In article ,
"Ed Majden" writes:

"Richard Brooks" Long live the memory of the Spitfire and our
Merlins!


The Spits are famed for winning the Battle of Britain. The Mustangs
are
famed for winning the war.

Ahh, those Merlins again! ;-)


The P51 wasn't a high performance fighter until the Brits installed the
RR Merlin in it. This increased speed and performance making the Mustang a
top long range fighter.

You might want to look into that a little bit deeper. All P-51s, (and
A-36s, and F-6As) were pretty damned high performance in their effective
altitude bands, faster cruising adn better accelerating at high speeds
than the than the contemporary Spitfire Vs and IXs. (Long tange
cruise at about 170 mph IAS vice 160 mph IAS for the Spits note that
that's indicated airspeed, which is the Sea Level equivalant of the
airplane's True Airspeed, which is higher as altitude increases, due
to the decreasing air pressure at altitude.) At low altitudes, a
P-51A or A-36 were quite high performers, better even than the V1650-3
engined P-51Bs. They were quite capable of dealing with the Fw 190As
of the time. In the Mediterranean Theater, the lower critical
altitudes of the engines wasn't as much of a factor, most combat
taking place at altitudes below 15,000'. It's worth noting that,
until the introduction of the 2-stage/2-speed Merlin 61 in the Spit
IX, Merlin/SPitfire critical altitudes were dropping as well, from
16,000'+ for the Spit I's Merlin III, , to 13,000' for the Spit II's
Merlin XII, , to 9250' for the Merlin 45 on the Mk V, and, later 3700'
for the cropped supercharger Merlin 45M for the Spit L.F V.
Merlin 45 engined Spit Vs, The Mistangs (and A-36s) could carry a
useful load as a fighter-bomber, and even without the extra fuselage
tank fitted to many B models, had an astonishing amount of range. The
first RAF firgters to reach Germany from Britain were Allison-engined
Mustang Is, in mid 1942, and they roamed all over Western Europe
shooting up whatever targets of opportunity came along.

The Spits did not have the range to be an effective long range bomber escort
but it was an excellent fighter. During the Battle of Britain the Spits
generally went after the fighter while the Hurricanes dealt with the
bombers.

The Spit certainly was an excellent fighter, and it had a lot of
stretch. I do find the claim that "Spitfires were sent after Figters
in the Battle of Britain, and Hurricanes after bombers" a bit dubious.
Especially with the command and control systems available at the time,
you don't get to pick and choose that way. Raides were intercepted by
whatever was available. The kill figures, vis-a-vis Fighters
vs. Bombers really don't differ all that much between Spitfires &
Hurricanes. What was more important was teh elimination of the
unweildy and worthless setpiece Fighter Attack tactics, which would
have casue crippling losses even if the RAF were flying Zeta Reticulan
Flying Discs. An excellent airplane doesn't make up for very bad tactics.
--
Pete Stickney
A strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many
bad measures. -- Daniel Webster