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Was it just that Supermarine charged more or was the airframe really that much more complicated to produce? The Hurricane seems more complicated with the cloth covered parts as compared to the all-metal fuselage of the Spitfire.
So you think that the lower cost was due to Hawker using existing tooling and not having to train skilled workers?
As the U.S.A.F. bombing survey states, the German aviation and engine industry started practically from nothing during 1933. The first DB601 engine factory was built from scratch during 1936. It takes several years for a major industry to start from nothing and work up to efficient production. The German aircraft industry was just starting to produce results during 1940. Britain, France, Russia and the USA did not have this problem as their aircraft industries were not destroyed during 1919.in 1940, with about 2/3 the workforce dedicated to spitfire production as was dedicated to 109 production, the british managed to produce roughly twice as many of their type as the germans did of theirs.
I don't believe a British worker was any better than his German counterpart though he (or she, at least in Britain, a whole other subject)
As the U.S.A.F. bombing survey states, the German aviation and engine industry started practically from nothing during 1933. The first DB601 engine factory was built from scratch during 1936. It takes several years for a major industry to start from nothing and work up to efficient production. The German aircraft industry was just starting to produce results during 1940. Britain, France, Russia and the USA did not have this problem as their aircraft industries were not destroyed during 1919.
1943 would be a better year for price / manhour comparison. By then German aircraft and engine industries were more or less worked up and Allied bombing was not yet a major factor.
The Spitfire was a new design using new procedures and materials. It was also a relatively complex design - the elliptical wing was very difficult to mass produce quickly. IIRC the wings were different as they joined through the fuselage. Again making manufacturing more time consuming and expensive.
The available data allow us to construct a curve depicted in figure 6 that shows the
development of working hours the three firms ATG, Junkers and Siebel needed on
average to produce one unit of the Ju 88 bomber in the period from August 1939 to
August 1941. Notice that the vertical axis presents the logarithm of working hours.
Overall, average working hours dropped spectacularly from 100,000 in October 1939 to
15,317 in August 1941.
That doesn't help if you must train practically the entire aviation work force (including supervisors) from scratch.
That doesn't help if you must train practically the entire aviation work force (including supervisors) from scratch. Let's look at historical results for the Ju-88 program.
http://www.econ.yale.edu/growth_pdf/cdp905.pdf
And the British, Americans and Canadians didn't have to train their huge expanding aviation workforce?
As stated, the elliptical wing construction was probably made a non factor when production tooling was developed to mass produce the wing. I believe all models of the Spitfire had their wings joined at the fuselage. Here's one under restoration. I see no major issue that would make a Spitfire wing more difficult to assemble than any other wing, especially if production tooling is used.
PV270 Previous Restoration History