Sydney Camm

sydney camm

thankyou all for the most interesting responses ,there are valid points for both men and their respective aircraft,most grateful for the comments,:cool:

Ah, a pointless argument over trivia… My fave. Some thoughts.

Certainly R J Mitchell was a better seaplane designer than Sidney Camm. 😉

Any aesthetic comments (‘ladylike’ :rolleyes: ) are both entirely subjective and thus essentially irrelevant to achievement.

Kev poses the question as to ‘why wasn’t the Hurricane developed’; it was – from a fabric wing, to Mk.II and IV, and then onto new types; Typhoon, Tempest, Fury and Sea Fury. Both the Spitfire and Hawker fighter family had their successes and failures, but both achieved points of unarguable excellence.

Simplistically, there’s no point where the Hurricane proved significantly superior to the contemporary Spitfires, and again, any enthusiast’s view overlooked the essential tenant of adequacy; both types were more than good enough for the jobs they did; minor ‘edges’ of one over the other are irrelevant, like preferring different brands of screwdrivers. However the Hurricane was ready to mass produce in the 1930s in a way the Spitfire simply wasn’t; in that way they did compliment each other. By the end of Hawker’s piston development, the Sea Fury, Supermarine’s efforts were simply outclassed.

We know what Mitchell ‘would have done’ – a minute’s googling show the next uncompleted Mitchell warplane, and it’s easy to extrapolate it’s strengths and weaknesses. Michell’s death threw 90% of the development work on the Spitfire onto the under-recognised Joe Smith team; where credit is rarely given, after blatherings of ‘genius’ over Mitchell.

Both Mitchell and Camm were unarguably great, great designers; but with flaws; Mitchell’s reputation rests on one superlative design and some other great achievements, Camm’s on a wider, solid if not spectacular portfolio.

Both their reputations stand well enough, neither was perfect or a failure.

They both had their moments of luck, and Camm was a better politician and IMHO, had a better grasp of mass-production requirements than Mitchell, and I personally believe (never having found evidence against it) that Mitchell was mainly lucky in the superb high speed handling effects of his famous Spitfire wing, while Camm was equally unlucky in the failure of the Typhoon’s wing.

Cheers

Certainly Camm was a brilliant designer.

But I offer a thought regarding Mitchell and Supermarine. None of the successor designs to the Spitfire were as good. Granted that the Attacker was really in the experimental period of jet design but the later designs from Vickers/Supermarine were not world beaters.

Now does that mean that if Mitchell had lived there would have been better designs produced or does it mean that the Spitfire was that rarity a one off piece of serendipity? It is hard to say because Joe Smith was no slouch and it was he who oversaw the Spitfire’s constant metamorphosis.

Also if we look at Mitchell’s designs prior to the Spitfire, they were either large competent flying boats or one-off no hold’s barred racers. The gull-winged monoplane fighter he designed was not successful or even capable of meeting the spec.

But as Mitchell did not live it is impossible to forecast the result. Camm however most certainly has the runs on the board.

had rj mitchell not passed away before the spitfire gained famethe myth would not have followed the aircraft ,primarily more hurricanes flew in the battle of britain than spits, hurricanes were much more robust and could be serviced in field as opposed to the spit which needed hanger space,take away the epelleptic wing and both aircraft are very similar in profile,the hurricane solid and powerful in presentation ,whereas the spitfire has a ladylike quality not suited to warfare:cool: 😎 😎

What utter rubbish! You are saying that the Spitfire was only famous because of the death of the designer? How was the fame of the Spitfire a myth?

Granted, more Hurricanes flew in the Battle of Britain but they complimented each other. The Battle would have been lost without the combination of the two. Hangar space? There’s plenty of documentary evidence of both Spitfires and Hurricanes being serviced in the field. Malta is one good example.

The elliptical, rather than the ‘epelleptic’, wing shape, was just one of many differences. But, if as you contend, the Spitfire had a ladylike quality not suited to warfare how do you reconcile the differences in the numbers of each type built? 14,000 hurricanes compared to 20,000 Spitfires? Or the fact that the Spitfire was capable of such a range of development from the Mk 1 right through to the FR47? Why was the Hurricane not developed in such a manner?

Regards,

kev35

You have over looked a few points hav’nt you.
Firstly, the Spit was the most aesthetic single engined fighter ever designed &
secondly the Spit lived longer than any of the above & to my knowledge gave more service than any single Hawker type.

But this argument will last even longer than the Spitfire. Q.E.D.

Cheers TASSE.

had rj mitchell not passed away before the spitfire gained famethe myth would not have followed the aircraft ,primarily more hurricanes flew in the battle of britain than spits, hurricanes were much more robust and could be serviced in field as opposed to the spit which needed hanger space,take away the epelleptic wing and both aircraft are very similar in profile,the hurricane solid and powerful in presentation ,whereas the spitfire has a ladylike quality not suited to warfare:cool: 😎 😎

Some would argue that the Hawker Hunter by being effectively still in (limited) military service in the U.K has eclipsed the length of service of the Spitfire . I would also say that the Hunter F.6 is possibly the best looking fighter of all time – but I am a little biased!

he was the finest aircraft designer this country ever produced just look at the hurricane, typhoon and tempest ,spitfire totally outclassed ! anyone disagree !:cool: 😎 😎 😎

You have over looked a few points hav’nt you.
Firstly, the Spit was the most aesthetic single engined fighter ever designed &
secondly the Spit lived longer than any of the above & to my knowledge gave more service than any single Hawker type.

But this argument will last even longer than the Spitfire. Q.E.D.

Cheers TASSE.

Sydney Camm was certainly a visionary designer and created some excellant aircraft that were (un-justifiably) over shadowed by one design.

You should also include the Kestrel (later Harrier) as Camm had major influence in that before he died and that design still serves today and of course the Hunter.

But what could have Mitchell came up with had he lived?

curlyboy