Having 20 more gallons of fuel in an under seat/rear tank allows Spitfires to be climbing before the Luftwaffe crosses the channel in 1940 instead of waiting until the last minute and climb up from underneath, in 1941 extra fuel allows MkV's to maintain higher speeds over France to negate to a degree being bounced so easily, in 1942-43 MkIX's could have been doing deep raids into France supporting the daylight bombers, more fuel allows more flexibility, it's that simple.
Spitfire Combat Radius (range) evolution, limitations?
- Thread starter IdahoRenegade
- Start date
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Shortround6
Major General
For a little bit of perspective a Spitfire I could climb to 25,000ft 4.9 minutes faster using the Rotol Prop than using the DH 2 pitch prop.
Adding 20 gallons of fuel to the Spitfire I would add another couple of minutes to the climb of the plane with the 2 pitch prop.
The British just squeaked by getting CS props.
Now the idea transforming the BoB by putting in 20 gallon tanks may need a bit of looking at.
You have to KNOW when the Germans are coming. Not guess when they are coming.
Depending on your cruise speed at over 20,000ft the extra 20 gallons may only give you around 30 minutes.
Map of Chain home.
Things got slightly better between 1938 and 1940.
Planes flying higher than 15,000 gave extra warning. Planes flying lower gave less.
Warning over land got worse. That is to say that German planes coming from the Southeast are going to give less warning than planes coming from Holland or Cherbourg may be just a few minutes.
I have no idea of how accurate the Germans knew the radar was but trying to standing patrols with just 20-30 gallons extra means the Germans can try feints. They fly 1/2 dozen plans just close enough to the get the British to scramble, British don't have a good count of the aircraft, Germans turn around and launch real raid 30 minutes later.
Reasons for the British doing late launches means radar operators could "guesstimate" size of the formations better. They could Guess the coarse a bit better (trying to judge if the incoming formation is going to do a dog leg) and they guesstimate or try to get a visual estimate of the height. Now you can do allof that stuff with larger fuel tanks but the delayed scrambles weren't entirely the result of short endurance of the Spitfires.
Now once you start sending Spitfires over Europe you need an external tank AND the internal tank.
Plus how far are your "deep" raids into France? 200 miles, 250 miles, 300 miles?
drgondog
Major
Adding enough internal fuel to compete with Mustang range would have rendered the Spitfire into a fat waddling fuel truck suitable for soon to be needed mid air refueler role.
Geoffrey Sinclair
Staff Sergeant
- 922
- Sep 30, 2021
I think you are trying to solve a problem the RAF did not have in 1940. The limiting factor for RAF fighter responses during the Battle of Britain was not range, but how good they thought they knew what the Luftwaffe was going do to over the next hour or two. Given the ranges involved the Luftwaffe bombers could stay in a holding pattern over France, fake setting course for England before returning to the holding pattern and still have the fuel to conduct a raid. The Luftwaffe could run feints, try saturation of an area, timing multiple raids to catch RAF aircraft on the ground, make course changes and so on, with a limited fighter defence it was always a judgement call about when to put fighters into the air, too early and they could be reacting to a decoy or be left behind by a course change. A main point of the system was to minimise flying hours and so strain on pilots and ground crew.
On an individual level having more fuel is a good thing. For the RAF as an Air Force in 1941 and into 1942 the Spitfire range was not much of a missed opportunity, it was in the second half of 1941 for the draw down of Luftwaffe day defences in France, the Germans had little in France etc. they were worried about and if they did the RAF lacked the bomber force to do much to them, even counting all of Bomber Command. Malta had the enemy coming to them, overseas Spitfire fighters elsewhere were a second half of 1942 event and most such day operations were happening within Spitfire V range. Getting working drop tanks was enough at the air force level of things but agreed more internal fuel was more efficient, though the mark V was not matching the performance of the German fighters.
The mark VIII helped solve the range issue and it arrived at the end of 1942, plus there was a build up of allied day bomber strength. My opinion of the optimal 1943 and beyond Spitfire change schedule, given what the RAF did, would be make wing tank kits available for earlier Spitfires, switch Castle Bromwich to the mark VIII, not IX (or at least the IX being built has the VIII internal fuel), by or in Q4 of 1943 enable the mark VIII to fight with a full 33 gallon rear fuselage tank, this would enable the Spitfire to keep matching the P-47 range for operations from England into 1944, in early 1944 enable a 1,000 pound bomb load, ideally with the rear fuselage tank full, to allow longer range fighter bomber operations, again mostly from England, then in the second half of 1944 put in the larger rear fuselage tanks to enable Spitfire escort from England of Bomber Command raids on the Ruhr. That matches the historical operations available for the Spitfires to do in quantity, plus the opportunity to enable longer range RAF day bomber raids in 1943 and fill the gaps escorting 8th Air Force bombers in the second half of 1943, but also note the limits at the time on the bomber strength in terms of size and weather as well as doctrine. In the period January to May 1943 while still under Bomber Command the RAF day bomber force dropped 1,230 long tons of bombs, the US medium and light bomber operations essentially started in July 1943, managed 8,179 short tons of bombs for the year, all up the 8th and 9th Air Force bombers dropped 22,440 tons on France and 767 tons on the low countries in 1943. There were still few targets in France, Belgium and the Netherlands the Germans needed to defend though, defence was more about attritioning the allied bomber force. The US heavies dropped 47,452 short tons of bombs in 1943, over half in the final quarter of the year. Not a lot of point having long range escort fighters and few bombers available.
Look at the RAF Merlin P-51 operations in late 1943 and early 1944 when considering what the longer range Spitfire would have done out of England, the RAF P-51 units certainly did operations in support of the 8th Air Force raids, but as far as I know that was only a part of their work, Operation Overlord was more the priority. The same would apply to any long range Spitfires in the same time period. In any case these P-51 were a better choice to replace long range Spitfires in the escort role as soon as the P-51 were operational.
Why should a long-range Spitfire compete with Mustang?
SaparotRob
Unter Gemeine Geschwader Murmeltier XIII
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drgondog
Major
Why should so much discussion lead to making design decisions for the Spitfire that did not have much value in 1944-1945?
Because a long-range Spitfire would've been an asset from 1940-43, as well as in 1944-45. Even in 1939, if the RAF is allowed to bomb Germany.
GregP
Major
And exactly how are the Spitfires supposed to know "Better" when to take off in 1940? They had Chain Home and already knew from where the Germans were coming, and they took off accordingly. They even had Chain Home Low to see the low-flying raids. Your extra 20 gallons might allow them, say, 10 minutes of extra climb time, but they already were doing quite well in the BOB at being to altitude for their attacks.
And nobody wanted the extra weight at the expense of less armament. If the people at the time had the chance to vote for more fuel (they didn't), they might have or might not have. The Spitfire was already a pretty darned good fighter, and adding fuel might or might not make it better in their eyes. Tough to ask at this juncture.
We can all see it needs the fuel in your eyes, perhaps not without some justification. I'm just wondering if anyone at the time tries to make that happen.
drgondog
Major
Of course it would have. The same can be said for Bf 109 and Fw 190 in 1940. Ditto for instant access and design integration into the Mustang with Rolls engine hierarchy. But having a plausible, sellable solution approach to make it happen was impossible, technically and politically.
Your totally missing my point, the radar operators tracked incoming raids and Hurricane and Spitfires were launched only after they were certain what the target was, the reason being that they lacked endurance, an extra 20G of fuel gives them the freedom to launch earlier to get above the bombers and more importantly the fighters, it even allows the radar operators to direct them to the optimum position for an attack.
Just to be clear, I'm not trying to make the Spitfire into a Mustang, I'm just trying to get more than 85G of fuel into it.
No idea, apparently if a fighter can't carry enough fuel to fly to Berlin and back it's not worth perusing.
I think you should read and understand what I am saying, more fuel allows more flexibility, flying feints and bogus raids is part of warfare, flexibility gives you options to deal with it instead of guessing your enemy's intensions.
Why does more fuel mean less armament?, the fuel is going in behind the seat, not in the wings.
What front line fighter didn't have it's fuel capacity increased throughout the war?.
Spitfires had 85G because they started with two bladed props, then two speed props with less than 1000hp, by 1939 they had constant speed props, 100 octane fuel and 1200hp, the reason for weight saving was no longer there as it's performance increased, and kept on improving.
Shortround6
Major General
Why didn't we realize this before ????????????
Weight added to the fuselage doesn't count when fighting gravity, ONLY WEIGHT IN WINGS counts for Gravity.
Hmmmm,
Bf 109,
P-40?
P-39?
Both of them actually had versions with their fuel capacity reduced to gain performance.
F6F.
F4U
And that is off the top of my head, no research.
Granted they all had total fuel capacity increased but internal fuel stayed the same or was reduced.
The British had tested the better propellers 1939 (other countries had bee using them for 3 years or so) but it wasn't until 1940 that they were in production unless you have dates?
The frantic scramble to retro fit DH two position props between the BoF and the BoB shows the difference between testing something and producing it.
The Spitfire had "constant speed props, 100 octane fuel and 1200hp" but it was in 1940 and not 1939. They were called Spitfire IIs.
The Spitfire Is, even with CS props and 100 octane fuel were not cleared for 1200hp for take-off or climb.
Until you get the CS props you are dealing with around 600-700hp for take-off and climb. In fact you can't even use the rated 880hp for low level high speed level flight.
BTW, since in the real world weight added to the fuselage does affect climb/performance the some of the hoped for gain in performance in MK II was canceled out by the weight gain in extra equipment like IFF, different armor etc.
Add, as has been pointed out before. They did make about 50 MK IIs with extra fuel. it wasn't done well but it was done and we can see see the difference performance and make estimates based off of it.
Edit, The P-40 and P-39 both took out guns and ammo to improve climb and their guns and ammo were in the wings. P-39 had it's fuel in the wings. P-40 took out the forward 'wing tank' which was actually underneath the cockpit.
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We know that it was technically possible to have a longer ranged Spitfire via increase of internal fuel and realization of the idea of a drop tank, since it was done.
Politics - not having a doctrine covering a LR fighter and later the open disparaging of the idea by the RAF brass - stood in the way well into 1944.
GregP
Major
OK, Pat. The Spitfire WOULD have been better with more fuel. You win.
But, in real life, they didn't pursue it except for the PR variants late in the life of the airplane.
Now, what has changed that actually happened? Nothing. We're stuck with Spitfires as they were actually built, like we were before you started this. So, we might as well praise and enjoy their successes and lament their failures, like we do for all the other piston fighters.
But, in real life, they didn't pursue it except for the PR variants late in the life of the airplane.
Now, what has changed that actually happened? Nothing. We're stuck with Spitfires as they were actually built, like we were before you started this. So, we might as well praise and enjoy their successes and lament their failures, like we do for all the other piston fighters.
