Guy has immaculate Mk9 in his garage?

[kevin king]

 

[Doug Moisuk]

Any idea the date this video was made?

[kevin king]

Any idea the date this video was made?

Ya, 2006 Doug. That Spitfire was mounted on a post one time in its life. And the guy said original Spitfires were designed for 25 hours of flight time? Pretty interesting stuff on this video. The owner that  restored it has a very complete history of the plane. More of this Spitfire is on the last 1/4 of tape 5
Kevin

[Dan McEntee]

I guess i over estimated the number of Spitfire fans on this forum.

      No, Kevin, it's just that time of year when forum activity slows down. I did want to make a comment on one thing that the owner said and that was the 25 hour  life span of a Spitfire. I imagine he didn't put that in the correct context. In combat at the time of the Battle of Brittan , pilots and planes didn't have a very long life expectancy, and I know I have read at one time what that was according to the statisticians at that time but don't remember or sure. The Spitfire was meant as a purely defensive fighter, and it didn't have a very large fuel capacity because it didn't need one if it wasn't going to be going very deep into the continent, so landing to refuel and re-arm after short sorties was common. It took several sorties to work up to 25 hours. It it's role, it took a lot of abuse and damage and at some point it was better to write off a ship to be stripped for parts as long as replacements were coming off the assembly lines at a regular pace. By the time the air frame got to 25 hours it may very well have been pretty war weary, or maybe even nonexistent.  When you think about it in that context, he probably meant that it's life expectancy was 25 hours. It had to be engineered to take the stress and loads of combat aerobatics and operating off of rough airfields, so you had to build them pretty dog gone stout! I have read some stuff about the Japanese Zero and how it was a very minimalist designed airplane. They were only expected to last one or two missions, given the Samurai philosophy the practiced, so no more material was put into the airplanes that was absolutely needed. That helped keep the weight of the aircraft down and the performance up and stretched the supply line as far as possible. I read some where once that a stock, from the factory Mitsubishi A6M Zero would not be able to be issued an airworthy certificate in this country today! Just the way the airplane was assembled would be considered unsafe today. And of all the magazine comparisons I have read about WW-2 fighters, I don't think the Zero and Spitfire were ever compared head to head, but I'm sure they must have met up in some places in the CBI theater of operations.
  Type at you later,
  Dan McEntee

[kevin king]

Thats interesting stuff Dan. I always like hearing the history of these warbirds. He also explained the reason for the invasion stripes only going half way up the side of the fuse on some spitfires. 😁
Kevin.

[John Park]

My father, a machinist in a small engineering company in southern England, told me msny tales of rebuilding worn-out, shot-up or crash-damaged Rolls-Royce Merlins during the war, and the care and effort that had to be put into the work to get anywhere near RR standards - putting a final finish on reground crankshaft journals with the finest available emery cloth etc. etc.  Shift-work, of course - six to two, two to ten, and the hated ten to six (trying to sleep during the day in a house full of evacuee children!).  In those days, nothing went to waste if you could re-use it!

[katana]

"You've had a play with it! Now, can we have it back Please?"

I got my Lady a flight in a 2 seater Spit for her 60th this past summer out of Biggin Hill - if you ever get the chance TAKE IT !

[john e. holliday]

This great stuff.  It must be nice to have your own Spitfire.

Came back to finish the video and in the video I seen a face that looked familiar.  I thought it was John Ashford.  I can't remember when when to a better place.

[dale gleason]

There's other faces and voices we recognize, Doc. Great video, lots of historical knowledge.


dg

[Chris McMillin]

I sure miss Bill Rutherford.
Chris...

[kevin king]

I sure miss Bill Rutherford.
Chris...

Chris, if you havent seen this, Bill Rutherford's plane is in the "Camera plane flights 7" video. Near the end of the video,  Bill is dive bombing the flying circle lol. Its unreal.😆
Kevin

[kevin king]

🏃

[Avaiojet]

Kevin,

Quit the hobby and use the money to become a Pilot.

Not a bad give up.

[qaz049]

      No, Kevin, it's just that time of year when forum activity slows down. I did want to make a comment on one thing that the owner said and that was the 25 hour  life span of a Spitfire. I imagine he didn't put that in the correct context. In combat at the time of the Battle of Brittan , pilots and planes didn't have a very long life expectancy, and I know I have read at one time what that was according to the statisticians at that time but don't remember or sure. The Spitfire was meant as a purely defensive fighter, and it didn't have a very large fuel capacity because it didn't need one if it wasn't going to be going very deep into the continent, so landing to refuel and re-arm after short sorties was common. It took several sorties to work up to 25 hours. It it's role, it took a lot of abuse and damage and at some point it was better to write off a ship to be stripped for parts as long as replacements were coming off the assembly lines at a regular pace. By the time the air frame got to 25 hours it may very well have been pretty war weary, or maybe even nonexistent.  When you think about it in that context, he probably meant that it's life expectancy was 25 hours. It had to be engineered to take the stress and loads of combat aerobatics and operating off of rough airfields, so you had to build them pretty dog gone stout! I have read some stuff about the Japanese Zero and how it was a very minimalist designed airplane. They were only expected to last one or two missions, given the Samurai philosophy the practiced, so no more material was put into the airplanes that was absolutely needed. That helped keep the weight of the aircraft down and the performance up and stretched the supply line as far as possible. I read some where once that a stock, from the factory Mitsubishi A6M Zero would not be able to be issued an airworthy certificate in this country today! Just the way the airplane was assembled would be considered unsafe today. And of all the magazine comparisons I have read about WW-2 fighters, I don't think the Zero and Spitfire were ever compared head to head, but I'm sure they must have met up in some places in the CBI theater of operations.
  Type at you later,
  Dan McEntee

The A6M Zero and the RAAF Spitfire Mark 8 met over Darwin, Northern Australia in 1943. The latter had problems, the Merlin engine didn't perform well at high altitude  in the tropics, and there were all sort of other problems adapting a North European design to the local conditions. In Seafire form the Spit performed much better flying off Royal Navy Armored Carriers during the Allied Invasion of Okinawa in 1945. The undercarriage was a real problem landing on the RN Carriers. There's lots on Youtube.

The A6M used a substantial quantity of the Japanese developed 7075 Aluminium Alloy in it's structure, which for equal strength can be much thinner and hence lighter than that of the more common 2024 (Duralium) Alloy . This wasn't appreciated in early superficial Allied examinations of captured airframes. Hence the crap about airworthness. It's become forgotten in the literature, but the first detailed scientific analysis of the Zero's construction and metallurgical uniqueness was made by Australian CSIRO Scientists, and RAAF Engineers in 1942 on airframes salvaged from around Darwin.

[kevin king]

Kevin,

Quit the hobby and use the money to become a Pilot.

Not a bad give up.

😁 too late for me. I would rather build them anyway.