Fw-190: the roots of the great roll rate?

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One obvious thing we've overlooked despite the photographs posted is the Fw 190s use of a carry through spars, there were no bolts and I imagine the lower wing skins were continuous across the fuselage.
Only the main spar went through the fuselage. ( see page 52) the wing skin below the fuselage was the tank bay cover.
cimmex
 
The concern for ensuring that overstressed Spitfire wings were wrinkle free on the leading edge but could tolerate with indifference 2.5mm wrinkles aft of the main spar is evidence again that the spitfire in concept is a single spar design.
Do try reading what I wrote; the only part of the Spitfire wing where wrinkles could be ignored, was between ribs 14 - 19, which is the where the aileron hinges attach to the rear spar. Any wrinkles, anywhere else, forward or aft of the mainspar, would necessitate bolts and wing inspection, with probable wing replacement.
A two spar aircraft is almost completely indifferent to the state of the leading edge skins and the leading edges can be penetrated by landing lights, pitot tubes, gun ports without any serious engineering.
Like four .303" Brownings, or cannon, perhaps?
I believe the Spitfire used no less than 4 bolts to attach the main spar. Evidence not only of the load this spar needed to carry but also of design to resist torsional loads.
As said above, SEVEN bolts + ONE on the rear spar.
Do a second thought experiment, and think what will happen to the wing, when the ailerons (attached to the rear spar) are operated, and the sliced-through rear spar is free to flap up and down, instead of moving the wing.
Do that to a two spar design and you've likely to loose the wing as you've lost the important rear spar and the thick upper skins that form a torsion box.
Nice to see that you agree with us.
 
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Thanks, if we use bolts as a unit of strength (assuming they are the same size) we could say 12.5% of the stress goes through the rear spar. I would say that the rear spar however carries mainly twisting forces from the aileron and thus acts only to stiffen the wing torsionally to a considerable degree.

It's intricate engineering. The spitfire doesn't seem to ave a wing box.
 

I accept that the rear spar bolt is critical in providing torsional stiffness; however I see the rear spar of almost total insignificance. It could have been eliminated.

Firstly there is almost zero torsional load on the spitfire wing when flying statically since the centre of lift is where the spar is at around 25% of chord.

Minor torsional loads would come from pitching moment as AOA varied; however aileron torsional loads would be more.

How much? 100kg per aileron maybe? That's only about 1000 Newton Meters. Not much really.

The torsional loads from the aileron would be transferred via the ribs at the hinge points to the box formed between the main spar and the leading edge which is part of that same rib. The ribs at the leading edge have elaborate triangular trusses so that leading edge box is much much stiffer than the main spar alone.

Once at the wing root the torsional loads must be transferred from the leading edge box to the rear spar bolt via rib 1. This Rib could have been bolted directly to the fuselage however the load is transferred via the rear spar.

The most significant part of the rear spar are those few inches between rib 1 and fuselage attachment. The trailing edge spar outboard of that area is of little significance I assert.

Supermarine seems to have been cautious in penetrating the leading edge of the spitfire and of course the holes were not that big or had elaborate engineering around them, such as the plug leading edge nacelles that were plugged and left in place when the 0.5 Brownings or Hispano weren't fitted.
 

You are right about 'discontinuity'. Having said that - if the fasteners were done properly, the removable panel would have served as an effective shear panel.
 
IMHO, the roll rate of a fighter is a function of aileron size and throw. The Mustang has 3 settings 10 degrees, 12 degrees, and 15 degrees. I want to say that Betty Jane is set at 12 degrees of throw. It is slow getting around, I've flown a couple D models that roll much faster. Speed is also a factor, ailerons will stiffen up as speed is increased, above 240kts it almost takes 2 hands on the stick to do a crisp roll. I can only image how nice an FW rolls with those big ailerons and tons of throw.

JH
 

See prior discussion a couple of posts back
 
Let me put this out there - would anyone here want to fly a Spitfire, maybe pull 4 or 5 Gs with it's rear spar damaged or eliminated?

Siegfried - it seems you're making your assumption on a visual observation. Do we even know the exact dimensions, size and material the rear spar was made from?
 
If anybody can shed some light on this: in Seafire, why the rear spar have had the hinge, but not the lock at the wing fold line; in the same time, the main spar was featuring the lock (that was holding the fixed and folding part of the spar's low beam together)?
 

The latter comment would only be true if a.) the Center of Pressure never changed with AoA (and it always does), and b.) if the primary Normal and Shear loads to wing plane always passed through the Center of Intertia of the Prime Beam/Spar.
 
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I accept that the rear spar bolt is critical in providing torsional stiffness; however I see the rear spar of almost total insignificance. It could have been eliminated..
What you see is immaterial, since it wasn't eliminated, therefore it was still there, therefore the Spitfire wing had two spars, not one..
Obviously your knowledge of the Spitfire falls way below what's needed. The Mk.I/IIa/Va leading edge had tubes fixed to the mainspar and extreme leading edge, through which the .303" Brownings passed, and which stiffened the whole assembly.
For the cannon, there was a substantial casting fitted to the leading edge, which was strong enough for the eccentrics (used for setting the convergence angles of the cannon, and .5" Browning - when fitted) to be fitted inside, and which held the guns rigidly in place.
The casting(s) in question:-
 
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Edgar, thats a little unkind but thankyou you simply prove my point. The image you effortfully provided shows elaborate engineering around the gun penetrations to carry through the loads along the leading edge skins and ribs. Just as I stated. The thought own goal comes to mind but a wonderfully enlightening image. You and tomo have progressed our knowledge.

Just study those "engineered" gun ports. It's probably been pressed or cold drawn in nearly a dozen stamping operations and tooling set ups which would have been followed by quite a lot of drilling at the flanges for bolt attachments. Its a lot more trouble than just wrapping skins around the leading edge and drilling a hole. In a two spar design you would just drill a hole though you would then need to engineer to access magazines in the area between spars.

The rear spar no doubt added some modest but worthwhile amount of stiffness to the trailing edge but it looks like the bulk of the torsional loads were conducted through the torsion box formed between the main spar and substantial leading edge skins. The torsional load would then have been transferred to the wing root rib number 1 and thence to the attachment to the fuselage at the rear of that rib. That first rib would have been extra important.
 
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