Spitfire ammo in dog fights
 

Hi

I was reading that the Spitfire (WW2) had about 17 seconds of firing its guns before the ammo ran out. If the pilots ammo ran out did he return to base to reload?

Yes, same way a tank, trooper or battleship returns to ammo dump to get more bang stuff

Interesting. I'm not a neat freak, but I shuddered a bit when the ammo dragged on the ground as they were stuffing it in. No wonder guns jammed.

Working link to the above video ...

Thank you all for replies, the pilots must have been in the sky for a very short time, taking into account the time to fly back to base, reload and back to the action.

Sorties could take a couple of hours, Spitfires ranged all over northern France on escort missions. They also conducted "Ranger" (squadron free lance sweeps) and Rhubarb (section freelance sweeps) into France. A good book to read is Wing Leader by Johnnie Johnson or The Big Show by Pierre Clostermann. They both go into details about these types of sorties.

from the Spitfire V inwards they were also armed with Cannon. Cannon was tries on the mark II during the battle of Britan but they proved unreliable so a lot of 11 group squadrons went back to 303s

In days of yore one could fly to Hendon for a dirty weekend in the Smoke. On the Vampire the 29mm ammo boxes were ideal small suitcases and were used for this purpose.

One Friday a box was filled with togs and given to the armourers to mount in the aircraft. A slight mistake ensued and they went into the wrong one.

Whilst one hero was turning onto the flag with a trail of cuff links and shirt collars streaming through the air our other hero was lugging a load of 20 ammo on the Underground.

Surely the point of military dits is that however unlikely they are at least credible. This one doesn't even begin to qualify. On any level.