As an American, I have to thank you Brits for carrying your love of craftsmanship forward to another American/British collaboration, the winning of Le Mans by Ford, !966, 67, 68 and 1969... It was the combined talents and attitudes of Carrol Shelby, Ford and many Brits that was compared to a WW2 win all over again....
Great upload. We were so unprofessional in many ways and the later day neo Nazis claim the Spitfire was ALWAYS inferior to the FW 190. Personally I think not and I have read a huge number of books from the pilots from that era which only confirms my claim.
The Polish pilots were generally exceptional yes, and for a good reason, they'd seen their country invaded and towns burned and families killed so were far more driven to kill as many Germans as they could, whereas our officers saw shooting a German down as more of a sport. We Brits fought Germany but the Poles truly hated the Germans on another level completely, Britain never suffered the way Poland did under German occupation. Revenge is a powerful driving force.
Interesting what he had to say about the view out the cockpit - faults that the Spitfire shared with virtually all of its contemporaries. They made improvements to rearward vision (see all the late-model fighters with bubble canopies, including many Mark XIVs and XVIs), but the nose and the wing were still in the way. The fix was to move the pilot forward until he was sitting over the nose - but you can't do that, the engine's in the way.
Not on its own. The Hurricane actually accounted for more kills in the BoB. However, had the hurricane faced the luftwaffe on its own in he summer of 1940, we'd have lost. The Spitfire aced the 109 in a dogfight and so, kept the german fighters occupied, leaving the Hurricane to shoot the bombers down.
when we loo at the QUALITY of the planes the spit ranks out the huricane in all classes exept roll. There's no secret that the hurricane shot down the most planes, but when we look a the average plane the spit shot down the most german aircrafts. Also the hurricane came into production before the spit since the spit was hard to develop, which was about the only problem about it.
A bit of nostalgia for this Memorial Day Weekend, and an insight to the equipment of 609 Squadron, earlier in the war. I'm enjoying the rare book, by a flight surgeon, George Armour Bell, attached to 609 in its Typhoon Days through Northeastern Europe. The TR 9 helped after WW II to transition pilots of Ireland, India and Norway to adjust to their RAF surplus fighters. The functional limitations described do not offset the beauty and grace of this magnificent airplane.
There is a TR9 bed at Ardmore, south of Auckland, in New Zealand. It does the air shows around the country each year, together with the Mark IX rebuilt of Brendon Deere's, which is based at Ohakea Air Force Base. The TR9 is available for paying passengers at NZ$4,500 for thirty minutes and at the Classic Fighters Omaka 2017 air show on Sunday they advertised flights and were sold out in twenty minutes. If my credit card had been up to the challenge I would have been in the queue you can bet.
The very special plane that set a landplane record of 379 mph was very different from the Bf 109 of 1937 which could barely get to 300 mph, interesting that the landplane record was much lower than the seaplane record of 440 mph set in 1934.
@Phil Allison Except the S 6 B won the Schneider Trophy in 1931and set the world air speed record that year at 407.5 mph, an Italian Macchi MC 72 raised it to 423 6 mph in 1932 and 440.5 mph in 1933
Brilliant footage I must say. This is where Mr Paul Day is giving an excellent review of one of the most famous, and for some infamous, fighters ever built. I've got the smae, full, footage on VHS which I taped about 12 years back from Discovery and this information is still partially responsible for what my knowledge about these fighters is today!
having said that our own best pilots were generally not even flight officers, our flight sergeants were generally more effective. Ginger Lacey for example was one of our best aces and he was not an officer either.
I wish people would not comment when they have no idea. 66 % of the RAF fighters in the Battle of Britain were Hurricanes and they shot down about 55 %, far less Spitfires shot down about 45 % and Spitfires had a lower loss ratio.
Or could you? There were a couple of examples - from unlikely sources. One was the General Motors P-75. The other was a proposed fighter from Rolls Royce (!) that got as far as a papier-mache mock-up in a hangar in 1945. Both used the P-39 layout - move the engine behind the pilot. Yes, the P-39 was ahead of its time, but it didn't go far enough. This forward placement of the cockpit was applied to pretty much every 1950s jet fighter and survives to this day.
Hurricanes were more suitable for the BoB. For reasons of ease of manufacturing, repair and landing on rough/damaged airfields. The hurricane was more suitable for the inexperienced pilots as he had more visibility over the engine when taxing as well as the wide undercarriage. It could also accommodate larger built pilots because of the bigger cockpit. It took a lot of punishment for the bullets and cannon could pass through the fabric and out the other side. The gun arrangement too meant a blistering concentration of fire. The Spit obviously cannot be denied it played a massive part. Just the idea we had the Spit, which was already a legend, kept the German pilots a little apprehensive at the very least. This psychological advantagecan help turn a dogfight in your favour, even if only by a tiny amount.
Air Commodore H I Cozens , Henry Iliffe b: 13 Mar 1904 d: 21 Jun 1995 He wrote the report which resulted in the early modifications to the Spitfire, including constant speed propellers, revised canopy, improved oil seals for the engine and improved gearing for the starter motor. During WW2, whilst in command of the Base at Hemswell, he made the only colour movie film of Lancaster operations entitled 'Night Bombers', now available on video.
My grandad said that the Hurricanes won the Battle of Britain and the Polish pilots were in fact the best of the best. Wasn't the highest scoring ace the Czech Frantisiek. I'm sure he was for a while at least - before they shot him down. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
the Mk V was markedly inferior to the FW190 ( A4 ? ) . The MkIX was markedly superior in a dogfight. The only thing the Spit did not have was the speed to force the German fighters to stand and fight. The Germans, knowing the Spits quality in a dogfight , carefully avoided taking them on. The trouble for the 262's was dogfighting. They couldnt . Slash and burn only......which, since it accounts for approx 70% of kills anyway, was not a prob . Their target was bombers .
Re Hurricane versus Spitfire performance in BOB, at the beginning of the battle there were 2339 Hurricanes in service compared with only 1400 Spitfires so naturally the results were in favour of the Hurricane, that does not mean that the Hurricanes were better than the Spitfires. They both performed admirably.
@edmundscycles The Hurricane is responsible for 70% of the kills during the Battle of Brittain. That says it all. It was the true workhorse of the RAF. The Spit was the showhorse and was absolutely keeping moral up! They did it together i think. Blue Skies!
Don't agree with the assessment compared to modern day jets without the limitations of having the engine forwards. Yes design has improved and ergonomics became key factors instead of wherever you could fit something due to build constraints. Things have progressed as proved by excellent aircraft like the F16, which showed yet another massive leap from the jets prior, but at the onset of ww2 they'd come from basically biplanes that were a turkey shoot to this level a more than equal footing.
After spending 8 minutes essentially enumerating the many shortfalls of the design he sums it up by saying "I think Mitchell got it absolutely right". LMAO
Apart from the fuel capacity and the lack of armament you mean. And the fact he prevented any expansion of their production facilities, you are correct.
Paul Day is actually a bit of a snob - also his "default position" lies in comparing the Spit layout - which was atypical of the forefront of monoplane fighter design - by modern figther standards - I've seen other clips of his pompous attitude - Ha ! he should be so lucky as to fly these great planes ...I only got to work on them ...IE: the PPS Spit Mk II shown with my ex-boss Tony Bianchi ...I have an "auto smile" with his "Morning !" Ha...good memories...good guy !!
?? "prevented expansion of production facilities" ?? Strange statement !!...Mitchel was DEAD well before production was seriously under way. It was the great Joe Smith who took on Mitchel's "design mantle" ..but he and the design crew had no input as to production arrangements.
I wondered why the Blue?black scheme was. Apparently and early pre-war Identification scheme. you could tell who was who from the ground. Read about it in the BoB book "Piece of Cake"
Incorrect questions. Both fighters were ones of the best for their own tasks. Mustang was the ultimate high-altitude bomber escort fighter, Spitfire - a very agile, easy to handle (at least in the air) and packing quite a punch, enough to knock the germans out of the sky. Both were quite brilliant birds.
@@MDzmitry but I remember Mustang, is have excellent record however Mustang is propellr piston fighter, Mustang can shootdown German Jet Engine fighter Me 109, and Mustang have top speed between several propeller piston fighter: 670 km/hour...
@@pekom88 From the article on 401 squadron: "On 5 October, a five-strong squadron patrol encountered a Messerschmitt Me 262 jet of KG 51 and shot it down. The pilot, Hpt. Hans-Christoph Buttmann, was killed. This was the first victory over this type credited to either the RAF or RCAF."
@Simona050 Its wrong to say that one aircraft is the hero of the battle of britain. It was the combination of BOTH aircraft that gave victory. And, of course the pilots is the most imbortant piece of equipement in an aeroplane.
Protection first, second and third. Also an indication that the pilot had actually fired his guns - many pilots were mortified if they returned from a mission with patches still intact. The armourers didn't mind as it meant that they didn't need to clean and reload the guns.
iskandartaib You forgot one other plane that was going to have a mid engine and forward cockpit....one of the original Mustangs was to be converted to a mid engine using the Griffon engine and forward cockpit but Griffons were in short supply and it never happened....FYI
Wilbur Finnigan the mk. XVI had the same works number as the mk IX. The difference was that the XVI was fitted with a Packard 266. The 266 was a close cousin to the Packard 1650 fitted to the Mustang the difference being the propellor spline, the angled intercooler pump, a slightly different supercharger gear ratio and the supercharger gear change from MS to FS was an electric solenoid on the Packard 266 where on the RR Merlin 66 it was a pneumatic ram. Many MKXVI's were kept in service well after the war because they were produced strangely enough after the revamped MK VIII. The XVI was built with all the latest modifications such as the straight undercarriages legs (earlier marks had the distinctive toe in which wore tyres out very quickly) and 12 inch MK XIV wheels and brakes. They can be recognised by the over blister on top of the wing that allowed the wheel to retract fully into the wheel well.
As an American, I have to thank you Brits for carrying your love of craftsmanship forward to another American/British collaboration, the winning of Le Mans by Ford, !966, 67, 68 and 1969... It was the combined talents and attitudes of Carrol Shelby, Ford and many Brits that was compared to a WW2 win all over again....
Ford certainly trounced them, without resorting to copying. Excellent times to of witnessed I'd imagine for those who were involved.
And some kiwis! MCLAREN built the 1966’ winners !
Great upload. We were so unprofessional in many ways and the later day neo Nazis claim the Spitfire was ALWAYS inferior to the FW 190. Personally I think not and I have read a huge number of books from the pilots from that era which only confirms my claim.
very interesting to hear an experienced Pilot giving run down on the Spitfire Thanks for posting!
The Polish pilots were generally exceptional yes, and for a good reason, they'd seen their country invaded and towns burned and families killed so were far more driven to kill as many Germans as they could, whereas our officers saw shooting a German down as more of a sport. We Brits fought Germany but the Poles truly hated the Germans on another level completely, Britain never suffered the way Poland did under German occupation. Revenge is a powerful driving force.
Interesting what he had to say about the view out the cockpit - faults that the Spitfire shared with virtually all of its contemporaries. They made improvements to rearward vision (see all the late-model fighters with bubble canopies, including many Mark XIVs and XVIs), but the nose and the wing were still in the way. The fix was to move the pilot forward until he was sitting over the nose - but you can't do that, the engine's in the way.
The guy clearing his throat at 3:13 is hilarious! :D
Protection is important.
Is it ?
Thankyou for this series much appreciated
Well done lads!!! We will always remember you!!!
Not on its own. The Hurricane actually accounted for more kills in the BoB.
However, had the hurricane faced the luftwaffe on its own in he summer of 1940, we'd have lost.
The Spitfire aced the 109 in a dogfight and so, kept the german fighters occupied, leaving the Hurricane to shoot the bombers down.
you are right, the fw-190 was only clearly superior up to the mark V, when the mark IX appeared this superiority was finished.
Great video, never seen this one before.
Thanks for posting it!!!
when we loo at the QUALITY of the planes the spit ranks out the huricane in all classes exept roll. There's no secret that the hurricane shot down the most planes, but when we look a the average plane the spit shot down the most german aircrafts. Also the hurricane came into production before the spit since the spit was hard to develop, which was about the only problem about it.
A bit of nostalgia for this Memorial Day Weekend, and an insight to the equipment of 609 Squadron, earlier in the war. I'm enjoying the rare book, by a flight surgeon, George Armour Bell, attached to 609 in its Typhoon Days through Northeastern Europe. The TR 9 helped after WW II to transition pilots of Ireland, India and Norway to adjust to their RAF surplus fighters. The functional limitations described do not offset the beauty and grace of this magnificent airplane.
There is a TR9 bed at Ardmore, south of Auckland, in New Zealand. It does the air shows around the country each year, together with the Mark IX rebuilt of Brendon Deere's, which is based at Ohakea Air Force Base.
The TR9 is available for paying passengers at NZ$4,500 for thirty minutes and at the Classic Fighters Omaka 2017 air show on Sunday they advertised flights and were sold out in twenty minutes.
If my credit card had been up to the challenge I would have been in the queue you can bet.
The very special plane that set a landplane record of 379 mph was very different from the Bf 109 of 1937 which could barely get to 300 mph, interesting that the landplane record was much lower than the seaplane record of 440 mph set in 1934.
@Phil Allison
Except the S 6 B won the Schneider Trophy in 1931and set the world air speed record that year at 407.5 mph, an Italian Macchi MC 72 raised it to 423 6 mph in 1932 and 440.5 mph in 1933
Brilliant footage I must say. This is where Mr Paul Day is giving an excellent review of one of the most famous, and for some infamous, fighters ever built. I've got the smae, full, footage on VHS which I taped about 12 years back from Discovery and this information is still partially responsible for what my knowledge about these fighters is today!
having said that our own best pilots were generally not even flight officers, our flight sergeants were generally more effective. Ginger Lacey for example was one of our best aces and he was not an officer either.
I wish people would not comment when they have no idea.
66 % of the RAF fighters in the Battle of Britain were Hurricanes and they shot down about 55 %, far less Spitfires shot down about 45 % and Spitfires had a lower loss ratio.
Big trouble... yes. But as it turned out we did have it. And the Germans got a good kicking.
Or could you? There were a couple of examples - from unlikely sources. One was the General Motors P-75. The other was a proposed fighter from Rolls Royce (!) that got as far as a papier-mache mock-up in a hangar in 1945. Both used the P-39 layout - move the engine behind the pilot. Yes, the P-39 was ahead of its time, but it didn't go far enough. This forward placement of the cockpit was applied to pretty much every 1950s jet fighter and survives to this day.
Hurricanes were more suitable for the BoB. For reasons of ease of manufacturing, repair and landing on rough/damaged airfields. The hurricane was more suitable for the inexperienced pilots as he had more visibility over the engine when taxing as well as the wide undercarriage.
It could also accommodate larger built pilots because of the bigger cockpit.
It took a lot of punishment for the bullets and cannon could pass through the fabric and out the other side.
The gun arrangement too meant a blistering concentration of fire.
The Spit obviously cannot be denied it played a massive part. Just the idea we had the Spit, which was already a legend, kept the German pilots a little apprehensive at the very least. This psychological advantagecan help turn a dogfight in your favour, even if only by a tiny amount.
Air Commodore H I Cozens , Henry Iliffe
b: 13 Mar 1904
d: 21 Jun 1995
He wrote the report which resulted in the early modifications to the Spitfire, including constant speed propellers, revised canopy, improved oil seals for the engine and improved gearing for the starter motor.
During WW2, whilst in command of the Base at Hemswell, he made the only colour movie film of Lancaster operations entitled 'Night Bombers', now available on video.
great cilp
Brilliant!
My grandad said that the Hurricanes won the Battle of Britain and the Polish pilots were in fact the best of the best. Wasn't the highest scoring ace the Czech Frantisiek. I'm sure he was for a while at least - before they shot him down. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
you are a true pilot pilots''just tell me when i watch you...
tj
the Mk V was markedly inferior to the FW190 ( A4 ? ) . The MkIX was markedly superior in a dogfight. The only thing the Spit did not have was the speed to force the German fighters to stand and fight. The Germans, knowing the Spits quality in a dogfight , carefully avoided taking them on.
The trouble for the 262's was dogfighting. They couldnt . Slash and burn only......which, since it accounts for approx 70% of kills anyway, was not a prob .
Their target was bombers .
seeing down up was not a problem as of how they were constantly diving and ascending
it had an armoured wind shield, awesome
notice the condoms to protect the 20mm hispano cannons, army issue must have been green.
Re Hurricane versus Spitfire performance in BOB, at the beginning of the battle there were 2339 Hurricanes in service compared with only 1400 Spitfires so naturally the results were in favour of the Hurricane, that does not mean that the Hurricanes were better than the Spitfires. They both performed admirably.
What do they mean modern spitfires? How long were they in service?!
3:13 into the video. THAT LOOKED LIKE A CONDOM TO ME.
@edmundscycles The Hurricane is responsible for 70% of the kills during the Battle of Brittain. That says it all. It was the true workhorse of the RAF. The Spit was the showhorse and was absolutely keeping moral up!
They did it together i think. Blue Skies!
They were very good people. Pity about our argument over guess what? I hope that is solved in a practical way one day.
You and I both!
Don't agree with the assessment compared to modern day jets without the limitations of having the engine forwards. Yes design has improved and ergonomics became key factors instead of wherever you could fit something due to build constraints. Things have progressed as proved by excellent aircraft like the F16, which showed yet another massive leap from the jets prior, but at the onset of ww2 they'd come from basically biplanes that were a turkey shoot to this level a more than equal footing.
After spending 8 minutes essentially enumerating the many shortfalls of the design he sums it up by saying "I think Mitchell got it absolutely right". LMAO
Apart from the fuel capacity and the lack of armament you mean. And the fact he prevented any expansion of their production facilities, you are correct.
Paul Day is actually a bit of a snob - also his "default position" lies in comparing the Spit layout - which was atypical of the forefront of monoplane fighter design - by modern figther standards - I've seen other clips of his pompous attitude - Ha ! he should be so lucky as to fly these great planes ...I only got to work on them ...IE: the PPS Spit Mk II shown with my ex-boss Tony Bianchi ...I have an "auto smile" with his "Morning !" Ha...good memories...good guy !!
This was designed like the F104 Starfighter: short range attack-interceptor....fuel capacity was perfectly adequate for fighting over homeground.
?? "prevented expansion of production facilities" ?? Strange statement !!...Mitchel was DEAD well before production was seriously under way. It was the great Joe Smith who took on Mitchel's "design mantle" ..but he and the design crew had no input as to production arrangements.
I wondered why the Blue?black scheme was.
Apparently and early pre-war Identification scheme. you could tell who was who from the ground.
Read about it in the BoB book "Piece of Cake"
Whose more though? Spitfire or Mustang?
Incorrect questions. Both fighters were ones of the best for their own tasks. Mustang was the ultimate high-altitude bomber escort fighter, Spitfire - a very agile, easy to handle (at least in the air) and packing quite a punch, enough to knock the germans out of the sky. Both were quite brilliant birds.
@@MDzmitry but I remember Mustang, is have excellent record however Mustang is propellr piston fighter, Mustang can shootdown German Jet Engine fighter Me 109, and Mustang have top speed between several propeller piston fighter: 670 km/hour...
@@pekom88 Top speed doesn't equal agility, and Spitfire Mk.IX has the first ever confirmed Me.262 kill amongst RAF/RCAF
@@MDzmitry spitfire never shoot down German Jet fighter on WW 2
@@pekom88 From the article on 401 squadron: "On 5 October, a five-strong squadron patrol encountered a Messerschmitt Me 262 jet of KG 51 and shot it down. The pilot, Hpt. Hans-Christoph Buttmann, was killed. This was the first victory over this type credited to either the RAF or RCAF."
What is wrong with weekend Biggles? M.
@Simona050 Its wrong to say that one aircraft is the hero of the battle of britain. It was the combination of BOTH aircraft that gave victory. And, of course the pilots is the most imbortant piece of equipement in an aeroplane.
I thought the red tape was places to check for jammed guns, not protection.
Protection first, second and third.
Also an indication that the pilot had actually fired his guns - many pilots were mortified if they returned from a mission with patches still intact. The armourers didn't mind as it meant that they didn't need to clean and reload the guns.
why is one wing painted blue, the other black at 2:25?
3:36 German translation at the bottom: fartregulator. LOL
the quintessential stuff upper twit, still, the man has his talents and in the correct circumstances would be most effective.
iskandartaib You forgot one other plane that was going to have a mid engine and forward cockpit....one of the original Mustangs was to be converted to a mid engine using the Griffon engine and forward cockpit but Griffons were in short supply and it never happened....FYI
info is wrong ! ! ! he say all mk's after the 12 were Grifon powered,,,,wrong the MkXVI 16 was a Packard built 266 MERLIN...FYI
Wilbur Finnigan the mk. XVI had the same works number as the mk IX. The difference was that the XVI was fitted with a Packard 266. The 266 was a close cousin to the Packard 1650 fitted to the Mustang the difference being the propellor spline, the angled intercooler pump, a slightly different supercharger gear ratio and the supercharger gear change from MS to FS was an electric solenoid on the Packard 266 where on the RR Merlin 66 it was a pneumatic ram. Many MKXVI's were kept in service well after the war because they were produced strangely enough after the revamped MK VIII. The XVI was built with all the latest modifications such as the straight undercarriages legs (earlier marks had the distinctive toe in which wore tyres out very quickly) and 12 inch MK XIV wheels and brakes. They can be recognised by the over blister on top of the wing that allowed the wheel to retract fully into the wheel well.
WTF???