Is Spitfire Mk V still the dominat spit mark in mid war?

[1K3]

If yes were all spit 5's wings clipped, full span, or both?

[Guppy35]

Originally posted by 1K3
If yes were all spit 5's wings clipped, full span, or both?

Go search Spitfire first 1K3 cause yer gonna get all kinds of threads where this has been discussed, in particular the numbers of Spit Vs in service at the time.  Kurfie will go to great lengths to tell you the V was the main Spit into 44.  I'm not going to get into a Spit debate with him again.  It's a waste of time.  Suffice to say Spit Vs were certainly still in service in numbers well into 1943 with the last ETO Spit Vs being replaced in June-July 44, but they were not the primary air superiority Spit.  This would have been the Spitfire LFIX.
 
Of course it depends on what mid-war is to you.  In 1942 the Spit V would have been the dominant Spit with the Spit IX only coming into service towards the late part of the summer in July-August 42

Wing types depends on theater of operations etc.  Spit Vs still soldiering on in 1943 ETO from England often had clipped wings to go with the low alt Merlins.  But there is no hard fast rule on who had the clipped wings.  I can post photos of the 501 Squadron Spit Vbs that flew on D-Day and they had full span wings and 6 exhaust stacks.

Aussie Spit Vc in the Pac and the RAF Vcs in Burma had full span wings.  MTO birds were a combo of clipped or full span depending on the job they were doing.

[Squire]

LF Vs, not Vs.

...and we will never see a L.F. V Spit in AH because it boosts at +18 lbs and has clipped wings (many), and a low alt Merlin 50M, with a FTH at 5900 ft.

You would hear the screaming as far away as Tokyo.  

To answer your Q, some had clipped wings and some did not. Both Vs and LF Vs had both normal span and clipped span wings. Many folks think that "LF V" meant it had clipped wings, thats not true, its just that many of them did.

Im gone, too, this has all been covered a dozen times. Ltr.

[Sable]

Is there a particular date, or engagement you are interested in?  That makes it a lot easier to nail down what the RAF was actually flying.  People often refer to everything from 1941 to 1943 as "mid-war" and it was a period of great change for fighter command.

[Kurfürst]

See Rule #4

[Karnak]

I see you're no longer claiming there were only 10 squadrons of Mk IXs by mid 1944.

Now I wonder if you can figure out duty assignments or if you think Fighter Command was entirely blind to the type a squadron was equipped with when assigning tasks?

[TimRas]

Kurfurst,
Something wrong here. You have the squadron numbers 32,43,64,66,72,74,92,111,131,132,152,249,306,310,312,315,317,340,453 and 457 squadrons listed as both IX and V squadrons.

[Pooface]

See Rule #4

[Stang]

lolz.

[MiloMorai]

Kurfy is still clueless about the RAF. All squadrons in the ETO and MTO were under RAF command.

Number of Mk IX Squadrons in September 1943 : 29
Number of Mk V Squadrons in September 1943 : 68

MkV Sept 43
32, 43, 64, 66, 72, 73, 74, 80, 81, 87, 92, 93, 94, 111, 118, 123, 126, 127, 130, 131, 132, 145, 152, 154, 165, 185, 225, 229, 232, 238, 242, 243, 249, 253, 288, 302, 306, 308, 310, 312, 315, 316, 317, 322, 340, 349, 350, 401, 402, 411, 412, 416,  417, 451, 453, 501, 504, 602, 610, 611, 897 = 43(18)

Did not include the non-Europe squadrons (5).

MkIX Sept 43
19, 32, 43, 64, 65, 66, 72, 74, 92, 111, 131, 132, 152, 222, 241, 249, 306, 310, 312, 315, 317, 340, 341, 421, 453, 457, 485, 501, 682, = 29

Those MkV squadrons in bold are in the MKIX list he posted.

Kurfy once chasitised me for using a modelling book as a reference, yet he uses a modelling book here.

Also notice he is changing his story and not claiming the MkV was the predominate Spitfire model into early-mid 1944 as he did in a thread last week.

Kurfy, what is  wrong with the Merlin 61? The only difference worthy of note was it had a higher rated altitude than the Merlin 66.

There's a very good discussion of this at butch board with more consturctive people involved than guppy.

Yup, one is Neil Stirling who you slander every chance you get.

[Crumpp]

You would hear the screaming as far away as Tokyo.

If it was modeled realistically, I hardly think people would be screaming about it.

All the best,

Crumpp

[Squire]

Spit V with just +16 lbs boost.

Where have you been?

Later.

[Kweassa]

The war started in '39 and ended in 45'.

 So I'd say;

'39~'41 = early war
'42~'43 = mid war
'44~'45 = late war

 So planes that started full squadron service and put into regular combat duties between '42~'43 would qualify as 'mid war'... I think...

[Crumpp]

Spit V with just +16 lbs boost.

Problem was they kept putting it with the wrong time period.  It was a 1943 variant not a 1941 plane.

Against it's contemprary opponents historically it was not a "superplane" by any means.

All the best,

Crumpp

[Squire]

Well, I don't see a 109F-2 or a Fw190A-1 in AH2 either. Im ok with that, I am all for the Spit Vb as it is now, I don't want to see it get any special breaks. Same with the 150 octane stuff, I don't want it, because it just gives the Spit haters ammo to use.

As far as a clipped +18 lbs Spit LF V goes, I can't imagine this place not freaking out over its inclusion, considering the past reaction to Spits in general, especially the dogfight under 5k MA.