Natural metal Spitfires.

[Graham Boak]

Photo-recce aircraft in bare metal? I thought that the subjects were fighters? Was 40 SAAF a PR unit - I thought that was 60 SAAF with Mosquitoes? Or is this a reference to FR aircraft - fighters with a fuselage camera for low-level work?

Franek: I suspect that the PR Mk. XIX had little height advantage over the later PR Mosquitoes, but that can be settled by consulting books I don't have to hand. Certainly Mosquitoes flew recce missions over Eastern Europe in the early days of the Cold War. However, it may well be true that the MiG 15 was the first aircraft capable of (regularly?) intercepting the PR.XIX, but that has little to do with the jet/piston argument in principle. It is much more to do with the capabilities of early Russian jet fighters, the Russian Air Defence system, and the ability to route around defence centres. In the same way as the 8th AF rendered the Me 163 threat impotent by simply not flying near their bases.

[stefaan]

Hi Graham

40 SAAF was a PR sqn or FR as you call them.
3 sqn and 7 sqn were fighters.
I am not including 41 as it was for a specific duty ie to catch the PR intruders.
I have seen NM Spits in all these sqns but only in Italy.
40 sqn did Tactical recce work and 60 sqn in the Mossies Strategic recces.
Stefaan

[Franek Grabowski]

Graham
Spitfire LF.IX, the most popular or even the only available version in USSR, had a service ceiling of about 12,500m. MiG-9 theoreticaly had a service ceiling of about 12,800-13,000 but IIRC Spitfire simply flew better at altitude, while MiG suffered of several problems disallowing its combat use and was not available in quantities. MiG-15 outclassed Spit, having ceiling at 15,200m and finally replaced her in air defence units. Oh, both had RR engines.
And their enemy was initially Spitfire XIX (with performance superior to LF.IX - I think Griffon had better alt. performance rather than Merlin in Mosquitoes) and then Canberra, I think both with RR engines.
My point is not that the jet engine was a bad concept (at last jets replaced pistons), just only the level of development was not so advanced. Initially, the main advantage was superior speed and climb and not necessarily altitude. With speed advantage of about 200km/h you do not need the latter that much. Of course, the only way to intercept such a beast was to climb higher and then to build up the speed in dive. A very hard task and definetelly a job for an excellent ground control. But still, was it the reason of paint removal?

[Alex Smart]

Hi All,

I know it is a short and a simple reply but wern't Spitfires that were in Desert camoflage sceme in Italy removed from squadrons and re painted in the Grey/green camoflage more suited to northern climbs ? it is then possible that some were redelivered to Squadrons when needed before the "New" camoflage was applied ?

Alex

[Graham Boak]

Stefaan: PR in the RAF was something of a private air force, reporting to high command and (at least later in life) largely concentrating on strategic reconnaissance. They were allowed to go their own way with camouflage schemes, although settling on the well-known PRU Blue. FR units were fighters with cameras, flying tactical missions, reporting to local authority and the relevant Army HQs. These grew out of the old Army Air Co-Operation units, and were normally camouflaged in the same schemes as fighter aircraft in the same theatre. So although both flew Spitfires with cameras, they had distinctly different roles and positions in the organisation.


Alex, you may well be right, although the need wouldn't seem that desperate and the apparent concentration of these in SAAF units does imply something else. However, if 41 Sq was dedicated to the interception of intruders, and these bare metal aircraft have been seen in other units, then we can probably rule out the search for performance limits. It begins to look as though local SAAF HQ relaxed the rules on camouflage before the RAF as a whole.

Maybe, however, someone will bring to the forum a mass of photos of baremetal RAF fighters in Italy.....