… Britain rules the seas, but air is more important than water. In battles with the Luftwaffe, a superhero was born, who ground a good third of German aircraft in the sky in World War II. His name is “Supermarine Spitfire” (“Ardent”).
It is curious that the creator of the legendary aircraft, aircraft designer Reginald Mitchell, did not have a specialized education. The lack of a diploma was compensated for by colossal experience in engineering positions. From a draftsman at a steam locomotive plant to the technical director of Supermarine.
Over the years, Mitchell has designed 24 types of various aircraft, including the record-breaking Supermarine S6B (1931). Looking at modern airliners, it is impossible to imagine how this braced monoplane with ridiculous floats could accelerate to 650 km / h. Even a decade later, in the early years of WWII, no production fighter could boast such a result.
An experienced designer knew that the main drag in flight was created by the wing. In pursuit of speed, you need to reduce its area. Reduce so much that in modern cruise missiles, instead of wings, only short "branches" stick out. But an airplane is not a rocket. A wing too small will lead to an unacceptable increase in landing speeds. The car will crash into the lane. But what if, instead of hard soil, there is water that can soften the blow? And Mitchell put his S6B on floats. The merry flying boat broke all records, and its creator received the prefix "sir" to its name.
The games continued until the order for a promising fighter jet for the Royal Air Force appeared. The competition was not easy, seven well-known companies (Bristol, Hawker, Westland, Blackburn, Gloucester, Vickers and Supermarine) applied for participation. At first, the Supermarine models were hopelessly “leaked” to competitors, and Mitchell's bold plans did not find application in practice. Until the correct configuration of the elements appeared: an ellipsoidal wing of amazing beauty and grace, a similar thin-profile elliptical tail and a Rolls-Royce Marilyn motor with a reliable liquid cooling system.
But what kind of romance is there without women?
Lucy Houston played a special role in the history of “Spitfire”. British aristocrat who donated 100 thousand lb to Mitchell. sterling. It was a lot of money: in those years, it was possible to build four production fighters with it. In fact, she sponsored the creation of one of the most successful aircraft of the Second World War, which simply would not have appeared without her.
Here the force of the explosion mixed blood with water, But even then, stern and strong, Airplane steering wheel wreck
The dead hand did not let go …
(Spitfire wreck off the coast of Malta)
When Mitchell was told how beautiful his plane was with such an elegant wing, he shrugged his shoulders indifferently: "What difference does it make, the main thing is how many machine guns you can put in this wing." And there were as many as eight of them - 160 bullets per second. Although weak, rifle caliber (7, 62).
In fact, it was not weak for the initial period of WWII on a "purebred" fighter-interceptor, created for battles with their own kind. A bullet, no matter how “small” it is, is still a bullet. It took just one hit to the Messerschmitt engine to cause the entire cooling system to fail (which is true for any aircraft with an in-line engine with a vulnerable liquid-cooled jacket). And there were more such bullets per second than modern six-barreled miniguns produce. The air was literally saturated with traces of red-hot lead. Spitfire was not created for jokes.
Almost at the same time, the "cannon" modification of the fighter was launched into series, with two 20-mm "Hispano" cannons in the wing. The installation turned out to be easy (even easier than the standard "garlands" of machine guns), but fixing it turned out to be a problem. "Hispano" was intended to be installed in the collapse of the cylinder block, where a heavy engine became its carriage. When installed in the wing, it was necessary to design a new carriage and increase the rigidity of the structure.
The fighter's armament has evolved continuously.
The 1942 Spitfires already had mixed cannon and machine gun armament. The latest modifications were equipped exclusively with cannons. It is worth noting that following the results of the air battles of World War II, the question "Which is more effective: cannons or" garlands "of machine guns?" and remained without a definite answer.
Spitfire and his faithful partner Mustang
As, however, and the choice of the engine. Despite their increased vulnerability, liquid-cooled motors ensured better streamlining and improved aircraft aerodynamics. Unlike the USSR, Germany and the USA, where a wide range of aircraft with liquid and air cooling engines was used, the British flew off the entire war exclusively on liquid cooled engines. The Rolls-Royce Marilyn, named after the bird of prey of the falcon squad, became the permanent symbol of the Royal Air Force (or did someone seriously believe that the engine of the combat plane was named after the wizard from Oz?)
An extremely reliable and versatile engine that the shaves put on everything. From one “Merlin” it turned out “Spitfire”. Of the two - "Mosquito". Of the four, the strategic Lancaster. The degree of prevalence of "Merlin" is evidenced by the fact that the number of modifications of the main "branch" of the development of the motor had continuous numbering from "1" to "85". Excluding licensed copies and experimental directions.
The Ardent dynasty also had a dozen major modifications: from the “primitive” pre-war version of the Mark-I to the crazy Mark-21, 22, 24 delivered in the last months of WWII. Extended fuselage, teardrop lantern, bomb holders. The maximum speed in level flight is 730 km / h.
In 1944, during tests, the pilot Martindale accelerated such a "Spitfire" at its peak to 0.92 speed of sound (1000 km / h), setting an absolute record for piston fighters of the WWII.
After the war, in 1952, the weather scout (Spitfire of the 81st squadron based in Hong Kong) reached a record altitude of 15,700 meters.
In terms of their characteristics and design, these were completely new aircraft, retaining only the name from the original "Spitfire". Inside there was no longer "Merlin", instead of it, starting with version XII, a new Rolls-Royce Griffon engine was installed. The British squandered the cylinders quite well, bringing the working volume to 36.7 liters (10 liters more than that of the "Merlin"). At the same time, thanks to the efforts of the designers, the dimensions of the motor remained unchanged, only the weight increased by 300 kg.
"Griffons" with a double supercharger could produce 2100-2200 hp in flight, the German engineers never dreamed of that. However, this was partially due to high-quality gasoline with an octane rating of 100 and above.
Simpler modifications of the Spitfire, "winged war workers", also shook the heavenly blue with the power of their motors. As an example - the most massive model Mk. IX (1942, 5900 built copies).
Takeoff power 1575 HP Level flight speed - 640 km / h. Excellent rate of climb - 20 m / s in steady state. In dynamics - who knows how much. Many tens of meters per second.
The high-altitude qualities of the fighter were ensured by a two-stage centrifugal supercharger and American Bendix-Stromberg carburetors with automatic mixture control (altitude corrector).
All-metal construction. High-altitude oxygen system. Multi-channel radio station coupled with a radio compass. On Spitfires IX of the British Air Force, it is obligatory to have an R3002 (3090) radio responder of the friend or foe system.
Armament - two 20-mm cannons (120 rounds per barrel) and two "Browning" caliber 12, 7 mm (500 rounds). On some of the machines, instead of large-caliber machine guns, there were four rifle calibers.
Striking Armament - lb 500 a bomb on a ventral mount and two 250-lb. under the wings.
Among the Nine records:
She owns the first reliable case of the destruction of the jet "Messerschmitt" (October 5, 1944)
On the same "Spitfire" in March 1945, air defense aviation pilots intercepted a German high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft over Leningrad, flying at an altitude of over 11 kilometers.
In September 1945, a record jump was made from the cockpit of the Nine. Pilot V. Romanyuk jumped with a parachute from a height of 13 108 meters and safely landed on the ground.
In total, the Soviet Union got 1.3 thousand "Spitfires". The first machines appeared back in 1942 as part of the 118th Naval Aviation Regiment of the Northern Fleet. These scouts (mod. P. R. Mk. IV) made their significant contribution to the victory in the North, incommensurate with their number. Thanks to their altitude and speed qualities, the Spitfires could fly with impunity over German bases in Norway. They were the ones who “grazed” the parking lot of the battleship Tirpitz in the Kaafjord.
Another batch of aircraft appeared in the spring of 1943 (this was the first time that Spitfires were officially supplied abroad). The fighters of the Mk. V modification were immediately thrown into the Kuban "meat grinder" as part of the 57th Guards IAP, where they showed quite successful results (26 aerial victories in a month).
From February 1944 began large deliveries of "Spitfires" modification IX. Considering the high-altitude qualities of these fighters (the Spitfire had a ceiling 3 kilometers higher than the domestic La-7), all British fighters were sent to the air defense aviation.
Statistics instead of words
According to the Black cross / Red star, authored by Andrey Mikhailov and Krister Bergstrom, one of the most complete reference publications on air confrontation during WWII, as of October 1944, the Luftwaffe lost front 21,213 aircraft.
During the same period, the losses of the Luftwaffe in the Western theater of operations amounted to 42,331 aircraft. If we add another 9,980 German aircraft lost in the period 1939-41, then the complete statistics will take the form 21213 to 52311.
Indirectly, these calculations are confirmed by the adoption of the "Urgent Fighter Program" to protect the Reich (1944, Hitler's decision to curtail the production of all types of aircraft, except fighters). All sorts of stories about the battles of the allies with jet Messerschmitts, He.219 Wuhu, strategic four-engined bombers He.177 Greif and FW-190 Sturmbok modifications, which were not heard of on the Eastern Front.
It is possible to compare the figures of the Luftwaffe with the facts of the sinking of thousands of ships in the Atlantic and Mediterranean. All this required bombers and torpedo bombers, under the cover of fighters. Which made sorties and, of course, suffered losses. Attack of the Maltese convoys, air cover during Operation Cerberus, a massive raid of thousands of German aircraft on Allied airfields (Operation Bodenplatte, January 1, 1945) with painful losses for both sides, etc. etc.
And at the same time take into account the scale of the air Battle of Britain.
Taking all this into account, it becomes clear why the bulk of the Luftwaffe aircraft died in the Western theater of operations.
Where the main and most massive enemy of the Germans in the air was the "Supermarine Spitfire", which killed at least a third of all fascist aircraft during the war years. A natural result for 20 thousand fighters, continuously produced from the beginning to the very end of WWII, and every day, for 6 years, engaged in battles with the Luftwaffe.
