Why some spits had their wing tips cliped?
The reason I’m asking, is because I’m about to start a new spit, and I wanted to bild it with normal wing tips. But the decal scheme I’m thinking of using is with cliped wings.
Could a Spit have normal wing tips and then had their tips cliped, or they came cliped as they were bilt?
The clipped wings on the Spitfires gave them a better role rate, something that could prove important when you had a Fw-190 on your tail.
Clipping the wings improved overall performance by reducing drag. As far as I know (and I may be wrong here) the Marks that had the clipped wings were all factory.
Happy New Year,
Bruce
I believe the clipped wing was intended for low level attack because of the better manoevrability. The full eliptical wing was an asset at high altitude to supply better lift and control in the thinner air.
the clipped wings were as already stated for increased roll rates and they could be modified in the field so the one you are building may have been built with normal tips. in the july 2003 Flypast mag there is a pic of a clip wing spitfire XI (serial no MK912) getting normal wingtips fitted for its delivery to its new owners in canada. hope this helps. Greg
Thanks guys.
And Greg that helped a lot. That was what I wanted to know. I’m gonna reserch a little more about this particular aircraft to check if I can make it with eliptical wing tips.[8D]
The cliped wing spits were also used for the V1 chasers as they had less drag/more speed chased them down faster.