[Crumpp]

During WW2, however, the demands of production testing thousands of aircraft meant that each factory adopted its own techniques, designed to test aircraft to an acceptable standard, as quickly as possible, before delivery: this did not mean that there wasn't a standard set by the RAE, simply a divergence of ways in which it was done at a production level. The same thing happened in the 'States, each factory adopted a testing regime broadly following the NACA guidelines.

Once again, a standard is a standard. The Air Ministry and the RAE did not have one.

The United States had a standard during the war. That does not mean every airplane met that standard. Most aircraft were designed before the standard was adopted. It does mean, they designed to meet, tested to meet it, and implemented design corrections to meet the adopted standard. Part of that report and standard is included in the very first post in this thread.

The design firms in the United States were obligated to meet a standard. Supermarine was under NO Obligation to correct the Spitfire. It as already in production and service. It took the NACA, Gates, and mounds of evidence of the instability before a simple correction was adopted.

With the right information, figuring out how much weight to add to your elevator bellcrank is no different than a weight and balance. Once more, a designer can add springs, bungees, weights, and other devices to increase or decrease the control force as he wants.

Facts are the RAE relied upon the individual talent of the engineers and the opinion of the pilots.

Not all engineers are equal. For example, Sir Sydney Camm was very talented with stability and control design. His designs reflect that. RJ Mitchell certainly missed the mark on the Spitfire.

Is a stable aircraft more or less maneuverable than an unstable one.

It does not matter how maneuverable an aircraft is if the pilot cannot control it.


That is the Spitfire's issue. Nobody is claiming it should be less maneuverable. The longitudinal axis should be so maneuverable as to be very difficult to precisely control.

Generally speaking, all aircraft above Va can exceed their airframe limitations. You can do it more easily in the Spitfire.

It is also harder to precisely control in a turn. The strength of the buffet determines the scope of the effects of the stick shaker zone. Hitting stick shaker in a Spitfire is easier due to the longitudinal instability.

Properly modeled, the Spitfire has world beating performance. While not the most agile fighter, it is fast, climbs well, and excellent rate of steady state turn.

The majority of fighter pilots in World War II never got into a single dogfight. Most kills occurred without the "victim" even knowing the opponent was there behind them.

So all those anecdotes about "easy to fly" are worthless without the context and a comparison of pilot skill. I would love to fly a Spitfire and throw it around the sky on a sunny afternoon.

That is not the same as dog fighting. Dogfighting is what you do in this game and it has very little if anything at all to do with the actual events or history. An actual simulation of WWII would be zero fun. For the vast majority of pilots, it was lots of tedious flying to be killed without ever seeing who did it. For a few, it was a few seconds of terrified maneuvering before death and for a rare few that we still talk about today, the thrill of the hunt.

The NACA and the RAE agree that the aircraft was difficult to precisely control in a turn. It was twitchy airplane. The airplanes characteristics are measureable, definable, and everyone who was involved with the airplane agreed upon them.

The Spitfire should take time and skill to master. Once mastered, reward its aficionados with the performance they expect.


I think this thread has about run its course. Time to submitt the bugtracker.