Supermarine Spitfire Mk VIII

On paper the Mk VIII was the Spitfire the RAF wanted for 1943: all the Mk VII engineering — re-stressed fuselage, shortened ailerons, torque-linked undercarriage and retractable tailwheel, enlarged tanks — without the weight and complication of pressurisation, plus a reshaped fin and pointed rudder. Timing defeated it. The Mk IX, an improvisation built on Mk Vc airframes to answer the Focke-Wulf Fw 190, proved good enough that Castle Bromwich was given over to it entirely, leaving the Mk VIII to Supermarine's own lines.

Three sub-variants covered the altitude bands: LF Mk VIII on the Merlin 66, F Mk VIII on the Merlin 63 and HF Mk VIII on the Merlin 70. The F managed 657 km/h at 25,000 ft and the HF 669 km/h at 26,500 ft. A few early aircraft had extended wingtips but most used the standard ones; Supermarine's chief test pilot Jeffrey Quill said the best Spitfire to fly was "the Mark VIII with standard wingtips" and loathed the extended tips for spoiling aileron response. Range was its strong suit: 96 gal in the main tanks plus the wing tanks gave 1,060 km, a 90 gal slipper tank stretched that to 1,900 km and a 170 gal tank to more than 2,400 km, though so loaded the aircraft was restricted to straight and level flight. Up to 1,000 lb of bombs could be carried.

One Mk VIII, JF299, tested the cut-back rear fuselage and teardrop canopy intended to remove the blind spot from which so many pilots were shot down. Trials showed a large gain in all-round visibility and, with modifications, the arrangement was standardised on later Spitfires including the last Mk IXs and Mk XVIs.

The Mk VIII served almost entirely outside Europe: with the Desert Air Force and the USAAF in the Mediterranean, with the RAAF and the RAF in the South West Pacific and in South-East Asia. With 1,658 built it was the third most numerous operational variant after the Mk IX and the Mk V, and arguably the best balanced of all the Merlin Spitfires.