Angus, first you´re wrong about the Emils power setting. In flight there were only 1.3ata available, and this were only 1000PS.
Your power setting 1030hp @6.25lb is for the Merlin II and 87 octan. As far as i know the Merlin III, fitted to the Spitfire I+II, did have slightly more power with same boost. But ok, let´s use 1030HP or ~1050PS
I think it´s better to compare the standard Spitfire I from ´40. IN the MKII test there is the "Rotol Spitfire I, N.3171". The header of the test indicates that those machines were prepared to war condition, though they don´t mention weapons.
Topspeed 290mph near ground, 346mph at 19k.
Your data about the 109E is based on this very special machine that seems to be responsible for all these handling trials, because the flight tests show also french data. It should be noted that this machine saw service, was extensivly flown by the French after it was captured, was then transfered to england where it was further flown.
The french got significantly better results with the machine, the english trials clearly show a lack of maintance.
In the french tests where this 109E was still in better shape, it reached 354mph at 15k.
There exist a document from russia showing the performance of a 109E3 from an english test. This captured machine performed in england like this:
295mph at ground, 348mph at 14.5k
So even a captured 109E (which was definitly not an aerodynamic wonder) could beat with slighly less power in an english test the SpitI/II, if you compare equal alitutes and consider overall condition. Tests comparing own new fighter to captured machines are always not 100% representative btw.
With +9lb or even +12lb, the spit probably was slightly faster, but this would mean also with a huge power advantage.
According to the british tests the 109E reached minimum 2700ft/min the first 10000ft, this is 3.7minutes. They measured 8minutes up to 19700feet, but most important is this sentence from the test report:
"Owing to cooling difficulties the radiators were open up to 13000 feet and then gradually closed up to 26000feet. This may account for the discrepancy between the measured times to height and those published in germany"
In the Tsagi charts the 109E exceeds 3000ft/min up to 13k, thus you can expect ~5 minutes up to 15k.
And now, just to bring in some german data too: The climb times from a 109E manual are:
3000m/10k 3,0 minutes
6000m/20k 6,3 minutes
Unfortunatly no german data about SpitI/II is available to me, it would have been highly interesting to see how caputres english machines performed in german tests!
niklas
