Stability and Control characteristics of the Early Mark Spitfires

[NZtyphoon]

Originally Posted by CaptainDoggles

Point it out, then. The only questions I've ignored are the silly ones that have no bearing on the matter, like did 1930's Britain have a stability standard.

As I have pointed out before Crumpp made this an integral part of his claims about the Spitfire control characteristics - that Britain's aircraft manufacturers did not have a design standard for stability and control, therefore they designed bad characteristics into aircraft such as the Spitfire and got away with it because, unlike the mighty Yanks and Germans, they were not "obligated" to correct such things; this type of claim deserves to be challenged because it shows an incomprehensible lack of knowledge from someone who claims to be an expert in aeronautical engineering! Blame Crumpp for introducing the subject in his first posting.

[CaptainDoggles]

Originally Posted by NZtyphoon

As I have pointed out before Crumpp made this an integral part of his claims about the Spitfire control characteristics - that Britain's aircraft manufacturers did not have a design standard for stability and control, therefore they designed bad characteristics into aircraft such as the Spitfire and got away with it because, unlike the mighty Yanks and Germans, they were not "obligated" to correct such things; this type of claim deserves to be challenged because it shows an incomprehensible lack of knowledge from someone who claims to be an expert in aeronautical engineering! Blame Crumpp for introducing the subject in his first posting.

Why does it matter, though? Historical trivia does not an engineer make. You can't prove someone isn't an engineer because they haven't heard of Somebody Lanchester.

I'm an engineer and I've never heard of him before this thread.

And lastly, not that I really care, but if Britain had a unified standard in the 30s, then why is there a document from 1947 talking about developing one for the first time? I'm sure that the individual manufacturers did indeed have their own standards, but that's not being disputed.

[NZtyphoon]

Originally Posted by CaptainDoggles

Why does it matter, though? Historical trivia does not an engineer make. You can't prove someone isn't an engineer because they haven't heard of Somebody Lanchester.

If Crumpp wishes to make definitive statements and claims, based on a very small amount of evidence there's no reason they cannot be challenged.

Originally Posted by CaptainDoggles

And lastly, not that I really care, but if Britain had a unified standard in the 30s, then why is there a document from 1947 talking about developing one for the first time? I'm sure that the individual manufacturers did indeed have their own standards, but that's not being disputed.

If not for you convenience then I'll answer for others - if you bothered reading the 1938 doco you'll see that aeronautical development had outstripped the standards of the time, from biplane to monoplane, such that the RAE and Air Min were working with the aircraft industry to promulgate better standards. Now, what happened during WW2? Jet aircraft, high speed prop driven aircraft approaching the speed of sound etc etc so now a new set of standards had to be developed and introduced; basically aeronautics and aeronautical engineering were changing extremely quickly from the early to mid 1930s on, so I don't believe that it was possible for even NACA to devise and stick to a definitive set of "standards" in the way Crumpp claims. Think about it - how was it possible to use the same stability and control standards for a 150 mph biplane fighter as for a 450 mph monoplane?