbers needed a whole new factory was built at Castle Bromwich, near
Birmingham as a "shadow" to Supermarine's
Southampton factory. Although the project was ultimately led by Lord Nuffield who was an expert in mass construction, the Spitfire was a bit too complex and Supermarine and Vickers engineers were needed. The site was set up quickly from July 1938 - machinery was being installed two months after work started on site.
Variants
There were 24 marks of Spitfire and many sub-variants. These covered the Spitfire in development from the Merlin to Griffon engines, the high speed photo-reconnaissance variants and the different wing arrangements.
Naval versions
A naval version of the Spitfire, called the
Seafire, was specially adapted for operation from
aircraft carriers. Additions included an arrester hook, folding wings and other specialized equipment. However, like the Spitfire, the Seafire had a narrow undercarriage track, which meant that it was not well suited to deck operations. Due to the addition of heavy carrier equipment, it suffered from an aft centre-of-gravity position that made low-speed control difficult, and its gradual stall characteristics meant that it was difficult to land accurately on the carrier. These characteristics resulted in a very high accident rate for the Seafire.
The Seafire II was able to outperform the A6M5 at low altitudes when the two types were tested against each other in WW2. Contemporary Allied carrier aircraft like the
F6F Hellcat and the
F4U Corsair, however, were considerably more powerful. Late-war Seafire marks equipped with the Griffon engines enjoyed a considerable increase of performance compared to their Merlin-engined predecessors.
The name Seafire was arrived at by collapsing the longer name
Sea Spit
fire.RAF service
The first Spitfires to shoot down another plane did so in early September 1939. On this occasion the downed aircraft were RAF Hawker Hurricanes, attacked by accident.
The Spitfire and Mitchell are often credited with winning the
Battle of Britain. This is a view often propagated within popular culture, such as in the film
The First of the Few .
The Spitfire was one of the finest fighters of the war; aviation historians and laymen alike often claim it to be the most
aesthetically appealing. It is, however, frequently compared to the Hawker Hurricane, which was used in greater numbers during the critical stage of 1940. Although early Spitfires and Hurricanes carried identical armament , the placement of the Hurricane's guns was better due to the closer pattern of fire that resulted. A slower top speed, however, made the Hurricane more vulnerable when fighting the German fighter escorts. Wherever possible, the RAF tactic during the Battle of Britain was to use the Hurricane squadrons to attack the bombers, holding the Spitfires back to counter the German escort fighters. In total numbers, the Hurricane shot down more
Luftwaffe aircraft, both fighters and bombers, than the Spitfire, due to the higher proportion of Hurricanes in the air. Seven of every ten German planes destroyed during the Battle of Britain were shot down by Hurricane pilots. Losses were also higher among the more numerous Hurricanes.
The Mark I and Mark II models saw service during the battle and beyond, into 1941. Both of these used 8 x .303 machine guns and although having this number of guns sounds impressive the fact is that this relatively small calibre armament was more suited to shooting down the wood/canvas machines of the first world war. It was relatively common during the Battle of Britain for the German planes to suffer surprisingly high numbers of .303 bullet holes but still return safely to base. The use of a smaller number of larger calibre guns would have been far more effective and this was rectified in later versions of the Spitfire. The Mark V entered service in early 1941, and was the first to feature
cannon armament . The configuration of two 20 mm cannon and four .303 machine guns was standard during the mid-war years.
Another contemporary, the Luftwaffe's Messerschmitt
Bf-109, was similar in attributes and performance to the Spitfire. Some advantages helped the Spitfires win many
dog fights, most notably, maneuverability, with both the Spitfire and the Hurricane having higher rates of turn than the Messerschmitt. Good cockpit visibility was probably a factor, also, as these early Bf-109s had narrow, panelled, heavily-framed cockpit windows. At this time, the Merlin engine's lack of direct fuel injection meant that both Spitfires and Hurricanes, unlike the Bf-109E, were unable to simply nose down into a deep dive. This meant the Luftwaffe fighters could simply "bunt" into a high-power dive to escape attack, leaving the Spitfire spluttering behind as its fuel was forced by negative "g" out of the carburettor. RAF fighter pilots soon learnt to "half-roll" their aircraft before diving to pursue their opponents. The use of uninjected carburettors was calculated to give a higher specific power output, due to the lower temperature, and hence the greater density, of the fuel/air mixture fed into the motor, compared to injected systems. "
Miss Shilling's orifice," , a holed diaphragm fitted across the float chambers, went some way to cure the fuel starvation in a dive in March, 1941. Further improvements were introduced throughout the Merlins, with injection introduced in 1943. Production of the Griffon-engined Spitfire Mk. XII had begun the year before.
The introduction of the Focke-Wulf Fw-190 in late 1941 along the Channel front proved a shock to RAF Fighter Command, the new German fighter proving superior to the current Mark Vb in all aspects except turning radius. Losses inflicted on RAF Fighter Command and its Spitfires were heavy as air superiority thus switched to the Luftwaffe units through most of 1942, until the Merlin 61-engined Mark IX version started to see service in sufficient numbers later in the year. Some squadrons still operating the Mark V attempted some degree of parity with the FW-190 when they received specially modified versions that had four feet of wing-tip removed and reduced supercharger blades on the Merlin for optimum performance at lower altitudes. These aircraft were designated LF Mark V officially but were also known by their pilots as "Clipped, Clapped and Cropped Spits," also referring to the fact that many of these Spitfires, thus modified, had seen better days.
The first Spitfires to see overseas service were Mark Vs flown from the deck of the aircraft carrier HMS Eagle to Malta in March 1942. In the months that followed, some 275 Spitfires were delivered to the beleaguered island. To counter the dusty conditions, the Spitfires were fitted with a large Vokes air filter under the nose, which induced drag and lowered the performance of the aircraft. Spitfire V and the later, much-improved, longer-ranged Mark VIII also soon became available in the North African theatre and henceforth featured heavily with the RAF, SAAF and USAAF during the campaigns in Sicily and Italy.
As the American strategic bombing campaign gathered momentum in mid-1943, the need for fighter escort meant much of Fighter Command's Spitfire force was utilised while the US fighter groups worked up to operational status. The poor range of the Spitfire however meant the RAF support operations were limited to North West France and the Channel. As the battle intensified deep over occupied Europe, USAAF fighters like the
P-47,
P-38 and
P-51 bore the brunt of bomber protection. The Spitfire IX squadrons had to bide their time until the invasion of Europe before getting to grips with the Luftwaffe fighter force.
By then, newer, Griffon-engined Spitfires were introduced as interceptors, where their limited range was not an impediment. These faster Spitfires were used to defend against incursions by high-speed "tip-and-run" German fighter-bombers and V-1 flying bombs.
The first Griffon-engined Mk. XII flew on August 1942, but only five had reached service by the end of the year. This mark could exceed 450 mph in level flight, and climb to an altitude of 30,000 feet in under eight minutes. Although the Spitfire continued to improve in speed and armament, it remained
short-legged throughout its life .
As American fighters took over the long-range escorting of USAAF daylight bombing raids, the newer, Griffon-engined Spitfires progressively took up the tactical air superiority role as interceptors, while the Merlin-engined variants were adapted to the fighter-bomber role.
After the Normandy landings, Spitfire squadrons were moved across the Channel, operating from tactical airfields behind enemy lines. As the Allied air forces achieved air supremacy, Spitfire pilots had fewer opportunities to combat German aircraft, and concentrated their efforts on roaming over German territory, attacking targets of opportunity, and on providing tactical ground support to the army units. The newer, faster marks of Spitfire were retained in Britain to counter the V-1 flying bomb offensive in mid 1944, although these aircraft, too, began moving across the Channel before the war in Europe ended.
Although the Griffon-engined marks lost some of the favourable handling characteristics of their Merlin-powered predecessors, they maintained their manoeuvring advantage over German designs in Europe throughout their production.
The first Spitfires in the Far East were two PR IV photo-reconnaissance marks in October 1942. The threat of Japanese attacks on Northern Australia prompted the dispatch of Spitfire Vb's in late 1942. No 1 Wing RAAF was formed in Darwin, the first kill being achieved in February 1943, and saw constant action until September 1943. Spitfire VIII's were received in April 1944. In the Burma/India theatre, the first Spitfire V's were not received until September 1943.
Spitfire pilots, used to European combat conditions, were shocked to find that they could not follow the Japanese
Mitsubishi Zero through a turn. They were forced to adopt similar tactics to those used by the American pilots , relying on their far higher speed capability, especially in a dive , and firepower to prevent the Japanese pilots from using the Zero's turning advantage.
Service in other air forces
Apart from the RAF, Spitfires served with most of the Allied air forces in World War II, especially the
Royal Canadian Air Force ,
Royal Australian Air Force ,
South African Air Force and
Royal New Zealand Air Force . It was one of only a few foreign aircraft to see service with the
United States Army Air Forces. Several European countries also operated Spitfires based in the UK, including French,
Norwegian,
Polish,
Dutch and
Czechoslovakian squadrons in the RAF.
The RAAF, the
Royal Indian Air Force and the RAF also used Spitfires against
Japanese forces in the
Pacific theatre.
There is evidence that the
Luftwaffe also used captured Spitfires to attack Allied targets: one such episode was the strafing of civilians from the village of
Grendon, Northamptonshire in 1940.
Following World War II, the Spitfire remained in use with many air forces around the world, including the
Belgian Air Force, Union of Burma Air Force,
Royal Canadian Navy as the Seafire,
Czech Air Force,
Danish Air Force,
Egyptian Air Force,
Armee de l'Air and the
French Navy Aeronavale, Royal Hong Kong Auxiliary Air Force,
Irish Air Corps,
Israeli Air Force,
Italian Air Force,
Royal Netherlands Air Force,
Royal Norwegian Air Force,
Royal Thai Air Force,
Portuguese Air Force,
Swedish Air Force,
Syrian Air Force,
Turkish Air Force, Rhodesian Air Force, and the SFR Yugoslav Air Force.
Spitfires played a major role in the
Greek Civil War, flown by the RAF and SAAF during 1944 and 1945, and by the
Hellenic Air Force, from 1946 through the end of the war in 1948.
Spitfires last saw major action during the
1948 Arab-Israeli War, when — in a strange twist —
Israeli Air Force Spitfires flown by formerly
RAF pilots in World War II like
Ezer Weizman were engaged by
Egyptian Spitfires and Royal Air Force Spitfires. However, some air forces retained Spitfires in service until well into the 1960s.
Speed and altitude records
During the spring of 1944, high-speed diving trials were being performed at
Farnborough to investigate the handling of aircraft near the
sound barrier. Because it had the highest limiting Mach number of any aircraft at that time, a Spitfire XI was chosen to take part in these trials. Due to the high altitudes necessary for these dives, a fully feathering
Rotol propeller was fitted to prevent overspeeding. It was during these trials that EN409, flown by John Martindale, reached 606 mph in a 45-degree dive. Unfortunately the engine/propeller combination could not cope with this speed and the propeller and reduction gear broke off. Martindale successfully glided the 20 miles back to the airfield and landed safely.
"That any operational aircraft off the production line, cannons sprouting from its wings and warts and all, could readily be controlled at this speed when the early jet aircraft such as Meteors, Vampires, P-80s, etc could not, was certainly extraordinary" —
Jeffrey QuillOn 5 February 1952 a Spitfire Mk. 19 of No. 81 Squadron RAF based in
Hong Kong achieved probably the highest altitude ever achieved by a Spitfire. The pilot,
Flight Lieutenant Ted Powles, was on a routine flight to survey outside air temperature and report on other
meteorological conditions at various altitudes in preparation for a proposed new air service through the area. He climbed to 50,000 feet indicated altitude, with a true altitude of 51,550 feet , which was the highest height ever recorded for a Spitfire. However, the cabin pressure fell below a safe level, and in trying to reduce altitude, he entered an uncontrollable dive which shook the aircraft violently. He eventually regained control somewhere below 3,000 feet . He landed safely and there was no discernible damage to his aircraft. Evaluation of the recorded flight data suggested that, in the dive, he achieved a speed of 690 mph or Mach 0.94, which would have been the highest speed ever reached by a propeller-driven aircraft. Today, it is generally believed that this speed figure is the result of inherent instrument errors and has to be considered unrealistic.
Planes remaining in use
About 50 Spitfires and a few Seafires remain airworthy, although many air museums have static examples. The
RAF maintains some for flying display and ceremonial purposes in the
Battle of Britain Memorial Flight at RAF Coningsby in
Lincolnshire.
The Temora Aviation Museum in Temora, New South Wales, Australia, has an airworthy Supermarine Spitfire Mk VIII, which is flown regularly during the museum's flying weekends.
Area51Aviation, a British company specializing in ex-military aircraft have both a Spitfire and Seafire at their Home Airfield at North Weald Airfield .
The
Black Spitfire is a black-painted Spitfire which belonged to
Israeli pilot and former president
Ezer Weizmann. It is on exhibit in the Israeli Air Force Museum in Hatserim and is used for ceremonial flying displays.
Spitfire in the media
Spitfires are featured in several motion pictures
- Battle of Britain starring Michael Caine. Set in 1940, this film features several flying sequences involving Spitfires, as well as a surprising number of other flying examples of WWII era British and German aircraft. The film's production company was "Spitfire Productions, Steven S.A."
- Piece of Cake starring Tom Burlinson. When it aired on the BBC in 1987, this was the most watched BBC miniseries in history. Based on the novel by Derek Robinson, the six part miniseries covers the prewar era from early 1939 to "Battle of Britain Day," September 15 1940. The series has time to develop its large cast, and depicts the air combat over the skies of France and Britain during the early stages of WWII, though using several flying examples of late model Spitfires in place of the novel's Hawker Hurricanes. There are shots of several Spitfires taking off and landing together from grass airstrips.
Memorials
- Sentinel, a sculpture by Tim Tolkien in Castle Bromwich, England, commemorating the main Spitfire factory.
Operators
Greece lies at the juncture of Europe [i], Asia [i], and Africa [i]. ...
,
Hong Kong,
India,
Ireland, Isreal,
Italy,
Netherlands,
New Zealand,
Norway,
Poland,
Portugal,
Rhodesia,
South Africa,
Soviet Union,
Sweden,
Syria,
Thailand,
Turkey,
United Kingdom,
United States,
Yugoslavia.
Specifications
Spitfire Mk Vb
References
- Dibbs, John and Holmes, Tony. Spitfire - Flying Legend - The Fighter and 'The Few. London: Osprey Aviation, 1997. ISBN: 1-84176-005-6.
- Morgan, E.B. and Shacklady, E. Spitfire : The History. London: Key Publishing, 1992. ISBN: 0-94621-910-9.
- Palfrey, Brett R. and Whitehead, Christopher. . Royal Air Force .
- Price, Alfred. The Spitfire Story. London: Silverdale Books, 1995. ISBN 1-85605-702-X.
Footnotes
External links
-
- - Information about Spitfires still flying today
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