Historical myths -

[observer]

Some interesting historical reappraisals coming out about the Battle of Britain, and it seems it wasn't such an uneven match as we've been led to believe. EG. We over estimated the strength of the Luftwaffe by as much as 50% at the time; the Germans under estimated the strength of the RAF and exagerated their kill rates. With the largest Royal Navy, Operation Sealion appears doomed from the start - so, not so much a near run thing.

[Evil Sid]

that may well have been the case.

 

not really morale boosting to say 'we were pretty evenly matched' or 'we out numbered them ten to one really'

 

much better and more of a boost to say 'we were outnumbered but our determination and grit got us through'

 

true for both sides called propaganda or spin these days

[observer]

Another one is the myth of the Spitfire: in an even dog fight, the Me109E was a better fighter aircraft, with a 20mm cannon, with a longer burst, rather than .303 browning MGs. It had fuel injection, rather than a carb, which caused the Spit to flood and stall on negative G. It's heavier engine weight, gave it a faster dive rate, usefull for escaping trouble. Problem was, Goring forced the fighters to close support the Bombers, thus making them vunerable to RAF attacks.

[algy]

IF YOU WISH TO READ THE FACTS - READ ON

The Spitfire achieved fame in the Battle of Britain. It was seen as the aircraft that had saved Great Britain from Invasion. In fact it was the Hurricane that bore the brunt of the Battle of Britain, equipping 32 Squadrons to the Spitfire's 19.

 

However it was the Spitfire that gained the respect of the Luftwaffe, a force that was until then accustomed to having its own way.

 

The Spitfire and Hurricane were, in truth, a great team. The Spitfire had the performance and speed to take on the German fighters, and its widely spaced "blunderbuss" machine-guns were ideal for fighter-v-fighter dogfights. The rugged, reliable Hurricane was available in numbers that ensured the RAF did not lose a battle of attrition. Its closely grouped machine-guns were good for bringing down German bombers.

 

What of the Spitfire's opponent the Messerschmitt 109? Which was the better aeroplane? Some sources say the Spitfire was faster, others maintain it was the Messerschmitt that had the edge in speed. Some people have even said the Bf109 was more manoeuvrable. The Bf109 also had the advantage of a direct fuel-injection system for its engine, which meant it could do negative G manoeuvres that a Spitfire would have difficulty following (See the section on the Merlin engine). The 109 was also equipped with cannon armament, whereas the Spitfire had to make do with machine-guns. Many armchair aviators have concluded that the Messerschmitt was the better design. However the Spitfire is remembered as the victor, and rightly so...

 

We shall now look in more detail at the performance of both aircraft, remember that all figures refer to the Spitfire Mk I and the Messerschmitt Bf109E.

 

SPEED

 

SPITFIRE Mk1 = 355 MPH AT 18,500 feet. *

 

Bf 109E = 348 MPH AT 17,500 feet. *

 

You will no doubt see maximum speeds for the Spitfire quoted as being around 365 mph, this is without much of the equipment on board a Spitfire would have carried into battle in 1940. Foremost amongst the extra weight was a sheet of armoured metal behind the pilot and an armoured windshield in front of him. Ask most Spitfire pilots what they would prefer, the armour or a few extra mph and most would plump for the armour. With armour fitted it was rare for the pilot of a Spitfire to be killed outright by the machine-guns or low-velocity cannon of a 109E. With his Spitfire shot to bits around him the Spitfire pilot could bale out or crash-land to fight another day. His biggest danger was his fuel tank catching fire or exploding. There was no problem with losing a Spitfire, British fighter production had been pushed to new heights in 1940. A Spitfire pilot would find a new aircraft waiting for him back at his airfield. It was pilots the British were short of in 1940, not aircraft.

 

Airspeed varies with height and both the Spitfire and Bf 109 achieved their best speeds in the band between 15 and 25 thousand feet. The speed of the Bf 109 did not trail off as markedly as the Spitfire Mk I at extreme heights above 30 thousand feet so at these very high altitudes the Bf109 had the advantage in speed. Combats at these altitudes were rare during the Battle of Britain (although they were becoming more common towards the end of the battle). The reverse was true at low level, where the speed of the Bf109 dropped off more markedly than the Spitfire. At sea level up to 5 thousand feet the Spitfire was the faster.

 

MANOEUVRABILITY

 

A Spitfire pilot will tell you the Spit could turn inside the 109. Some Messerschmitt pilots were unshaken in their belief that the 109 could turn inside the Spitfire! Both designs were capable of turning circles that would cause the pilot to "black-out" as the blood drained from the head. The pilot who could force himself to the limits without losing consciousness would emerge the victor from a turning battle, and the Spitfire pilots had supreme faith in their machine. The British popular press (and even one broadcast by the BBC early in the war) told them that the wings came off the 109 in a dive or in tight turns, untrue but possibly based on some early wing failures in the 109's predecessor the Bf108. British designers and aeronautical pundits also found the Bf109's wing structure somewhat strange, with only two attachments between the wing and fuselage and their suspicions that this might prove fragile in combat probably influenced the popular press comments.

 

The Spitfire had a lower wing loading than the Bf 109 and this would normally give the better turning circle. However the 109 had help with its leading edge slots which gave a lower stalling speed, and thus was able to turn tighter than a simple comparison of wing areas might suggest. The 109 was very forgiving if stalled, with little tendency for a stall to develop into a spin, something that could happen to a Spitfire, although the Spitfire gave its pilot plenty of warning that he was approaching a stall due to the slight twist in the wing known as "wash-out". It is this "wash-out" which probably holds the key to the Spitfire's success. Because of the twist to the wings the stall (break up in airflow over the wing) would develop first near the fuselage rather than at the tip as on most conventional "straight" wings. This manifests itself as a feedback to the pilot through the controls and the airframe, in effect the Spitfire "talks" to the pilot and tells him he must ease back on the stick to avoid stalling completely. Because the airflow at the tips of the wings (where the control surfaces are) is still stable the controls are still effective. In a tight combat turn with minimum turning circle the aircraft is always on the edge of stalling, the feedback the Spitfire gave its pilot is probably the crucial factor in a turning battle.

 

There is more than one account by German wartime fighter pilots that suggest that many Luftwaffe novices did not use the turning performance of the 109 to the full. They seem to have regarded the point at which the automatic slots popped out as being a warning to ease back. Only more experienced pilots pushed the Bf109 to its limits. The way the slots operated could itself be a problem, causing the Bf109 to "buck" and throw off the aim of the Bf109 pilot, perhaps at the critical moment.

 

Both the Spitfire and Messerschmitt became harder to control at high speeds, with greater and greater strength needed on the control column as the speed increased.** However the problem was much worse in the Messerschmitt and in the high speed fights that developed in the Battle of Britain the Spitfire had the advantage.The Messerschmitt's elevator control was very heavy at high speed and there are reports that Spitfire pilots would escape from 109s by diving towards the ground and pulling up at the last moment knowing that the German would find it much harder to pull back on the stick to escape destruction. The Spitfire was capable of being pulled out of a dive with such high "g" forces that the pilot would black out (for only a second or so), meaning the pilot, not the aircraft, was the limiting factor, this is how it should be for a fighter. The Messershmitt's heavy elevator control at high speed meant that a German pilot would not be able to pull enough "g" to black out, meaning the aircraft itself was the limiting factor.

 

This brings us to the control column; the small cockpit of the Bf109 allowed only a very small area of travel for the stick, only 4 inches. Nowadays, with powered controls this would be seen as an advantage (like the small steering wheel in a racing car), but in 1940 pilots used sheer muscle-power to haul their aircraft around the sky. The cramped cockpit of the 109 meant that its pilot could employ only a fraction of his strength on the control column. Meanwhile the more spacious Spitfire allowed more elbow room for its pilot to wrestle with the control column, which was topped by a large spade type grip so that the pilot could use both hands.

 

The rate of roll of the Messerschmitt was inferior to the Spitfire at high speed. Since you have to roll before you can get into a turn this gave the Spitfire pilot another advantage at the start of any turning dogfight at high speed.

 

Thus it can be seen that if a Spitfire pilot could keep the speed of the dogfight high he held a distinct advantage in manoeuvrability.

 

Two very different appraisals of the turning circles of the Spitfire and Bf109 can be found in the books "Fighter" by Len Deighton and "The Most Dangerous Enemy" by Stephen Bungay. The former has a diagram showing the Bf109s turning circle to be inside that of the Spitfire (750 feet and 880 feet respectively) while the latter has a diagram showing the opposite (850 feet and 700 feet respectively). Crucially all the tests of mock combats between captured Bf109s and Spitfires always give the Spitfire the edge.

 

ARMAMENT

 

The Spitfire had eight Browning machine-guns spread out along the wing. These each had 300 rounds of normal bullets, tracer, incendiary or armour-piercing (the last type only effective against the thinnest of armour). The guns were configured so that the bullets converged on a single point some distance in front of the aircraft. At first this distance was over 400 yards, however pilots soon found that the best results were obtained if they made it 250 or 200 yards instead. The use of eight machine-guns meant that even the novice fighter-pilots thrown into the battle by the British had a chance of hitting something if they could get into firing position. On the other hand the 109`s armament favoured the marksman. The 109 had two machine guns of similar performance to the British Brownings, but mounted in the nose and synchronised to fire through the propeller. These had magazines of 1,000 rounds each, which meant the German could keep his finger on the trigger over three times longer than his British counterpart, but after that time he would have still expended 400 less rounds than the Spitfire pilot. The Messerschmitt was also equipped with two 20mm cannon, but they had a low velocity, poor rate of fire and only 60 rounds per gun****. Against British bombers they were devastating, but the manoeuvrable and swift Spitfires and Hurricanes were a difficult target.

 

The incendiary bullets used by the British in the Battle of Britain gave the RAF a great advantage. They could cause the fuel-tank of a target aircraft to explode and the flash of light they gave off showed the British pilot his bullets were striking home. The incendiary bullet had been developed in secret at Woolwich Arsenal and was only just ready in time for the Battle of Britain. Named "de Wilde" ammunition by the British this was a ruse to make the Germans think it was based on the work of a Mr de Wilde in Switzerland. In fact it had been found that "proper" de Wilde bullets could only be made by hand, whereas the British design could be mass-produced. The British "de Wilde" bullets were the invention of C. Aubrey Dixon, a Captain in the Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire Regiment (he retired with the rank of Brigadier), one of the unsung heroes of the Battle of Britain.

Credit to John Dell's Aviation Site (Dingers Aviation Pages).

[observer]

The "myth" was that the Spitfire was FAR superior to the Me109; even your facts dispel that myth and merely add fuel to a 70 year old debate.

[Jerry]

I hope I can persuade my grandson to read your comparisons. Like many boys he went through a World War II aircraft appreciation phase -- and kept asking me 'which was better?' and would not be satisfied with my mention of variables and better in what sense? Simple speed? Simple firepower. Most kills in dogfights? Here it all is in detail, thank you.

[observer]

Any appreciation of a weapons system, also has to take into account it's tactical application, context and the quality of training of it's users. Warfare is a bit like that game kids play with their fists - paper - stone - scissors; there is always one asset type to destroy another, and thus the skill of the General, is their collective application. EG. The Tiger Tank was much feared, but few in number and costly to produce, the allies countered with quanity over quality, and persued a policy of attrition. Likewise, the later German jet, the Me262; which Hitler misused as fighter-bomber.

[Lt Kije]

Goring forced the fighters to close support the Bombers,

 

Not at the beginning of the battle Obs

[observer]

Errm, I know - the original Agler Tag tactics were to take out the radar stations with Stukas, take out the airfields with heavier bombers and wear down our fighters with theirs. About the best option available to them, but: radar stations were quickly repaired, plus we had some mobile units: grass runways are difficult to render unsuable: and their losses were permanent, as pilots lossed over England were captured; our's were returned to their units.