No Spitfires In Burma After All 102
FBeans writes "In a story at the end of last year, it was reported that up to 124 lost WWII Spitfires could be buried in Burma at various locations. A team sponsored by Wargaming.net and led by David Cundall, who says he witnessed one such burial of planes, have been investigating a site that was thought to have up to 36 planes buried in crates near the end of the war. However, based on the evidence they have obtained recently, it seems there are no Spitfires buried at this location, and no substantial evidence supporting any other location, possibly leading to the end of the hunt. Over 20,000 Spitfires were made between 1938 and 1948, at a cost of around £12,000 each. Cundall has spent 17 years of his life and around $200,000 hunting the Supermarine planes; presumably, the lack of evidence will not stop him from continuing to search."
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I think the main reason they flew Spitfires was that stuff like the P51 didn't actually exist until 4 years after the Spitfire first flew.
For example, a major reason why they didn't use P-51s during the Battle of Britain was that they hadn't been invented yet
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Which funnily enough is about right. The aircraft was a hack, a case of fix-what-we-have. The development history of the Spitfire is one of constant attempts to keep-up with the state-of-the-art as set by Germany and, to a lesser degree, the USA.
That's true of all designs that had been around when the war started. Messerschmitt Bf 109 was progressively souped up to the flaming hot rods that the G models were.
Constantly out-performed, out-manoeuvred and over-rated; the only reason the RAF continued to fly Spitfires is that there weren't enough Lend-Lease aircraft from the USA to meet demand.
Interestingly, the P-51 was designed to the British order, and first shipped to RAF. They found the early variants lacking, or at least not providing enough added value above Spitfires.
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For example, a major reason why they didn't use P-51s during the Battle of Britain was that they hadn't been invented yet
"...continued to fly Spitfires..."
Once P-51s were available the Spitfire was obsolete. But they still needed aircraft.
You should realize when the P-51 was developed it was a MAJOR flop. The United States recognized it as failure as a fighter(due to its bad engine design) and the design was slated for ground support only! The British ordered some under the lend-lease but insisted they be altered to accept the spitfire engine (R.R. Merlin) it was with the English engine that the P51 became a fighter at all and it NEVER rendered the spitfire "obsolete" as like most every aircraft in the war the Spitfire was continuously upgraded with various marks and variants and thus remained a frontline fighter in the U.K throughout the war (and even after). While the P51 had extended range due to its new laminar wing design. In a dogfight between the two with all other things equal the spitfire proved more than a match, as evidenced by tests conducted at the time.
P.S. the scoop under the fuselage is NOT for cooling the engine it is in fact, the engine air intake. The Merlin is liquid cooled and the scoop(s) under the wing(s) are for the radiators...