The Wren Type 8 - the Laminar Flow Wing Spitfire Prototype

[Leading Observer]

The Wren Type VIII - The Improved Spitfire/Seafire Project

In 1942, to improve the roll characteristics of the Spitfire, the British Air Ministry asked Vickers-Supermarine to devise a new wing for the Spitfire, and to incorporate a laminar flow wing section in the new design. By November that year, the company's chief designer, Joseph Smith, was working on the new wing, which would ultimately lead to the design for the Spiteful, Seafang and Attacker aircraft.
It was decided, because of the pressures on Supermarine in the of building and improving of the existing Spitfire design, that the contract for a proof of concept prototype would be given to the Wren Aircraft Company, who had the both capacity to design and build one-off aircraft at the behest of the larger aircraft manufacturers, and a proven track record in doing so.
At the beginning of 1943, Wren were supplied by the Ministry of Supply with a surplus Spitfire Vc, along with Joseph Smiths design blueprints for the new wing and given a free hand to design and build a laminar flow winged Spitfire, using the supplied Spitfire Vc as a starting point and would be known as the Type 8 within the company.
Whilst work commenced immediately, because it was being done alongside the development of Wren's own Type 6 fighter, and because the company only had a small design team, and its workforce were largely involved in repair work on damaged aircraft, it progressed somewhat slower than the Ministry would have liked, and by the end of the 1943 only the Spitfires wings had been removed and put into storage hanger at the Wren factory, and the rest of stripped down to its bare bones in a small hanger, and work started on constructing the new wings.
Whilst the new wings were being built, John Wren and Harry Mason, the heads of Wren's design team, decided that the existing coolant radiator and oil cooler should be relocated, the oil cooler going into a modified Volkes filter fairing under the nose, and the radiator to a location underneath the fuselage, akin to the one being fitted on their own Type 6. The undercarriage was placed outboard on the new wings, retracting in towards the centreline, which would improve the landing characteristics of the design, especially if a Seafire variant was to be developed from the design.
With the wings finished and all the modifications completed, the aircraft was re-assembled, repainted and ready to be wheeled out of the hanger on the morning of February 6th 1944. The mild weather in early February allowed the company to run some ground runs, which highlighted a few minor problems with the cooling system, which were soon rectified. However the winter arrived with a vengeance and freezing weather and heavy snow put a halt to any further work.
Once the weather improved, the first flight took place without incident, and after further trials, a favourable report on the performance of the new wing was sent to the design team at Supermarine, who commenced work on their own design, which emerged in due course as the Spiteful/Seafang.
The ultimate fate of the Type 7 is unknown, but it is believed that it was scrapped at the end of the war.




 

[NARSES2]

Neat little project   

[royabulgaf]

Great!  I love the backstory.  Just out of curiosity it looks like you used the PM fuselage?  Maybe it's due to the beefed up Vokes filter and ventral radiator.

[royabulgaf]

Ah.  I hadn't reached your later post yet. 

[Leading Observer]

Great!  I love the backstory.  Just out of curiosity it looks like you used the PM fuselage?  Maybe it's due to the beefed up Vokes filter and ventral radiator.

It was the PM Spitfire fuselage that I used