Thanks Juzz
I forgot - he said the VII had a pressurised cabin too, and the 'blower' was a supercharger not a turbo. I'm pretty sure he may still have a small booklet on the Merlin all about how to operate the boost - that would be interesting to be modelled by HTC. (both the controls and the effect) - it was used at different heights not just hit 'P' from the ground up :-)
Anyhow, I'll stick my notes on Spit divebombing here:
I asked my father (80 next year) how they did dive bombing in Spits and he
instantly replied, "Well first you identified your target' ... "
(I thought, here's the training coming out nearly 60 years later - you can
hear the briefing officer bashing it into them can't you : Identify your
target!! Too many neutrals and friendlies got hit I suppose).
" ... then you'd cross the target slightly to one side, say to the right, watch
it disappear under the leading edge of the port wing and wait for it to
re-appear behind the trailing edge. Then you'd just do a lazy turn to the left,
and let the nose drop until it felt you were vertical. "
(What height would you be at?)
"Oh, you'd be at about 11,000 feet then you'd pull at out between about 5-6000
feet though the lowest might be between 3-4000. You'd be trimmed so that at
first you had to hold it in the dive but later the controls would be locked
solid. People used to tell tall stories in the mess about how hard they had to
pull back on the controls to get out of the dive - putting both feet up on the
instrument panel that sort of thing. When you pulled up you'd go vertical and
at some point just tip a wing over a bit to look back to see what damage you'd
done. Of course, you have to remember a Spit was never intended to be used as a
dive bomber - no dive brakes. From memory, the max speed they were rated for
was 490 mph. "
(In a VII?)
"No, I think it was pretty much the same as that in all the Mk's that I flew.
(You told me once about your CO being teased after hurting his neck - and
his dignity - after pulling too many g's. He was sitting in the mess head
crooked on one side, in pain when the squadron wit came in: "Hello sir, been
sitting in a draft?")
(Hardly ROTFL, but in context, it was 'smart' remark when commanding officer's
were next to God).
"Yes, our CO pulled too many g's in a dive, and the wings were actually pulled
up a little. If you ran your fingers along the wing near the root you could
actually feel little ripples in the skin. The aircraft was U/S of course.
Hehheh - he had ripples in his neck too."
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Skeet