Why the Spitfire had an Elliptical Wing

[gabor]

If there was anyone whom I didn't expect "vortice" from, it's you.

[sometimesleela]

This shorts series is awesome! By 2037 I'll know almost every cool spitfire feature without actually having to go through the horror of watching a full video.

[waynetaylor]

The spitfire is the most beautiful plane.... I have every set my eyes to see....!!
Majestic... sleek lines... basically poetry in motion.

[UnbarablePain]

Craxy how complex we can make wings today but back then there was a real debate on choosing an inferior wing design to save some money.

[grrlpurpleable]

You forgot to add... the elliptical wing is also incredibly beautiful :)

[captainaxle]

It was for maneuverability. The wing tip not affected by the entire wing. P47 thunderbolt had elliptical wing also

[gregbailey]

One "vortice" is called a 'vortex'!

[zoepentaleri]

"this creates a vortice at the wingtip"

A vortex. This is my biggest grammar pet peeve — vortex singular becomes vortices plural, there's no "vortice."

[Daniel-fziz]

You are right about the elliptical lift distribution - but you can also achieve that with other wing shapes, as the curvature and geometry of the wing does not need to be constant and can be adapted to achieve the same result.

[crazypilot]

Then after the Spitfire, some crazy Brit thought it would be a great idea to put a Merlin engine in a Mustang….😎

[Etx-z]

An interesting fact about the spitfire I found:

During the invasion of Normandy, when supplies got scarce, pilots decided to drop "Beer Bombs" (Which were cleaned fuel tanks filled with beer) for the troops on the ground.

Source: War History Online (website)

Edit:May have gotten some info wrong, sorry bout that.

[jeffreyoneill]

Thank you, I always wondered why the most beautiful wing was the best.

[JakeRobb]

“This creates a vortice…”

No. The word is vortex. The plural is vortices. You can’t just take off the S.

[bierce]

The aerodynamic advantage was s happy accident. The number of guns specified wouldn't fit in the intended straight taper, so the bulge was smoothed to the ellipse. And it has more induced drag than the laminar flow straight taper Mustang wing.

[machinemaker]

The downside of the elliptical wing is that the entire wing will enter stall at the same time. Normally the root stalls first, reducing lift, while the tips continue to function, providing "steering." This is useful for landing.

[Dave-dm]

The elliptical wing also allowed a thinner section aerofoil further improving aerodynamic efficiency.
Early Spits had eight 0.303
machine guns. Later models had four 20mm cannons with tear-drop blisters to cover the gun breeches. The wing was too thin to bury the bigger guns without bulges.

[xaxaszaposznikow]

WX-F marks shown on the footage were used by 302 fighter squadron, polish armed forces. They too, as the famous 303 sqn, fought during the Battle of Britain, althought on the time on Hawker Hurricane. Because of remote base, they only fought on one day of Battle, 15th of September 1940 if I remember correctly. Thank you for the explanation and choice of this particular Spitfire to show. I think the footage was taken on 1943, and Mk IX is shown.

[davidoneill]

Reginald Mitchell was a master aircraft designer and a true hero and patriot in every sense of the word.

[silentblackhole]

How they did this in the 1930s without digital computers amazes me!

[jeffi]

There were three of the most absolutely beautiful airplanes ever created during World War Two, the Spitfire Corsair and the P-51 Mustang. Just an old man’s opinion.