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I don't do models like Golden Bear does (See the UPDATE IV thread) but when I get chance to visit museums or air displays I take pictures when I can.

Here are a couple of Spitfire pictures which I took at RAF Duxford last year. First one is a Mk V if I'm right.

...and a couple of Spitfires together. The furthest looks like a Mk IX or XVI (a IX with an American-built engine), the nearest is one of the Griffin-engined monsters that appeared towards the end of the war and after. Not sure exactly which sort.

If you have some of your own, post 'em here...

Nice, show more if you got em

I've got lots from the Warbirds show last year. Looks like the same planes that flew then Howard. Were you there? I will try to post some later on. I think you will like them [:)]

Here is a very rare survivor, an Me 410 at the RAF Museum at Cosford. Developed from the unsuccessful Me 210 it was used in a number of roles from bomber interception to reconnaissance. What struck me most about the Cosford example was the crude construction, with especially large gaps round the panels under the nose. This could be due to the dire conditions under which late-war German aircraft were built, or it could simply be that the parts have been rolling round the floor of various museums before being assembled for display.

RAF Cosford has a large number of interesting aircraft but they are often jammed in together, so taking pictures from different angles can be quite difficult.

Note how the rear canopy bulges outwards at the sides to give an optically flat panel for the gunner to aim through. He used a sight inside the cockpit to control the machineguns in the barrettes on the sides of the fuselage in the same way as B-29 gunners did. I have not seen it stated anywhere but presumably this was to allow the canopy to be more streamlined.

RIAT (Fairford) this year. RAF Battle of Britain Memorial Flight, Lanc, Spit and Hurri.

And again.

And finally the big boy's close up

Here’s a P-51D at RAF Hendon in London, a free museum and well worth visiting if you are in the UK. It sits on a plinth which slowly rotates. Like a lot of museum aircraft I think it is over-polished and in use would have been considerably less shiny. The small black opening at the front of the wing root is the gun camera port, and the text beneath the kill markings describes it as a 'US Army P-51D-5-XA'. It was flown by Captain Donald R. Emerson, hence the nose art.

Well, when you had the time, you did wax and polish the planes, to make them smoother and slicker

was just reading about JG 301, how they were just stood down after rearming with 190s

the blackmen, had time to polish and putty the planes (they claim doing so, when they had the time could add up to 40 MPH to the top speed of the plane, the seams you mention above)

of course, next mission, they lost 40 pilots in combat

It's a familiar story - one of the most (in)famous cases of poor workmanship was of course the LaGG-3 - over 370mph in prototype form, but with production models poor finish and fitting cost it a good 25mph.  Poor training and flying with open cockpits because the operspex of hte hood was too opaque to see through cost another 10-15mph.  Fitting actual combat equipment and armour didn't help either......

But with all the reported problems of the type it was kept in manufacture until 1944 with almost 7000 built so I believe the reports might not have been completely typical of the type!

Aircraft were certainly polished, but I think that the degree of polish museum staff can achieve in an air-conditioned, enclosed hall on an unused aircraft devoid of petrol, oil and lubricants is going to be much greater than that which was often possible in the field. Looking through my copy of Freeman's The Mighty Eighth in Colour there are plenty of aircraft with a bit of a shine, but few as polished as you sometimes see in museums.

All of which is just an excuse to show a picture of a very shiny Spitfire XVI of course. This one is at RAF Cosford. The Spitfire XVI has basically a IX with an Packard Merlin 266, which at deliver 1,630 HP at 16,500 feet, ideal for the low-medium role it was intended for. Note the late wing type with the cannon outboard. The blanked off gun port just inside it was for a 0.5" Browning. Most of the pictures I have of Spitfire XVIs show them with bubble canopies.

Spitfire XVI picture...

This is Me 262-1a, W.Nr. 221272, originally coded ‘Red 2’ and possibly from III.EJG 2.

The fuselage of the Me 262 was wide in cross-section due to the need to retract the wheels into it – the heavy weight of the two engines required large tyres so retracting them into the wing was not possible.

The text on the nose wheel door is a warning against towing the aircraft by the nose wheel, which was weak and a constant source of accidents in the Me 262. The Germans used a special towing harness to move Me 262s around on the ground

These were sent to me by an ebay customer. They are the Spitfire and Hurricane that flew to Malta for the "Merlins over Malta" event last year. The photographs appear to have been taken from the walls of Valetta.

And another

And another

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