Spitfire MkI, No.19 Sqn RAF, October 1938

Spitfire MkI, No.19 Sqn, Royal Air Force, Duxford, Autumn 1938

The first operational RAF Spitfire was K9787 which arrived at Duxford airfield on 4th August 1938, followed by K9792 on 16th. 19 Squadron was tasked with getting up to 400 hours as quickly as possible onto these two airframes, in order to test the Spitfire's long-term serviceability. Other than some trouble caused by weak undercarriage legs, there was very little to report, other than a number of cases of a phenomenon called "Spitfire knuckle" - sometimes severely grazed on the inside of the fuselage while pumping the undercarriage up!

These initial batches of Spitfires were finished on the uppersurfaces in the Temperate Land Scheme of Dark Earth and Dark Green, with Aluminium undersides. (It is worth noting that in the RAF, aircraft are systematically painted with Aluminium paint rather than left natural metal.) Unfortunately the SF game engine does not allow for specular layers, and so the undersides appear simply pale grey. The Type A1 roundels were soon replaced by more sombre blue-and-red B Types. Finally, the figure '19' in flight colours on the tailfin was applied only briefly, possibly only for a series of air-to-air photographs taken on 31st October 1938. Underwing serials were carried in the normal way.

Serial numbers given in the menu list correspond to aircraft used by 19 Squadron during late 1938 and early 1939. Where a pilot has been identified as having flown a particular aircraft (The Royal Air Force did not attribute aircraft to particular pilots, although many did tend to have their favourites) that pilot has been listed in the menu.

For use ONLY with SF2 including the Israel Expansion Pack. This will NOT work if you do not have the stock TW Spitfires installed and working.

Includes 2048 and 1024 size skin sheets and new loading screen sounds.

Credits:

Model by Third Wire

Flight Dynamics by ShrikeHawk based on TW Spitfire MkIXc

Cockpit by Kesselbrut

Skin, decals, data.ini modifications, formations, sounds and assembly by ndicki

Guns by AvHistory