No Spitfire?

[PAT303]

Google maps has "measure distance" function. Select a location such as Calais, right click and you can drag a dynamic line which measures distance. One night, with a glass of wine by your side, you might enjoy exploring how deep past the UK coast an Me 109 might. I count the Me 109 range getting to about 10% without drop tank and 20% with. Bombers past that point would be intercepted by Hurricanes unhindered by Me 109. Fw 190 had slightly more range but not much.

For some Bizarre reason the Luftwaffe didn't push to install wing tanks in the Fw 190 until it was too late to manufacture them but the ones designed added enormous range.

The Luftwaffe can send bombers over London at under 10,000ft protected by FW 190's as close escort and 109 stacked up as high as you want to go, they can be that brazen because the Hurricane can't deal with that. With London ablaze the Luftwaffe doesn't have to go any further, all it has to do is isolate and let England wither on the vine, as far as drop tanks go you can get DT fitted to 109's and 190's quicker than you can get a Spitfire replacement in service.

 

[SaparotRob]

The world would be a better place if a long time ago it were made illegal to calculate and then quote an average without also quoting a norm and a standard deviation. Its been far more harmful than offensive language or triggering someone over a social justice language issue.

Lies, damn lies and statistics.
Samuel Clemens

 

[SaparotRob]

Well being stuck on an island with no where to go with enemy aircraft controlling your airspace is about as close to loosing as you can get. If the RAF only had Hurricanes I would do what the 2 TAF did to the Luftwaffe a few years later when the Spit XIV became available, I'd have FW190's circling fighter fields waiting to bounce the Hurri's as they came up to fight, the few that did get airborne would pose no threat to either the 190 or 109.

I think you bring up a good point. I'm not so good at what-ifs. Without the Spitfire, Britain would be stuck on an island. Britain and Germany may come to a negotiated settlement. Why keep banging one's head against a wall? Sir Winston Churchill seems to have been a polarizing figure (source: cherry picking numerous threads). Maybe with a less favorable outcome of the BoB, Britain is more willing to "chat". Britain keeps its Empire unmolested. The UK and the third reich have an armistice. Maybe Imperial Japan thinks again about acquiring certain resources now that the Commonwealth isn't preoccupied.

 

[SaparotRob]

.. or occupied.

 

[Koopernic]

The Luftwaffe can send bombers over London at under 10,000ft protected by FW 190's as close escort and 109 stacked up as high as you want to go, they can be that brazen because the Hurricane can't deal with that. With London ablaze the Luftwaffe doesn't have to go any further, all it has to do is isolate and let England wither on the vine, as far as drop tanks go you can get DT fitted to 109's and 190's quicker than you can get a Spitfire replacement in service.

The Typhoon was built to Air Ministry F18/37 ie the 18th specification of all type created in 1937 though only issued to Hawkers in March 38. The Spitfire was to F10/35.

If Spitfire Spec F10/35 isnt created then the Air Ministry can wait till 1936 to create a spec for a new Merlin engined fighter and it will still enter service a month before WW2. If it waits till 1937 the new type enters service at the close of the BoB about the same time as the Me 109F.

 

[buffnut453]

posting.... period at the end of a post isn't a winning argument. The Spitfire achieved nothing that more Hurricanes could have achieved until 1942 when the two stage engine was fitted. The Typhoon was forced into service early because the Spitfire Mk V couldn't handle the Fw 190. When war was declared the British were developing and or producing the Spitfire, Hurricane, Defiant, Typhoon and Whirlwind a ridiculous waste of effort mainly because war had not been declared and no one was certain what was needed.
It took three months on average to ship from the UK and P-51s were arriving in late 1941. If you have an aircraft factory with staff used to working with metal aircraft there is no reason at all that a shadow aircraft factory making P-51s couldn't have been made operational in UK 3 months behind that in the USA which means the aircraft are delivered at the same time. Packard did it with Merlins the other way around. Its OK being hard nosed and saying no one is going to license build our stuff in UK we want the jobs, well the war will have a different outcome then. BTW Disney released the Bambi cartoon in August 1942 the time of the Dieppe raid which saw the first use in numbers of the Spitfire Mk IX and the Mustang MkI and the B17 in US hands

Ok...game on.

The Spitfire achieved nothing that more Hurricanes could have achieved until 1942 when the two stage engine was fitted.

The Spitfire was a far more efficient and effective fighter. From actual Battle of Britain statistics, the 19 Spitfire squadrons made claims of 521 kills compared to 655 claims for the 30 Hurricane squadrons. That's 27.4 claims per Spitfire squadron versus 21.2 per Hurricane squadron. Now, I'm assuming that actual kills were proportionate to claims, but that's not a big stretch given that we're talking about a single battle and the same forces engaged. Therefore, if you have no Spitfires, you'd need an additional 6 squadrons of Hurricanes (ontop of the 19 "Spitfire" squadrons that would have been Hurricane-equipped) just to inflict the same number of casualties on the Luftwaffe. Given the Fighter Command pilot shortage in 1940, it's interesting to ponder where those extra squadrons would come from?

The Spitfire had a claim/loss ratio of 1.8:1 compared to the Hurricane's of 1.34:1. Swapping those Spitfires for Hurricanes means your front line wastage rate is significantly higher. And that's before we consider whether the Hurricane's ratio would remain the same without Spitfires (theoretically) tangling with the Me109s so the Hurricanes could take on the bombers. Yes, I know it was never that simple but the fact remains that the Spitfire could more than hold its own against the Me109E whereas the Hurricane really couldn't. And that's 1940 not 1942. Again, not only do we have to find 6 additional fighter squadrons but we have to replace a greater number of pilot losses due to the lower kill-loss ratio of the all-Hurricane force (and that assumes a constant 1.34:1 claim/loss ratio - the wastage problem for both pilots and aircraft is compounded if an all-Hurricane force has a lower ratio than that).

We're also assuming that the war would continue on the path it pursued without the Spitfire. That's a pretty big assumption to make. If Fighter Command can't generate those extra 6 Hurricane squadrons to achieve the same level of claims, then the Luftwaffe can count on 10% fewer casualties during the Battle of Britain...and perhaps many more given the relative effectiveness of Spitfire compared to the Hurricane. Again, would Hurricanes have maintained a 1.34:1 claim/loss ratio without the Spitfires, or an equally capable alternative, as part of the mix? The Me109F was coming into service in the late summer of 1940, with the Fw190 a year later, both well before your 1942 timeline. Both easily outmatched the Hurricane. With fewer losses and greater success against an all-Hurricane Fighter Command, who's to say the Luftwaffe won't continue to press on with the Battle of Britain into 1941?

As others have noted, photo recce is a key role that the Spitfire performed. Are we now expecting unarmed Hurricanes to fulfill that role as well? Slower, operating at lower altitude...they'd be dogmeat against the defences in Western Europe in the period when the early Spitfires were operating (mid-1940 thru the end of 1941).

If you have an aircraft factory with staff used to working with metal aircraft there is no reason at all that a shadow aircraft factory making P-51s couldn't have been made operational in UK 3 months behind that in the USA.

Except that the US never agreed to licence manufacturing for anything of significance (the Canadian Car Foundry-produced Goblins are a notable exception...except (pun intended) that the Goblin was worthless operationally). There has to be a reason for that. Also, to avoid the scenario above where Fighter Command has to find 6 additional Hurricane squadrons just to maintain pace with the real-world BoB figures, there would need to be a higher-performing fighter in the stable in the early 1939 timeframe. Again, there is NO WAY the US is going to enable licence production of a state-of-the-art fighter in 1938. You can say "there's no reason" but history shows that the US doesn't export jobs to anyone unless it absolutely has to...and in 1938, the US didn't have to. You keep pointing to the late-1941 timeframe but, as shown above, the only way we can effectively assume that the war proceeds as it did with the Spitfire is to have a more efficient fighter than the Hurricane fighting alongside it during the BoB...which means we need that aircraft in service in late 1938.

 

[tomo pauk]

While I'm not convinced that UK is doomed without Spitfire, I think that that one of British companies will need to come out with am 1-engined fighter that can fill the capability gap for 1940-41. De Havilland perhaps (yes, I know that 1-engined fighters were noth their forte in 1930s)?

 

[buffnut453]

While I'm not convinced that UK is doomed without Spitfire, I think that that one of British companies will need to come out with am 1-engined fighter that can fill the capability gap for 1940-41. De Havilland perhaps (yes, I know that 1-engined fighters were noth their forte in 1930s)?

I'm not saying that the UK was doomed without the Spitfire. However, to make a major change to the Fighter Command force structure and glibly assume that everything else continues uninterrupted seems very optimistic to me.

I agree the most likely COA is that a different UK firm will try to push a design that has higher performance than the Hurricane. The problem is the timeline. That push has to start around the time that the Spitfire is designed...and that was done without a formal RAF specification (the Spitfire spec was actually reverse-engineered to meet the design, not the other way 'round). The quoted 1935 spec had little to do with the actual Spitfire as designed.

 

[PAT303]

The Spitfire achieved nothing that more Hurricanes could have achieved until 1942 when the two stage engine was fitted. The Typhoon was forced into service early because the Spitfire Mk V couldn't handle the Fw 190.

The Spitfire MkV was rushed into service because the Hurricane was so outclassed, like I have posted already, if the Hurricane could hold it's own the interim model Spits would not have been made, instead of converting MkII airframes to MkV then MkIX's we would have had the MkIII, with clipped wings, retractable tail wheel, internal glass, cleaner aerodynamics, increased internal fuel and two speed Merlin it was 50+mph faster than anything else in the Allied inventory in 1940-41 and more than capable of handing both the 109 and 190 at any altitude, not only that Supermarine would have followed that development path and the RAF would move to the MkVIII and MkXIV as front line aircraft. The Hurricane hampered the RAF just as much as it helped by causing the less capable Spitfire marks to be rushed into production, even during the BoB the Hurri was fitted with Merlin XX's while the Spit ran the XII just to try and make it slightly less obsolete.

 

[PAT303]

Just to add, if the Luftwaffe was butchering Hurricanes over England during the BoB do you all think the invasion would have been called off?, I would want sealion to go ahead because the RAN would send the invasion fleet to the bottom of the channel and the war would be finished early but do any of you believe if the Luftwaffe pilots were taking care of the RAF Adolf would have continued the BoB until the RAF ran out of pilots instead of turning East?.

 

[buffnut453]

Just to add, if the Luftwaffe was butchering Hurricanes over England during the BoB do you all think the invasion would have been called off?, I would want sealion to go ahead because the RAN would send the invasion fleet to the bottom of the channel and the war would be finished early but do any of you believe if the Luftwaffe pilots were taking care of the RAF Adolf would have continued the BoB until the RAF ran out of pilots instead of turning East?.

That topic has been done to death multiple times on the forum. My personal view is that Sealion wasn't needed. All the Luftwaffe had to do was defeat 11 Group and force it to withdraw from its front-line airfields. This would leave London effectively exposed, which may have forced a no-confidence vote against Churchill's government. If that succeeds, it's entirely feasible that he'd be replaced by am appeaser who seeks peace with Hitler I return for salvaging the British Empire.

I know there are a lot of maybes in the above theory but it's more plausible than Sealion succeeding. Others on the forum have very different views. Thankfully, we never got to see what might eventuate if the RAF did lose the BoB.

 

[Greyman]

For what it's worth, even the standard Defiant (with turret)

• could out-turn a Spitfire
• had 1.65 times the range of a Spitfire (575 miles vs. 950 miles)
• had a better view than the Hurricane

I think if Britain was panicking with no Spitfire, it's possible Boulton-Paul could have produced something worthwhile.

 

[tomo pauk]

For what it's worth, even the standard Defiant (with turret)

• could out-turn a Spitfire
• had 1.65 times the range of a Spitfire (575 miles vs. 950 miles)

What fuel tankage is compared?

 

[wuzak]

The Hurricane hampered the RAF just as much as it helped by causing the less capable Spitfire marks to be rushed into production, even during the BoB the Hurri was fitted with Merlin XX's while the Spit ran the XII just to try and make it slightly less obsolete.

To a degree, that's true.

However, the changes needed to make Spitfire IIIs instead of Vs would have slowed production to an unacceptable level at the time.

Also, I'm not sure that Hurricane IIs made it into the BoB, and if they did it was very late. At that stage the choice was being made between the Spitfire V (Merlin 45) and the Spitfire III (Merlin XX).

(As an aside, it has often been assumed in here that the Spitfire got the 45 because it was a better engine, while the Hurricane had to soldier on with the dog Merlin XX. The reality is that was not the case.)

 

[wuzak]

The Typhoon was built to Air Ministry F18/37 ie the 18th specification of all type created in 1937 though only issued to Hawkers in March 38. The Spitfire was to F10/35.

If Spitfire Spec F10/35 isnt created then the Air Ministry can wait till 1936 to create a spec for a new Merlin engined fighter and it will still enter service a month before WW2. If it waits till 1937 the new type enters service at the close of the BoB about the same time as the Me 109F.

Hawkers (ie Camm) asked the Air Ministry shortly after the Hurricane prototype flew or after Hurricane production began, what were the priorities of types for the coming years. One of them, of course, was the next generation fighter, which Camm and Hawkers decided to pursue. This was before an official specification was brought out.

When the F18/37 specification was set, the aircraft Camm had been working on were similar to the specification, requiring a few alterations.

The F18/37 specification was to replace the Spitfire and the Hurricane, so not having the Spitfire would not have impacted its timeline.

 

[gumbyk]

For what it's worth, even the standard Defiant (with turret)

• could out-turn a Spitfire

A Sopwith Camel can out-turn a Spitfire...

 

[ThomasP]

Hey Greyman,

Can you provide a source for the idea that the Defiant could turn tighter than a Spitfire?

I ask because the Defiant Mk I had a TOGW of about 2000 lbs more than the Spitfire Mk I, a higher wing loading (~33 vs ~26 lb/ft2), but used the same 1030 BHP Merlin engine. As far as I know the Defiant had no special flaps or a lower drag wing. Base on these factors there is no way the Defiant would be able to out turn a Spitfire.

 

[Greyman]

Can you provide a source for the idea that the Defiant could turn tighter than a Spitfire?

AFDU Trials in May 1940. Based on a single 10 minute engagement between one Spitfire pilot and one Defiant pilot (and gunner). So, sample size not great.

EDIT: I think your weight figures are with the auxiliary tanks, which I was also using and may not really be applicable for 1940 (see below). A Defiant I with a normal fighter load (as per the A&AEE) is 7,509 lb, which shaves the wing loading down to 30 lb.

What fuel tankage is compared?

Spitfire I: 84 gallons
Defiant I: 162 gallons. So this must be with the auxiliary tanks. Perhaps not representative of a '39-'40 Defiant. I'm not sure when they were put into the Defiant I ... retrofitted after the Mk.II was developed?

Regular tankage was 104 gallons.

 

[Koopernic]

Hey Greyman,

Can you provide a source for the idea that the Defiant could turn tighter than a Spitfire?

I ask because the Defiant Mk I had a TOGW of about 2000 lbs more than the Spitfire Mk I, a higher wing loading (~33 vs ~26 lb/ft2), but used the same 1030 BHP Merlin engine. As far as I know the Defiant had no special flaps or a lower drag wing. Base on these factors there is no way the Defiant would be able to out turn a Spitfire.

The incomplete guide to air foil usage gives the following wings section:
Boulton Paul P.82 Defiant Root NACA M-6 mod Tip NACA M-6 mod. Applying a ruler to Shortround6's picture post 241 the Thickness/Chord ratio is 19% at 40% chord.
Corresponding Spitfire Root NACA 2213 and Tip 2209.2 at outer aileron hinge point.

NACA M-6 mod looks like a modified NACA 2219 or 2419. IE it is 19% thick with 2% camber at the 20% 40% chord. It looks like its slightly reflexed up at the trailing edge and this is likely the "mod" probably done to get good pitching characteristics.

Given the Defiant has an average T/C of 19% and the Spitfire ((13%+9%)/2=11%)

Now given the Defiants Wing loading was 27% higher its quite possible that the Defiant wing could easily generate a CLmax at least 27% greater given a wing 70% thicker.

We could study the NACA 2218, 2418, 4418 air foils and compare to 2212 or so.


Higher CLmax are associated with lower Lift/Drag ratios (ie higher drag/lift) leading to an eventual reduction in speed but this may take a turn to manifest.

 

[PAT303]

However, the changes needed to make Spitfire IIIs instead of Vs would have slowed production to an unacceptable level at the time.

If the Hurricane was as good as everyone makes it out to be the British could have sacrificed Spitfire production retooling the factories to gain a better long term fighter but that couldn't happen.