I’ll put this here so it doesn’t detract from any other thread and because it must only attract limited interest. However there are some who may find this link interesting but not want to start arguing the toss that only they can be right. This is a long, hour and a half nearly, lecture to the Institute of Mechanical Engineers which sheds some new light from original sources on the subject. It perhaps debunks some long held opinions in various countries about the de/merits of others’ reputations, attributes and failings. It is technical but not overly so, and is aimed at those who have passing interest as well as serious engineers. There is a long pause towards the start and it is probably better suited for those who are bored at the weekend.
A very interesting lecture.
It seems to confirm to start with my view that the Merlin was an over small capacity for its known opposition from the outset.
If the Schneider contenders were supposedly Mitchell’s reference point, combined with RR’s own designers rightly questioning the Merlin’s small capacity ?, then surely the Griffon should have been the default option from the start and the Merlin design set aside not vice versa.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolls-Royce_Griffon
I also liked the acknowledgement that British engineering has always been unfairly and unjustly compared with that of German.
We were well on terms with Germany in terms of piston powered aircraft.Especially the Griffon and later also the Napier Sabre.
It was only the strange choice to go with the Merlin and the Hurrricane instead of standardising Hawker’s and Supermarine/Vickers’ production on the Griffon powered Spit at the outset which arguably lost the battle of France and almost the Battle of Britain.Added to the choice of .303 armament when they knew that the Spitfire wing design could actually take cannons and .50 cal guns.
By implication that also would have meant the Mustang would have been Griffon powered not Merlin.Which air racers did later after the war.
Luckily conversely the Germans didn’t standardise on Jumo powered FW190 design and sooner.The DB being inferior to the Jumo like the Merlin v Griffon and Sabre and the FW being the superior aircraft than the 109 to put it in.
The Griffon Spit, Tempest and FW190D9 being the ultimate WW2 designs.
The axial flow jet v centrifugal was another matter.The exception proving the rule that we’d gone down a blind alley in that regard with the lame Meteor’s predictably shocking performance in Korea.
vintageaviationecho.com/voodoo-speed-record/
thisdayinaviation.com/14-august-1979
historyofwar.org/articles/we … mkXIV.html
spitfireperformance.com/spitfire-XIV.html
theaviationgeekclub.com/here … pe/amp/amp
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolls-Royce_R
I think Voodoo is the exception that proves the rule a good big un is better than a good little un there’s no substitute for cubic inches they’d got it right the first time. 
I have not got very far into the book yet which is a massive tome. It is written in clearly understandable languge however, although some of the illustrations of technical engineering drawings do need a magnifying glass to discover that the annotations are in German. What attracted me to it was that his lectures to the various Formula One engineering teams seem to have received rapt attention and praise. Likewise their realisation that these designers of 80+ years ago only had a slide rule to assist carrying out the calculations required.
but it has made me dig out this to read alongside it.
google.co.uk/books/edition/ … frontcover
On a similar note but referring to rocket science and NASA is the Film ‘Hidden Figures’.
cav551:
What attracted me to it was that his lectures to the various Formula One engineering teams seem to have received rapt attention and praise. Likewise their realisation that these designers of 80+ years ago only had a slide rule to assist carrying out the calculations required.
The bit I don’t get is how everyone including himself and even I think Lovesey in the day ? seems to have missed the point that a larger engine capaciy will deliver more output for less stress with the equivalent boost.Lovesey seeming to have jumped to the conclusion that it’s all about boost when boost will only get you so far before things go bang and/or cook.
Milch seems to have got close in his relisation that the Jumo 213 was superior to the DB 601 luckily for us he doesn’t seem to have made the link with its engine capacity.
A slide rule or even oiks wearing greasy jeans not white overalls who’s maths is less than CSE grade know that. 
I’m surprised that the lecture seems to have concentrated on the Merlin v DB in that regard while overlooking the Jumo and Griffon angle.
Luckily for us the Griffon project wasn’t totally shelved in 1939 and equally luckily for us Milch didn’t go through with the obvious nuclear option of stopping all DB and Me production and concentrating all his resources on just FW D9/Jumo only production which was the obvious solution to the DB’s and BMW 801’s short comings.
No surprise the metallurgy issues didn’t seem to hit the performance of the 213 as hard as the DB and the BMW when those shortages would have applied just the same to both firms.The Jumo 213 was arguably Germany’s finest piston engine of WW2 and the Griffon, not the Merlin, arguably ours.
Really can’t believe that the combined brains of RR and Supermarine didn’t reach the conclusion that it had to be a Griffon powered Spit and Hawker’s management didn’t ditch Hurricane production and get on board with Spitfire production ready for 1940.The war probably would have been over before 1941 in that case.
Conversely we were bleedin lucky that Milch and DB and BMW and Messerchmit management didn’t see what was staring them all in the face and do it a couple of years earlier at that.By concentrating all of their combined resources on FW and Jumo engine production and development. 
Edit to add it’s ironic that the P51 not the Griffon Spit was included in the horse power race title cover.
Also the Spit v 109 when FW190, especially D9, drivers viewed the Me as a flying Coffin and weren’t frightened to tell their superiors what they thought of it.The 109 was effectively obsolete when the 190 was introduced beyond doubt after the D9.
The F1 mindset of thinking relatively limited in terms of capacity seems to permeate the thinking in overlooking the fact that the horespower ( air superiority ) race was mostly dominated by the Griffon Spit, FW190 D9 and Tempest.
With the Merlin and DB relegated to being just also rans in that company.
Even the allied air command recognised that the P51 wasn’t an air superiority platform in the way that the Tempest and the Spit MkXIV were.
This is a great book written by a FW190 D9 driver.
It backs up Galland’s reference to the Spit ( obviously Mk XIV at that point bearing in mind the D9’s superiority over the Mk IX ) and to an extent the Tempest as being what they feared most with no fear of the T Bolt or the Mustang although the Mustang could obviously beat them by force of numbers.
I’m sure that this dogfight is also referred to by Heilmann in Alert in the West.