Is Spitfire really the BEST British fighter???

[cheddar cheese]

Well I think we will

[the lancaster kicks ass]

that's funny, i was just thinking we wouldn't.........

[Maestro]

Concerning the British plane that flew alongside the Spitfire for the whole war, I think the Hurricane did. If I remember well, the No. 1 Squadron used Hurricanes until late in the war. May be until the end of it.

[mosquitoman]

It wasn't in production all the way through but it was being used as a fighter bomber in the Far East untill the end. It was operational on D-Day and afterwards as a secure postal service aircraft to get orders to the front safely and securely

But the Hurc can hardly be considered a contender vs. the Spit do you think?

[Gemhorse]

Wow, have you guys been having a right old ding-dong while I've been absent !!!......Needless to say, IMHO the Spitfire was the 'Best British Fighter', and my reasons for this was firstly the huge 'morale-booster' they were to all in the British Commonwealth, through the 'Spitfire Fund'...It was abit like what 'Doolittle's Raid' on Japan was to the US, it inspired the people that the Armed Forces were fighting back.....

The Mk.1 could sustain a continuous rate of turn inside a BF-109E without stalling, the latter was known for flicking into a vicious stall spin without prior warning if pulled around too quickly....

The Mk.II was the flying machine when it came to the Spitfire, which enjoyed the best balance of power-to-weight...

The Mk.V was clearly at a disadvantage against the superior Fw-190 when it was introduced in 1941, morale was affected to a certain extent, but the RAF pilots still had confidence in the soundness of their Spits, they simply treated the Fw-190's with more respect than the Bf-109F's...the Fw's were not as prevalent in 1941 in combat as the Bf's, and the RAF countered by pulling in a total of 48 Sqn.'s into the frontline fighting. The Mk.V was the first 'truly-global' Spitfire, being used by the Allies in all major theatres of the War. The Luftwaffe pilots were prepared to 'mix-it' with the FW-190, due to it's fabulous rate-of-roll, unlike the Bf-109F/G pilots who tended to rely on sweeping attacks from altitude. Despite being hamstrung in performance, the Mk.V pilots nevertheless took the fight to the Luftwaffe at every oppurtunity, and this showed in continuing kills of Fw-190's & Bf's, the clipped wing helping in the lower-altitude combats...

The Mk.VIII was more robust than earlier models, great for the rougher airstrips of Burma etc., and the firing selector was improved by a vertically-arranged rocker system on the spad grip, press the top part and you got mg's, the lower, cannons, and in the middle, the lot, which was ideal for both ground-strafing or aerial combat. The Mk.VIII had two plus points, should the enemy get astern of you: [1.] you could out-climb them in a sustained ascent; [2.] if you had height, you could out-dive them, being almost twice as heavy as any enemy fighter likely to be encountered...One of our NZer's, Flg Off. Ken Rutherford clobbered at least 3 'Oscars' in a Mk.VIII, the most nimble of Jap fighters....

The Mk.IX was superior to the Fw-190 above 25,000 ft., it's two-stage, two-speed supercharger on the Merlin 61 coming in with a bang at about 16,000 ft. There were different variants of Mk.IX's, the one just mentioned known officially as Mk. LF IXC's, but the pilots called them IXB's, and the officially known F IXC, which the pilots called IXA's, these being powered by Merlin 61, 63 or 63A engines, which gave superior performance against Fw-190's below 27,000 ft. Also about this time, Fighter Command introduced the Mk.II Gyro Gunsight, which was a great improvement over the earlier GM 2 Reflector Gunsight, enabling pilots to score hits at ranges as great as 600 yds, and at deflection angles up to 50 degrees. Essentially, by 1944 the RAF finally had a fighter designed to operate in excess of 30,000 ft. where it had the edge on both Fw's & Bf's, and it was probably the most popular version of all...depending on the individual pilot, that is.....

The Griffon Mk.'s VII and XIV both had greater range with increased fuel capacity, the Mk.VII being easier to handle of the two, but the Mk.XIV was the real performer....It really shocked the Luftwaffe when introduced, as they liked to 'bounce' on RAF fighters from height and these aircraft would be climbing up to tackle them head-on, throttles wide-open!..These Spitfires were probably the toughest to master, basically being an 'engine with wings', their torque requiring utmost care taking-off. Their roll-rate was exceptional, climb-rate was in excess of 5000 ft/min and were notably used against the V1 attacks...As far as the War went, it was the superior Spitfire in all aspects....

The Mk.XVI was basically a Mk.IXB with a licenced Merlin 66 produced in the US by Packard. Unfortunately, all the minor adjustments made to the Mk.IX's Merlin weren't included in the blueprints sent to Packard, and some pilots believe they weren't as quick...Wg Cdr. R.W.F. 'Sammy' Sampson firmly believes this, but others really liked them, particuarly the clipped-wing LF XVI E. One other problem they had was a certain rev-range in which they wouldn't run smoothly, in their 'formation long-range economy-cruise', and this was caused by Packard using a slightly modified carburettor. Avoiding that rev-range was the only solution.... They came on stream around Sept. 1944, and were used for dive & skip-bombing which they excelled at. They were used in 'No Ball' attacks against V2 sites and other similar attacks and were believed to be the most offensively-optimised Spitfire, by some......

One RAF pilot who flew P-51D's after the Spitfires, stated that the Mustang without a doubt was a great aircraft to fly, especially the roomier cockpit on long missions, but that said, he wouldn't have traded any of his past Spitfires for any other Allied fighter....every Spit he flew was different, you just didn't get that feeling of 'individuality' with the Mustang, and simply put, didn't want to fly any other type than the Spitfire.......

So to a large degree, it was the pilots who decided that the Spitfire was 'Best'....The main difference between the Spitfires and the Typhoon / Tempests, was the latter were much heavier for a start...24 to 12 cylinder engines, but also the Hawkers had a much greater cruise speed, so that if combat was offered, they were already ripping-along and had that combat-speed right there on tap....They perhaps were no where as manoeuvrable as Spitfires, and even the heavy Mk.XIV [2000 lb heavier loaded than the Mk.VIII], may not have had as much manoeuvrabilty, it made-up for this in it's exceptional roll-rate and climb, with it's extra prop blade...the only 5-blader of the War, I believe........

Also, I do agree with one comment made, the Martin-Baker MB5 would have made a great addition to the British arsenal......

The only drawback I believe the Spitfire had, was it's range, and I guess that was one area that could have received more development earlier on, but then it was a much smaller aircraft to American fighters....this was overcome, to a point, in the PR versions, sacrificing guns for fuel tanks, and they did that PR run right into Germany virtually every day of the War. Initially, the Spitfire was built as a Defensive fighter too, and since all the big British bombers did the Nightshift, there wasn't much call for an escort fighter with great range....But wasn't she a LEGEND !!!!!

[Nonskimmer]

Originally Posted by Gemhorse

....But wasn't she a LEGEND !!!!!

She was indeed.
And like you indicated, the single biggest killer was the relatively poor range. Didn't the USAAF conduct experiments to improve the Spit's range (can't remember the exact mark used.), but the Air Ministry paid it little attention?

[the lancaster kicks ass]

WAS a legend?? she IS a legend people!!

but yes there really can be no argument, the spit has to be the best.........

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

I agree with RG that the criteria should not be what started before the war started and I agree with mossy that this is about the best British aircraft and not other nations aircraft. As for other things I have to respond to.

Originally Posted by Royzee617

What I meant was that just about only the Spitfire and Bf109 were effective fighters throughout the whole of WW2... the FW190 was not operational until 1941 (I think).

Actually the Fw-190V-1 first flew on June 1, 1939 several months before the war started and the Fw-190A-1 entered service in Sept 1940 only one year after the war started. So the Fw-190 evolved quite a lot throughout the war and started as a great aircraft and ended as a great aircraft. This to me would qualify this to be compared with the Spit just as a 109 was.

Originally Posted by RG_Lunatic

Alder, I almost always give the source link or present the images of the relevant pages. When have I picked a piece of data out of an obscure source and quoted it out of context w/o providing a link or the full content of the document being referenced?

Quite a bit you talk about a subject and say from my sources or from what I have read but you do not list from where you have read or whom you heard it from. That is all.

Originally Posted by DerAdlerIstGelandet

Quite a bit you talk about a subject and say from my sources or from what I have read but you do not list from where you have read or whom you heard it from. That is all.

Which is a totally different thing. Not looking up the refrence and stating that something is from memory does not present it as "fact".

Sourcing such info and quoting it out-of-context while providing no access to the source is quite a different thing. If no one has the book or document in question (or those that do do not look it up and comment), that info is going to be taken as fact even though it does not say what the author of the post is claiming it does.

You see the difference?

=S=

Lunatic

[Soren]

First I would like to say that the Spitfire without doubt was THE best British/Allied fighter of the war. And by 44 and onwards only ONE plane, Allied or Axis, could really match it, and that was the FW-190D.

Originally Posted by Gemhorse

The Mk.1 could sustain a continuous rate of turn inside a BF-109E without stalling, the latter was known for flicking into a vicious stall spin without prior warning if pulled around too quickly....

You couldnt be more wrong !

The Spit and 109 turned VERY equally, and only the Spit would get into nasty stall spins, not the 109 ! (And this is both scientifically and practically proven !)

Jeeze, just last night I saw a documentary where the German pilot was saying that while he thought the 109E could turn with the Spitfire, most pilots were afriad to push it to the limits because there was practically no warning before it stalled into a nasty spin. By contrast the Spitfire gave ample warning and the spin was mild and easy to recover.

[Soren]

Originally Posted by RG_Lunatic

Jeeze, just last night I saw a documentary where the German pilot was saying that while he thought the 109E could turn with the Spitfire, most pilots were afriad to push it to the limits because there was practically no warning before it stalled into a nasty spin. By contrast the Spitfire gave ample warning and the spin was mild and easy to recover.

RG the 109 had slats remember !

The 109 would only spin uncontrollably if one of the slats jammed, wich they did often did on the E series. If the slats didnt jam, then the spin would be VERY easely recovered, much easier than a spin with a Spitfire.

[mosquitoman]

The shape of the Spitfire wing meant that the plane would shudder before it stalled, giving the pilot a warning

Originally Posted by Soren

RG the 109 had slats remember !

The 109 would only spin uncontrollably if one of the slats jammed, wich they did often did on the E series. If the slats didnt jam, then the spin would be VERY easely recovered, much easier than a spin with a Spitfire.

You and your magic slats. That is not what the German pilots say at all.

Now you claim the slats prevented spins too.