100 MPH Faster Than Anything… in 1929?!

Added: 2026-05-09

[00:00:04]Good afternoon. Welcome to Solent Sky Museum. My name's Steve Wall Crop.

[00:00:09]And I'd like to explain about the couple of the exhibits we have in this wonderful museum.

[00:00:14]My favorite aircraft out of the 18 we have here is this beauty, the Supermarine S6 from 1929.

[00:00:23]It was the fastest thing in the world by at least 100 miles an hour in 1929 when the sister aircraft, identical aircraft to this, won the Schneider Trophy for Great Britain.

[00:00:37]Schneider Trophy being a contest devised by Jacques Schneider, the heir to an armaments firm, to make marine aircraft safer.

[00:00:48]And [snorts] also, his idea was that marine aircraft were the way forward for civil aircraft across the world. So, this girl we've got everything hand-built just at the back of the museum over the bridge in what was the Supermarine factory.

[00:01:05]And the engine is the Rolls-Royce R racing engine devised at the same time, 2,000 horsepower.

[00:01:15]It is art deco with wings as I'm often told I'm saying.

[00:01:20]With everything is form and function.

[00:01:22]The radiators are evaporative cooling in the wings.

[00:01:26]The fuel is in the center of the struts pumped through the front struts to the engine.

[00:01:33]And the ribbing you can see on the side takes the oil from the oil tank in the fin up one side through the engine red hot oil down the ribbing on the other side.

[00:01:46]The whole idea was to make the aircraft >> [music] >> win the competition. It was literally it's just got to do this.

[00:01:55]Seven laps, each one probably 150 miles at the time in 1929.

[00:02:02]And that's what the aircraft did.

[00:02:04]Now, some people have got the misnomer that this is the grandfather of the Supermarine Spitfire.

[00:02:12]It's not.

[00:02:13]And because it's a seaplane, or if you like a floatplane, Reginald Mitchell and his team only designed for land planes.

[00:02:22]But they designed 26 floatplanes.

[00:02:26]So, from this, some of the ideas went into the iconic Spitfire.

[00:02:32]Although there was an intermediate airplane called the Type 224 as a fighter, but it failed on every level for the government requirements, time to height, maximum speed, etc. Mainly because it used evaporative cooling, which frankly wasn't practical for a fighter.

[00:02:50]And it used the Rolls-Royce Goshawk engine, which didn't have the power output.

[00:02:56]Now, Mitchell wasn't happy with this.

[00:02:58]So, he said to the chair of Supermarine, "Would you back me if I do my own design with my team?" And he said, "Yes."

[00:03:08]And he went to Rolls-Royce and said to to Henry Royce, "I'm going to redesign a fighter.

[00:03:15]Have you got an engine other than the racing engine in mind?" And Sir Henry Royce said, "Yes, we've got this private venture 12, a V12 engine like the racing engine, but far more robust." And that engine became the Merlin.

[00:03:33]So, the first Spitfire flew 90 years ago this year, 5th of March, 1936.

[00:03:40]We don't have that prototype. In fact, the prototype was finally destroyed in the crash the day after war broke out, 4th of September, 1939.

[00:03:50]But we do have a couple of parts from the original prototype.

[00:03:54]The Spitfire we have in the museum is this beauty.

[00:03:58]It's one of the very last ones made, an F24, or if you like Mark 24.

[00:04:04]Completely different to what you might consider the Spitfire to be as in the Battle of Britain Spitfire.

[00:04:11]Because instead of weighing 3 tons, this is 5 tons.

[00:04:15]It's 100 miles an hour faster. The engine, the Griffin engine, which actually did develop from the Rolls-Royce R racing engine.

[00:04:25]The Griffin engine pushes out 2,000 horsepower as opposed to the Battle of Britain version that was 1,030 horsepower in the Merlin, which is one here.

[00:04:38]Five-blade propeller so that you can actually absorb and use the power of the aircraft. Four 20 mm cannon.

[00:04:49]A laminar flow wing, a lot thinner than say a Battle of Britain Spitfire.

[00:04:54]And wonderful.

[00:04:56]But this was built in 1946, by which time two jet fighters were in service with the Royal Air Force.

[00:05:04]Firstly, the Meteor that came into service in 1944.

[00:05:08]And secondly, the Vampire that came in in 1946. The Meteor broke the speed record in 1946 twice, 606 miles an hour first of all, then 616.

[00:05:21]So, 150 miles an hour faster than this Spitfire.

[00:05:27]And in fact, this wasn't the last incarnation of a piston engine fighter Supermarine produced. Because they also produced with even thinner laminar flow wing, the Supermarine Spiteful, and the naval version, the Supermarine Seafang.

[00:05:44]So, this is one of the very last batch made. So, in all of the Mark F24s, there were 80 made, including 27 conversions from the Mark 22.

[00:05:57]Difference being re-stressed wings to carry rockets or bombs, because this served in Malaya.

[00:06:04]And the other thing was an extra long-range fuel tank at the back of the Spitfire.

[00:06:11]That's back of the pilot's seat for the Spitfire.

[00:06:14]Otherwise, it's the same as the 22.

[00:06:18]So, the very last Spitfires in operational service, this served in Malaya.

[00:06:24]But the very last Spitfire flights in operational RAF service was on 1st of April, 1954.

[00:06:36]And that was in Hong Kong.

[00:06:38]So, the anniversary is today.

[00:06:41]A long time ago.

[00:06:43]But it's an iconic airplane.

[00:06:46]Unfortunately, the Hurricane doesn't get the credit it's due for the Battle of Britain.

[00:06:51]There were twice as many Hurricanes who shot down twice as many aircraft.

[00:06:55]But just about everybody comes in the museum from all over the world recognizes a [music] Spitfire.