Last of an Elegant Line

The Seafire Mk 47

The final version of the Seafire was the Seafire F Mk 47/FR Mk 47. There was no true prototype; instead, the first-production PS944 and PS945 served as trial aircraft. As the “definitive” carrier-based Seafire, the Mk 47 incorporated several refinements over earlier variants. After the first four aircraft, which had manually folded wings, the Mk 47 incorporated hydraulically powered wing folding (the outer wings folding upward in one piece), without the folding wingtips of earlier marks. All Mk 47s adopted the Rotol contra-rotating propellers for their 2,375hp Rolls-Royce Griffon 85 engines. The Mk 47 also featured a long supercharger air duct, the intake of which started just behind the spinner, and a modified curved windscreen, similar to that used on the Mk XVII. Other features unique to the Mk 47 were spring-loaded elevator tabs, a large inertia weight in the elevator-control system, and beading on the trailing edges of the elevators. These changes improved longitudinal stability, especially when the aircraft was fully loaded. The modified windscreen proved to be unpopular with pilots because of continual problems with misting, and the thicker, repositioned frames obstructed visibility during deck landings. In spite of recommendations to change the windscreen back to a standard Spitfire 24 unit, this was never done. Performance tests showed that the Mk 47 was slightly slower than the Mk 46 in maximum and climbing speeds, mainly due to the long supercharger air intake, which was less efficient than the shorter type fitted to earlier Seafires. The Seafire Mk 47 saw action with the 800 Naval Air Squadron onboard HMS Triumph during the Malayan Emergency of 1949 and during the Korean War in 1950. In 1951, however, all Seafires were withdrawn from front-line service. In all, 90 F Mk 47/FR Mk 47s were built, all by Supermarine. VR971, the last aircraft of the entire Spitfire/Seafire lineage of 22,000, left the Supermarine production line on January 28, 1949.

The sole flying example of the Seafire FR Mk 47 was restored for Jim Smith of Crystal Lake, Montana, by Nelson Ezell of Ezell Aviation in Breckenridge, Texas. The elusive propeller assembly came off a Shackleton.

The introduction of the bubble canopy didn’t happen all at once but was scattered throughout the lineage, making it difficult to identify a specific Mk by its canopy.

The massive power of the Griffon resulted in increased torque/p-factor and higher speeds, which demanded increasingly larger tail surfaces. The counter-rotating propellers negated the propeller effects but high-speed stability still required large surfaces.