Quote:
Originally Posted by Triggaaar
Which bit are you questioning? There's plenty of documentation as to why is went fro mk V to mk IX, missing the more advanced mk VIII etc, and the mk IX would not have been made if not for the 190.
But if, I expect, you're suggesting that they simply made the planes as good as they could regardless, well on the face of it you'd think so, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Developing a newly improved model takes time, effort, money etc, that could be used to make more of an existing model.
The objective is not to have the best fighter, the objective is to win the war. If your planes are inferior and being shot down, and you're losing, you make your plane better - no excuses acceptable, no price too high. If your planes are inferior but you're winning, while your opponent is struggling to keep supplying their 'superior' plane, your decision is not so easy.
I'm not taking anything away from the D9, it's just my opinion that you need to compare planes that were flying against each other in numbers. As posted above, there were a good number of D9s made, although I don't know how many flew and in what capacity (as some covered Me 262s etc). Has anyone got links to the performance of the D9 vs the Spit XIV? And if the war had continued the D9 would have been up against the Sea Fury - but it wasn't, so we don't look at how good the Sea Fury was. But as we know, there were other nations with great planes too.
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I'm not questioning the SpitIX's birth. Simply I think that engineering industry (engines, materials ect) always works for improvements and of course during wartime the improvements are researched very quickly (with problems of durability and safety, like you say the matter is to win the war).
Why did the DB use the fuel injection? Why was the Me262 drawn up in 1939? The war was almost ended but P51Hs, P47Ms, P80s were to be used by the Air Force: weren't the P51Ds and P47Ds enough to win the war?