Spitfire F.22 – with a Merlin??

The only thing I can spot that denotes “Merlin” is the four blade prop and direction of rotation.
The shape of the nose and cowl intake / blisters all say “Griffon” to me.

Not to worry. It’s only a model. Very nice otherwise.

Andy

Indeed. Looks like the modeller doesn’t understand the difference. As you say; no matter.

That would be up to the owner, I’d imagine.

Are you following me around? I could get a court order, you know.

That would be up to the owner, I’d imagine.

Are you following me around? I could get a court order, you know.

So no basis in reality then. A what if in squadron colours…

I’m sure you’ll be pleased as long as it’s not sent to Pima. :):):)

The only thing I can spot that denotes “Merlin” is the four blade prop and direction of rotation.
The shape of the nose and cowl intake / blisters all say “Griffon” to me.

Not to worry. It’s only a model. Very nice otherwise.

Andy

[ATTACH=CONFIG]250024[/ATTACH]

So no basis in reality then. A what if in squadron colours…

I suspect that the only consideration of putting a Merlin in a “Spitfire 21” is the branch of development that included the NEW new wing, aka Spiteful. There was consideration there, and it would have been an advanced Merlin, not a 66/266.

Mark12, I reached the same conclusion about Spiteful tails, though there may have been some other mods included as part of the package.

bob

..and as published (earlier than the website) in Morgan and Shacklady.

If I had to point to a likely source for the error, it would be that book, which seems to have suffered the attentions of a mischievous six year old who has just discovered ‘cut and paste’. It was an admirable undertaking, and a great reference, but one that has errors in it that took effort.

A great way of checking for plagiarism I suspect. Repetition of errors is often an easy check for proper research.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]250024[/ATTACH]

I’ll try to find the photos, yeah.

Daren, can you post a link to the model picture, out of interest?

The point may have been that the combine could produce more airframes than there were Griffon engines, or a fear of the same. More basically however, they were looking at a new wing for all Spitfire variants. The new wing was required to solve problems (wing twisting leading to aileron reversal and eventual destruction) caused by diving at high speed, and that applied to the later Merlin variants as well. So you shouldn’t think of taking built Mk.20-series airframes and reengining them, but continuing to built Merlin airframes with the bigger wing. A Merlin 100 powered airframe would still have been fairly impressive. Whatever the detail reasons, it was an idea knocked on the head early, possibly/probably before any project drawings were made.

Which is what makes this particular example so unlikely.

I guess to a seasoned Spitfire Griffon jockey, all that buzzing noise up front wouldn’t amount to much in regards to forward traction that late in the piece

I can’t see that it would ever even be proposed.

The late Spits were designed for, and around, the Griffon simply because the Merlin wasn’t big enough for the projected growth requirement for the airframe.

What would be the point of putting a smaller engine in than that for which it was designed? It isn’t as if there was a lack of Merlin/Spitfire data to work from.

Anon.

..and as published (earlier than the website) in Morgan and Shacklady.

If I had to point to a likely source for the error, it would be that book, which seems to have suffered the attentions of a mischievous six year old who has just discovered ‘cut and paste’. It was an admirable undertaking, and a great reference, but one that has errors in it that took effort.

He did provide a web link, but no matter what I did, no website would come up for me (yet it seemed to work OK for him).

Hi, Daren,

Just wanted to verify that the website (it works for me, fortunately) info is exactly the same data as found in your post #1 and also in Snafu’s post #4.

Cheers,

Matt

Thanks for the replies. Myth busted, it seems.

My records indicate this Spitfire was built with a Griffon 61 No. 520365/3698.

They also indicate it was issued to 608 Squadron in September 1947…but nobody noticed the strange engine.;)

I wonder how far forward the Merlin had to be mounted or how much lead had to be packaged in the engine bay to get the CoG within limits.

If you study the early Mk 22 Spitfire they all required modification prior to entering service. I suspect this was to upgrade to the Spiteful tail from the Mk 21 type tail.

Mark

(Cough) I do have a model of one underway…part of a set of “extra-late Merlin” options with aft fuel tanks and other options that didn’t make it. I assumed that the big tailplanes would be required for use of the aft tanks without handling problems, but that because of the shorter nose the lateral stability would be OK with the Mk.14/18 tail. However, I don’t know how much of the big tailplane design was integral with the Spiteful tail so this entire backend may have come as a package. It seems that the concept of a Merlin Spitfire XX series just didn’t get as far as considering such matters and producing a concept drawing – Supermarine archive diggers please be on alert!

I wonder what that would have looked like, normal Merlin cowling and without the Spiteful tail?
Cees