Do You Have an Illogical Hatred of an Aircraft?

[Clay_Allison]

When I said the speeds would be fatal to the Komet, I meant the speeds the V2 travelled would be terminal and literally rip the Komet apart!

The V2 could achieve a maximum speed of 3,545 miles an hour. Building a piloted aircraft that could handle that was far beyond any technology at the time.

One of the reasons people never heard the V2 on it's approach to target was because it was supersonic. At least with the V1, you could tell when it was ready to attack...the engine would shut down which started it's dive sequence.

I agree with you, I was just stating that there was no reason to change anything about the komet if it was going to be disposable anyway.

 

[GrauGeist]

Ahh...gotcha.

Yeah, if they could have found a way to make the V2's motor smaller while keeping it cool, it would have been interesting to see what could have been.

As it stands, the V2's motor was intended to run at full throttle. So when the candle was lit, it was game on.

 

[coffincorner]

Grew up believing the Spitfire was best so I've naturally gone the other way since:

Beautiful lines spoiled by the chunky radiator intakes under the wings (compare with the sleek 109's).
Expensive wing design - were there any performance benefits when most other fighters were nonelliptical?
Why on earth were the guns scattered across the wings when every other designer was doing their best to keep armament as close to the centreline as possible?
The Hispano barrels look too long - there must have been a significant drag penalty - why weren't they shortened sooner?

Still, she's hard to beat in the looks dept:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsxTocDwUKA

 

[Waynos]

Grew up believing the Spitfire was best so I've naturally gone the other way since:

Beautiful lines spoiled by the chunky radiator intakes under the wings (compare with the sleek 109's).

This is purely subjective to the individual of course, but to my eyes the Spitfire looked much better when the Mk IX saw the SAME radiators mounted under each wing, balancing its appearance. I always thought the various lumps and bumps blighted the 109 like warts, where the Spitfire always retained the smooth a graceful appearance. The sole exception for me being the XVIe which just looks wrong.

Expensive wing design - were there any performance benefits when most other fighters were nonelliptical?

and

Why on earth were the guns scattered across the wings when every other designer was doing their best to keep armament as close to the centreline as possible?

According to Mitchell the elliptical wing was not a deliberate design aim, it, and the spread of the guns, were merely the result of putting 8 guns into the thinnest possible wing, this wing allowed the spitfire to have the lowest drag of any other piston fighter and was the fastest piston aircraft ever recorded in a dive, so it probably halped a bit. It also had benefits in agility.

Agree with the rest, and welcome

 

[Clay_Allison]

This is purely subjective to the individual of course, but to my eyes the Spitfire looked much better when the Mk IX saw the SAME radiators mounted under each wing, balancing its appearance. I always thought the various lumps and bumps blighted the 109 like warts, where the Spitfire always retained the smooth a graceful appearance. The sole exception for me being the XVIe which just looks wrong.

and


According to Mitchell the elliptical wing was not a deliberate design aim, it, and the spread of the guns, were merely the result of putting 8 guns into the thinnest possible wing, this wing allowed the spitfire to have the lowest drag of any other piston fighter and was the fastest piston aircraft ever recorded in a dive, so it probably halped a bit. It also had benefits in agility.

Agree with the rest, and welcome

I always thought the P-51's laminar flow wings and Meredith Effect cooler gave it the lowest drag pound for pound.

 

[Civettone]

What's a Meredith Effect cooler?

At least with the V1, you could tell when it was ready to attack...the engine would shut down which started it's dive sequence.

I've read that that was only true for the first series. A mechanical problem which was corrected soon after. But the idea that you could tell when it was going down stuck. My dad told me that that's what they had been told, and that must have been at the end of 1944 when they were attacking Antwerp.

Kris

 

[GrauGeist]

What's a Meredith Effect cooler?

I've read that that was only true for the first series. A mechanical problem which was corrected soon after. But the idea that you could tell when it was going down stuck. My dad told me that that's what they had been told, and that must have been at the end of 1944 when they were attacking Antwerp.

Kris

That was it's design

It flew a certain amount of distance, held on course by it's gyros...then, when it reached it's destination, the engine shut off, and the guidance system commenced the dive to earth.

 

[Clay_Allison]

What's a Meredith Effect cooler?

Kris

The design followed the best conventional practice of the era, but included two new features. One was a new NACA-designed laminar flow wing, which was associated with very low drag at high speeds.[4][5] Another was the use of a new radiator design (one Curtiss had been unable to make work) that used the heated air exiting the radiator as a form of jet thrust in what is referred to as the "Meredith Effect."

The employment of the principle of low velocity cooling avoids the necessity for an increasing expenditure of power with increasing speed provided the exit conditions are adjusted to suit the speed. Further the combined effects of compressibility and heat transfer from the radiator may reduce the power consumption to nothing if the size of the radiator is adequate. By the use of the heat of the exhaust, in addition, and appreciable thrust may be expected from the presence of the cooling stream.

basically, it's a radiator that funnels the air heated by it through a rocket nozzle that provides thrust, partially negating the drag of the radiator itself.

 

[davparlr]

I always thought the P-51's laminar flow wings and Meredith Effect cooler gave it the lowest drag pound for pound.

I have read that the Mustang was some 30 mph faster than an equally engined spitfire. Unfortunately, I have been unable to find the reference.

 

[drgondog]

I have read that the Mustang was some 30 mph faster than an equally engined spitfire. Unfortunately, I have been unable to find the reference.

Dave - the early RAF tests are a good place to start looking.

The distinctive differences for same basic engine (and 700+ extra pounds for Mustang III (P-51B-1) were all about drag. Maybe the Meridith effect gave it a couple of mph - but maybe not.

 

[davparlr]

Flight test data from spitfireperformance show that the Spitfire IX pulling 18# (67") had a top speed of 330 mph at SL. The P-51D pulling 67" had a top speed of 375 mph at SL. While the heat exchanger may have helped, it is doubtful that it made that big a difference.

 

[Clay_Allison]

Flight test data from spitfireperformance show that the Spitfire IX pulling 18# (67") had a top speed of 330 mph at SL. The P-51D pulling 67" had a top speed of 375 mph at SL. While the heat exchanger may have helped, it is doubtful that it made that big a difference.

there are also the laminar flow wings.

 

[davparlr]

there are also the laminar flow wings.

They were a major factor. As drgondog stated, detailed attention to drag was also a major factor.

 

[Civettone]

Thanks Clay for the explanation on the radiator! Did any other aircraft use this type??

That was it's design

It flew a certain amount of distance, held on course by it's gyros...then, when it reached it's destination, the engine shut off, and the guidance system commenced the dive to earth.

I also found it on wiki: While this was originally intended to be a power dive, in practice the dive caused the fuel flow to cease, which stopped the engine. The sudden silence after the buzzing alerted listeners of the impending impact. The fuel problem was quickly fixed, and when the last V-1 fell, the majority impacted under power.

So it seems that the fuel flow interruption was not intended. And 'quickly' fixed. I wonder what they mean by 'quickly' though ...
I really wonder if someone can shed some light on this!

Kris

 

[Waynos]

I always thought the P-51's laminar flow wings and Meredith Effect cooler gave it the lowest drag pound for pound.

According to sources I have read (A J Jackson, J Glancey and A Price among them) the Spitfires low drag wing was what allowed it to beat all other piston fighters in terminal velocity dive tests (the ones where the prop came off one aircraft at m=0.9 estimated), an investigation into exactly why this was the case despite the Mustang's more modern laminar flow wing revealed 'imperfections' in the finish on the Mustang that gave it higher than predicted drag and in conjunction with naca the finish of production Mustangs was improved, but they never achieved a better drag rating that the Spitfire. This is not knocking the Mustang, Supermarines own laminar flow fighter, the Spiteful, also turned out to be draggier than the Spitfire and this was a source of great disappointment and frustration to Joe Smith. This has been attributed to a combination of the fineness ratio, aerofoil section and the slight twist in the wing of the Spit form what I remember, but as a student of the historical rather than the aerodynamic theory I don't pretend to fully understand this explanation.

edit to add. Having seen the other replies I had better add, I am specifically talking about what was found during terminal velocity dive tests and not at level flight speeds, it was that the Spitfire was somehow less dramatically affected by the rapid rise in transonic drag than the others, I don't know why that would be the case so I can't argue the point, just reporting it.

 

[MrCreak]

edit to add. Having seen the other replies I had better add, I am specifically talking about what was found during terminal velocity dive tests and not at level flight speeds, it was that the Spitfire was somehow less dramatically affected by the rapid rise in transonic drag than the others, I don't know why that would be the case so I can't argue the point, just reporting it.

The Spit also had a lower t/c ratio which would help.

 

[coffincorner]

Agree with the rest, and welcome

Thank you.

I always thought the various lumps and bumps blighted the 109 like warts, where the Spitfire always retained the smooth a graceful appearance.

Have to say I quite like the warts - the Germans seemed to fiddle with their designs more than the Allies, trying to extract every last ounce(gram) of performance out of their machines. For me it makes for more interesting reading.

the spread of the guns, were merely the result of putting 8 guns into the thinnest possible wing

That's understandable in the early marks. But how come there were still .303 'rattles' in the outer wings years later? They should have handed over the Spit to Kurt Tank for a makeover - he'd have sorted her out with wingroot synchronised cannons rüstsätze kits in a jiffy..

 

[Waynos]

Have to say I quite like the warts - the Germans seemed to fiddle with their designs more than the Allies, trying to extract every last ounce(gram) of performance out of their machines. For me it makes for more interesting reading.

The Spitfire was the most 'fiddled with' fighter of the war, just ahead, I believe, of the 109 and its development brought more success than the 109, whose 1945 model model trailed far behind the equivalent Spitfire in many respects. Maybe there is more to the Spit than you realise? It can get caricatured in Battle of Britain mode. Alfred Price's 'The Spitfire Story' is an excellent read.It covers all versions from mk 1 to 47, including photo recce, seaplane, and many other versions. I am actually looking for an equivalent book on the 109 if you know of one?

That's understandable in the early marks. But how come there were still .303 'rattles' in the outer wings years later? They should have handed over the Spit to Kurt Tank for a makeover - he'd have sorted her out with wingroot synchronised cannons rüstsätze kits in a jiffy..

I would have to look up the answer to that, except to say that later Spitfires did have .50's alongside the cannon, while others just had 4 x 20mm so the .303 was not retained all the time, though possibly too long yes.

I disagree that Tank could have done any better, synchronised guns would have needed new structure, added more weight and a lower rate of fire, so I'll stick with the 4 20mm of the later models.

 

[Shortround6]

That's understandable in the early marks. But how come there were still .303 'rattles' in the outer wings years later? They should have handed over the Spit to Kurt Tank for a makeover - he'd have sorted her out with wingroot synchronised cannons rüstsätze kits in a jiffy..

THe Hispano was never synchronised and may have been incapable of being synchronised so unless Kurt can come up with a new cannon the wing root option is out.
Spitfire also had a big enough wing so that you could put worthwhile armament both outside the propellor arc and inside the wing at the same time. less need for rüstsätze kits if your fighter can carry effective armament ALL the time.
I am not arguing wing mounted vrs centerline armament. But 2 Hispanos aren't really horrible all by themselves and extra .50s or the late model four 20mm means that for anything the Germans were using extra firepower wasn't needed.

 

[Civettone]

And Kurt Tank never managed to do anything in a jiffy, just look at how long he took to develop the Fw 190D...

I agree on the Spit having more development potential than the Bf 109. It was bigger to start with.
Kris