Today the Spitfire seems like a simple aeroplane but even by today’s standards, it was a complicated and sophisticated killing machine, one of the most advanced planes in its day. We went to a present day factory which build, maintain and restore vintage aeroplanes and we were lucky to find a Spitfire under construction. These are highly skilled engineers and craftsmen who build these aeroplanes by hand, just as they would have been built in their day. The workforce in the Secret Factories always get referred to as “unskilled” workers and after seeing the amount of craftsmanship required to build a Spitfire, we hope they will never be referred to as “unskilled”. In this clip, one of the chief engineers showed us how a fuselage is built and told us the importance of the huge yellow jigs that dwarf the Spitfires within them. To put it simply; if the jig was not used, the Spitfire would be flying around like a banana!

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