I knew I could count on you Jim. I've a plethora of Spitfire material including the standard works by Dr Alfred Price etc. Could this Witty be a model of the BBMF MkV with the four prop blade? Over to you 'Sherlock of the Dales'  |
Shamrock,
Alfred Price is an excellent aviation auther, his best work by far is the book he wrote with Jeffrey Ethwell called Target Berlin.
Its a masterpiece of detailed research that I think has not been bettered, about a single raid on Berlin by B17s.
Its a very graphic blow by blow account told from both sides in this battle, the information has been checked and cross checked in order to be as near accurate as is possible.
It is a book that is not for the faint hearted because it tells of the reality of war with no punches pulled.
As to the Spit, it could well be but my problem is finding out how and why this one came to have a 4 blade prop.
This aircraft was Jeff Quills mount from the early fifties until he retired from flying warbirds around the mid sixties.
It was very much a battle weary plane and was fully restored by Supermarine between 1951 and 52 almost from the ground up.
If Supermarine fitted a new uprated engine then they most likely fitted the 4 blade prop.
A little piece of useless info is that with the first tests of the MKV with the Merlin 45, 1 inch was shaved of the DH prop to keep its tip speed subsonic and thus reduce drag, (this added 8 mph to the Spits top speed).
In total there were at least 52 variants of the Spitfire, however if we include every change from begining to the end of its production the actual figure was quoted by Supermarine as closer to 100 !!!!!!!!!!!!