All language subtitles for Guy.Martins.Spitfire.2014.1080p.WEBRip.x265-RARBG

[Guy] Dead simple.

The plan is to try and build

the greatest Spitfire flying today.

[intense music playing]

[narrator] This is the inside story
of a mammoth project to resurrect

one of the nation’s favorite planes.

[Guy] I could say it's me and a few blokes
in a shed, but no, no, no, no.

It's a few blokes in an aircraft hanger
and I’m going to give a bit of a hand.

[narrator] Starting with a rusting wreck
dug out of a French beach,

the aim is to make the rarest Spitfire
of all, a MARK-1,

using nothing but authentic,
World War II designs,

materials and techniques.

This is going to be exactly as the MARK-1
was built 75 years ago, exactly!

[narrator] The original plane was
once flown by an RAF hero

whose forgotten tale
of daring-do involves Dunkirk,

Crash landings, Colditz,
and even the Queen.

[Veryan] Wow!

[narrator] But only
if an airworthy plane can be built,

will the original pilot’s daughters
finally witness

the tribute their father deserves.

[Guy] We’re not talking models
or anything, we’re not playing at it,

this is the real deal.

[dramatic music playing]

[narrator] The Spitfire is arguably
the most successful fighter design ever.

[Guy] Come on, come on lad,
keep up, keep up.

[narrator] Produced in greater numbers
than any other British combat plane,

it was introduced in 1938 and wasn’t taken
out of front line service until 1954.

[Guy chuckles] It's not very big, is it?

Eh? By eck!

[narrator] Its V12 engine made it faster
than anything else in the sky.

It could do 350 miles per hour.

It's elliptically shaped wings cut
through the air to make it

the best handling
and easiest-to-fly plane the RAF had.

It’s not hard to look at is it, eh?
Beautiful.

[narrator] This was the aircraft
that gave the country its finest hour,

victory in the battle of Britain,

when Germany was just two days away
from invading.

[engines revving]

[Guy] I mean, it is a bold statement,
isn’t it?

But if it weren’t for them,
we wouldn’t be here now

and I think it is right, isn't it?

Well, we might be eating Bratwurst!

[narrator] And yet it was only five months
earlier that the Spitfire

and the very plane Guy will attempt
to remake

had made its debut
in serious aerial combat.

It was the Dunkirk evacuation,
Operation Dynamo.

[dramatic music playing]

[narrator] By May, 1940, Germany had
successfully invaded most of Europe.

It relentlessly attacked
the remaining 300,000 allied troops

who had been cut off in northern France.

[Winston Churchill over recording]
We shall fight on the beaches,

we shall fight in the fields
and in the streets.

[bell ringing]

[narrator] Nineteen Squadron,
based at Duxford in Cambridgeshire,

had been first to take delivery
of the Spitfire.

It was tasked with defending
the troop evacuation.

[Winston Churchill] We shall fight
with growing confidence

and growing strength in the air.

[narrator] The commanding officer was
a very special pilot.

[Guy] Geoffrey Stephenson?
Yeah, legend.

He was trying to provide air cover
during-- during the mass evacuation.

As fighter pilots came, he was as good
as they got. Yeah, he was the man.

[narrator] Geoffrey Stephenson had flown
in an early version

of the Red Arrows aerobatic display team
before the war,

with the famous ace, Douglas Bader.

[Guy] We know what they named
Douglas Bader: "Tin Legs," yeah, Tin Legs.

[narrator] Thirty-year-old Stephenson’s
squadron was amongst the first

to reach the deadly skies above Dunkirk.

I’m sure if you was amongst that lot,
you would have just said

it was like the end of the world.
Armageddon.

[engine revving]

[Guy] Black smoke everywhere.

It was like raining planes.

Their planes have been shot down.

The anti-aircraft fire...

bombs.

Witnesses at the time say
it was just carnage...

[narrator] Nineteen Squadron quickly
proved the new Spitfire’s worth,

shooting down four Messerschmitt’s.

But soon after,
they were dramatically outnumbered.

In the ensuing dogfight,
two Spitfires were hit.

One of them was squadron leader
Stephenson’s.

[Guy] Took a bullet to the radiator,

he had to force land the Spitfire
on the beach we’re at now.

It would have been a bit messy.

[narrator] Drenched in boiling engine
coolant and with a cockpit full of steam,

Stephenson crash landed into the beach.
Somehow he survived.

Refusing to give himself over
to the Germans, he went on the run.

[Winston Churchill over recording]
We shall never surrender.

[narrator] Stephenson's plane.
Designation N3200,

became a toy for the Germans.

[Guy] Yeah, it was a trophy
to the Germans.

I’d have a few choice words for them boys.
Who had the last laugh, eh?

[narrator] Within a fortnight,
this prized British icon,

flown by a national hero,
had disappeared into the sand.

And it stayed there, left to rot.

[orchestral music plays]

[smooth music playing]

[narrator] But in 1986, the remains
were unearthed,

and eventually they came in the possession
of two anonymous collectors,

obsessed by originality.

They were determined to produce
a plane that was precisely

as Geoffrey Stephenson would have
flown it during the war,

so it could be displayed
in air shows around the country.

They sent the wreckage home
to the old Duxford base

Stephenson first flew it from.

Today, it houses a museum and the best
historic aviation engineers in the world.

We take pride in what we do
and they’re put together

properly with, with care and attention.

Even the bits you can’t see, that are
buried deep within the wing,

are done correctly.

[Terry] It’s a bit like restoring
fine artwork, I suppose.

You know it's totally,
completely handmade.

[Guy] It’s the ultimate.
You can get to work for a Formula 1 Team,

I’m not bothered. Are you bothered?
I wouldn’t be bothered.

Go on give me another.

[Guy] NASA, working with Americans,
I wouldn’t get on with Americans.

Who else, give me another job,
who else would be like--

-[Mo] Cern?
-Oh, Cern, Hadron Collider.

Yeah, but to be honest,
I don’t think I’m clever enough for that.

Getting to work on a Spitfire
with a Rolls Royce in it,

I mean that’s the ultimate,
you have made it, that’s it.

[projector rolling]

[narrator] As well as following
in the footsteps of the original workforce

who built the Spitfire,
using their exact same techniques…

Look at that! Like a glove, like a glove.

[narrator] ...Guy will learn about
the power of the Spitfire’s guns…

[Guy] I’m not much of a runner,
to be honest.

[narrator] ...the speed
of the ground crew...

[Guy] Right, where do you want me?

[narrator] ...learn from the people
that built

and flew the Spitfire originally.

[Peggy] It’s amazing what you can do
when the chips are down. It's amazing.

[Geoffrey] I don’t know what
we would've done without them.

Do you?

[narrator] ...Experience the flight
of his life,

which takes a surprising twist.

[narrator] And uncover
the extraordinary tale

of the original pilot,
Geoffrey Stephenson.

I feel very honored to work on one.
It's just...

This is a bit much,
I’m at a bit of a dither.

[quiet piano music playing]

[narrator] The two-year project begins
in spring, 2012.

[birds chirping]

Guy’s first day on the job begins
with the wrecked remains

of Stephenson’s plane.

[Guy] I would be the sort of person
that would have something like that

in me front room 'cause it tells
a story, doesn’t it?

But you’d say,
"What is the point in keeping this?"

But no, no, it’s just good for useful bits
of information.

How pipes was routed,
how bits of wiring was routed.

Look in here, look at all that
in there. Can you see?

Dig about and you can find name tags
on stuff. Look.

Here. Lamport. Lamport, look.
On the wiring.

There’s just loads.
Don’t fart near it, it’ll drop to bits!

Now, the first job we’re gonna do, we’re
gonna put these oil unions

down there, right? Put these here.
They could, they didn’t know,

they could have been either riveted in
or bolted in, but as you can see here.

These are bolted in, so ours will be
bolted in, as they should be.

[narrator] For the finished plane
to be truly authentic,

it will need a combination of refurbished
parts and new sections built

to original specifications.

We were able to extract a few bits
out of it but, um...

as for the actual air frame itself,
a new one was required

and the company on the Isle of Wight
has got the ability

to make that from scratch.

But they’re working from original drawings
just like, like we do here.

Go on, and what sort of money?

We’re looking about 200 to 250,000.

-You can see it though, can’t you, eh?
-[Mo] Includes the tail unit as well.

Oh, right, oh, yeah, 250 grand!
Bloody hell. Bloody hell!

[narrator] Guy, like the rest of the team,
will have to refer to the 75-year-old plan

retrieved from an RAF museum.

This is the old system diagram here.

-These?
-These are original drawings.

-[Guy] Bloody hell...
-[Mo] This shows the two unions

-which I’ve got here.
-[Guy] Yeah.

[narrator] The unions are joints
which connect pipes taking oil

from the engine to the oil cooler.

[Guy] First job, yeah,
working on a Spitfire.

[narrator] The first assembly jobs are
relatively straightforward

but still vital.

[Guy] I'm making a ruddy pig's ear
of this...

[narrator] If these joints aren’t fitted
securely, they’ll leak,

and if they leak, the engine could seize
in mid-air.

[Mo] As simple as any bit may seem
to fit, every bit is critical in the end.

If one bit fails then another bit may fail
and it, then you have trouble.

[Guy] And what do you reckon to the blokes
that would have been building

that back then?

They seem to have a different
skill set to what we have now.

You know, we have difficulty
in replicating them today.

[Guy] Is that right?

[narrator] Nearly half
the workforce was female.

Peggy Sugden started work
at a Wiltshire Spitfire factory in 1942.

We were pretty good at it, yeah,
very proud of myself actually.

You could do it almost blindfold, really.
We were that quick and so easy, really.

We had to work...

eight till eight, Monday to Friday,

eight till five, Saturdays,
and eight till four, Sundays,

and we just had the one week off in July.

Just one week.

That didn’t bother me. I loved it.
[stuttering] I never minded going to work.

[Guy] Back in early 40s,

you go into work knowing,

that the Germans wanna come over
and bomb you.

[cranking]

Eh? Not easy.
It's a bit pressure, isn't it?

I don’t think you just wouldn’t let
that get to you, would you?

You’d be very British about it.
You’d just get on with it.

Keep calm and carry on.
You’d have to be, wouldn’t ya?

Very British.

[Peggy] I knew that we might be bombed,

but it didn’t seem to bother me at all.
I had to-- I just loved it.

I loved every bit of it.

I loved the camaraderie. I loved it.
It was beautiful.

[narrator] As part of the latest
generation to work on a Spitfire,

Guy clearly has a lot to live up to.

[Guy] 'Course I’m up to the job, eh!

All right, I’m willing to learn, I’m not
going in there, I’m not going in there...

just try and you know, of course I can do
that, I’m holding me hands up

and saying, "Look, boys,
I’ve never worked on a plane before

and I’ve definitely never worked
on a Spitfire before."

You know, I need to point us
in the right direction,

but I’ll give it me all,
I’ll give it me best shot.

No question.
Definitely, 'course I can do it,

[intense music playing]

[narrator] Guy’s fitted
his first two parts,

but if this is truly to be
the greatest Spitfire ever made,

it still needs a quarter
of a million rivets...

[air pressuring]

...a rebuilt Rolls Royce engine,
fresh paint, new wings...

[Guy] Okay?

[narrator] ...real guns,
and a propeller worth six figures

before finding out if the whole thing
is good enough to fly.

-[dramatic music playing]
-[engine coughing]

[intense piano music playing]

[narrator] Guy Martin is helping
to build the nation’s favorite plane,

a MARK-1 Spitfire.

[engine revving]

This particular aircraft, N3200,
was shot down over Dunkirk in 1940,

and now the wreckage is being used
as the basis

for the most authentic Spitfire
to be built since World War II.

[Guy] Pull the handle there.

[narrator] It won’t be easy as is clear
on a recent restoration,

the Spitfire was a complex,
state-of-the-art aircraft.

[exhaling]

[Guy] They had the most
sophisticated fighter the RAF had.

Just look in here.
Look at the way the buttons finished off.

You see? I don’t want to press it.
Can I, am I alright to press it?

No, I best not press it.
I don’t want any bodies. [chuckling]

[mimicking gun fire]

[narrator] In the mid-1930s,
the aggressive foreign policy

of Hitler’s Germany rung
alarm bells in Britain.

A rearmament programmed saw the tender

for a new fighter plane won
by Reginald Mitchell,

from Stoke-on-Trent,
an aeronautical engineer

with no formal training.

In 1931, his sea plane had reached
a record-breaking 407.5 miles per hour.

That design was adapted into the Spitfire.

The first plane rolled out
of a Southampton factory in 1938.

[newscaster] It’s the fastest
single seater fighter in the world.

[narrator] Every young pilot who took
the helm immediately fell in love.

[Geoffrey] I was 18.
Now, all they said was,

"There’s a Spitfire. Go and fly it.

And if you break it
they’ll be bloody hell to pay.

Thank you!"
And I remember vividly walking out

and seeing this lithe-looking,
thoroughbred creature sitting there.

I thought, "My goodness, am I in charge
of that lethal looking thing?"

I got in it, they showed me how
to start it and then I opened the throttle

and the acceleration was nothing like
I’d ever known,

and it just seemed to hurl herself
into the air

with me hanging on to it.

[engine revving]

It was a thing apart and it seemed to flow
about the sky.

It was responsive.

It was very light on the controls
and it was a revelation.

[engine revving]

I remember thinking "Well, this is lovely"
as I was mucking about around the clouds

and I’ve got to get this thing back
on the ground,

which is quite an important part
of any trip, you see?

And we arrived on the ground.
Quite simply, the aeroplane flew me.

[narrator] Squadron leader
Geoffrey Stephenson,

English gent and distinguished pilot,

was in charge of N3200
when it was shot down.

-[explosion booms]
-[dramatic music playing]

His diaries reveal what happened
after he crashed

during the Dunkirk evacuation.

[Guy] They gave me a copy.

Well, I wouldn’t trust me
with the original either.

Yeah. Some interesting reading...

Some interesting reading.
There’s one bit here that reads...

"I had force landed on the beach
south of Calais.

Was not a time for emotion,
but rather cool planning.

Nothing of the sort occurred."

Nothing of the sort occurred?

[narrator] According to the diaries,
Stephenson evaded capture for 11 days,

walking 110 miles
through occupied France to Brussels.

He sought refuge at the US embassy,

but was turned away because the Americans
were not yet part of the war.

[Guy] Yeah, he would've been snookered
now, wouldn’t he?

He’s on the street, like German occupied
at that stage, weren’t it?

If you got captured and they say, "Well,
you’re obviously a spy."

[mimics explosion] Kaboom.

Blown his brains out, no questions asked.

[narrator] Stephenson had no alternative
but to turn himself in

and become a prisoner of war.

By May, 1940, Germany had successfully
invaded most of Europe,

but Hitler was furious that Britain had
rejected his offer of peace.

The British Navy and Air Force posed
a huge threat

so he ordered them to be destroyed.

The plan was first to gain
aerial superiority over the channel

before landing his infantry by sea.

The battle of Britain was about to begin
and the RAF needed more planes, fast.

[quiet violin music playing]

To help increase production, a new factory
in Castle Bromwich, in Birmingham

started producing Spitfires
in May, 1940.

Today it’s used by the Jaguar car company,

with works of art reminding the locals
of the area’s history.

[Guy] I’m not into modern art,
and that’s what we’re calling

that, isn’t it, modern art?

But I can appreciate that no one’s
forgotten and I think that’s right.

And then we’ve got here
is a nose cone, and...

some knob has gone and graffitied it.

Show a bit of respect.

-Do you know about these here?
-[boy] Yeah.

Go on, what are they?

-[boy] That is the Spitfire wing.
-[Guy] Is it?

Fair play, mate.
What do you think to it all?

-What do I think to it all?
-Yeah...

Well, for starters, it’s a bit of history,
ain't it really?

-Right.
-This place is like

World War II and all that,
you know what I mean?

That's spot on, mate! I'm impressed.

I’m impressed that you know
all about that.

-[Guy] That's great. Spot on mate.
-[chuckling] It's cool.

[narrator] The factory itself
is also one big monument.

Go on, watch this then.
It's in the first bit, see...

most-- most of Britain’s Spitfires
are made here from 39 to 45.

[narrator] The factory was
a colossal undertaking,

the size of 80 football pitches.

In today’s prices, it cost the government
nearly 400 million pounds.

Its huge size made it an obvious target
for German bombers,

so the whole building was covered
in camouflage paint.

There is a bit of camouflage left,
you see up there.

It didn’t stop them,
they still dropped over 200 bombs.

[narrator] To begin with,
production at the factory was a fiasco,

thanks to the very worst examples
of British industrial unrest.

We had too many old boys stuck
in their old ways, they knew best.

Saying that they’re gonna build
60 Spitfires a week!

All these old boys, "Oh, yeah, yeah,
we can do 60." Sixty Spitfires a week?

Anyway, April, 1940 come
and they hadn’t turned out one, not one!

[narrator] There were more than 3,000
different blueprints for a Spitfire

and the foreman,
recruited from car maker Morris

and used to simpler manufacturing,
wanted to ignore them.

You still get it now, don’t you?
"I’ve been doing it this way for 50 years.

That’s the way it’ll be done.
That’s the way it’ll be done."

Old boys stuck in their way,
we need some fresh blood in there.

We need the whip needed to be cracked
and it was.

[narrator] Lord Beaverbrook,
generally regarded as the unpleasant

and unreasonable proprietor
of the Daily Express,

was in charge
of the Ministry of Aircraft Production.

He was as passionate
about Spitfire production numbers

as he was about
his newspaper’s circulation.

Within a year, he’d kicked Castle Bromwich
into life with new management,

turning it into Europe’s
most efficient factory.

The north sides,
all the wings were done over there.

Over there, engines and the fuselage,
and here is

where all the assembling took place,

Eighty-five were being turned out a week,
and that’s some going.

I know all the workers said all they did
is work and sleep, nothing else.

Fair play.

Proper.

[narrator] At its peak, more than 14,000
people worked at Castle Bromwich.

It was one of the first places
to award equal pay to men and women.

[Guy] I wonder what we’ve got here.

I think this will be fuel tank assembly.

You see there, 40 percent
of the workforce were women.

[Sylvia] We were about 18, 19,

most of them moms, a lot of them
were girls I’d gone to school with.

[Guy] There they are making
fuel tanks.

Yeah, flat out making fuel tanks,
and their specialty was riveting.

We had to buy our own tools by the way.

Chisels and screwdrivers and everything
we had to provide ourselves.

You needed a chisel in case
your rivets weren’t flat,

you know you would have
to chisel them off,

which I didn’t do very often,
I generally got them right. [chuckles]

[Guy] And look here,
there’s a lass here riveting,

no pressure,
but that’s the Prime Minister,

that’s Winston Churchill looking over her.
No pressure, love, no pressure.

It was quite nice 'cause I was earning
loads of money. [chuckling]

Much more than I got as an apprentice
at hairdressing.

By eck.

[narrator] Riveting a fuel tank is
Guy’s next job back at Duxford.

The team are eight months
into the N3200 project.

[Mo] These early MARK-1,
the fuel tank doesn't have a--

like a crash or bullet proof covering
like the later version,

so, it’s even more important
for it to be leak proof.

[narrator] And that needs
precision riveting,

and like in Castle Bromwich,
Guy will have to do this by hand,

rather than rely on a modern day robot.

[Guy] If you’re putting a rivet
in a place of stress,

like on the bottom of a fuel tank,

then you have to use
these hardened rivets,

but you can’t rivet a hardened rivet up.

So what you have to do,
you have to heat it up to 495 degrees

and that then makes the rivet
more malleable,

you know, you can rivet it up then.

[narrator] The rivets, made of the same
steel alloy as 75 years ago,

are then frozen to preserve
that malleable state.

There are just two hours to use them
before they harden.

Nick Dean is in charge.

What’s the plan then now,
we put some in.

-[Nick] Yeah.
-[Guy] Where do you want me?

[Nick] Right, so what we’ll do is start
from the middle and work outwards.

-Just bring it down gently.
-All right.

[narrator] A rivet is a quick way
of permanently joining

two pieces of metal together.

-[Guy] That all right?
-[Nick] Yeah, that’s fine.

[narrator] The shaft is pushed
through a hole and has its end flattened

by a rivet squeezer, exerting a ton
of force to fix it in place.

This tank here is 37 gallons.

And the tank that sits
above it is 48 gallon.

So, what, are 85 gallons altogether.

When she was up in the air,
she’d be using...

a gallon a minute.

I mean that is thirsty,
a gallon a minute.

Yeah, that is some going.

You could not tip it away faster,
could you really, could ya?

Now, if you’re looking on, you’ve got
enough fuel for an hour’s worth of flight,

so that’s only half an hour there,
half an hour back.

Any more than an hour...

and we’re gonna be in bother, yeah.

Now, I’ll get these rivets in.

[air pressuring]

Nick’s been on this five weeks,
don’t think knackering it up now!

Bloody riveting,
it’s not a bloody laughing matter, is it?

-[Nick chuckles]
-[Guy] Five weeks gone into this.

[narrator] It’s finished, exactly
as it would have been done originally.

If a job's worth doing,
it’s worth doing well. Yeah, fair play.

-[speaking indistinctly]
-[siren blares]

[narrator] The battle of Britain began
on July 10, 1940.

It was the first campaign
to be fought entirely in the air

and became the Spitfire’s
most celebrated moment in history.

Hitler’s plan was first to attack
naval convoys in the channel...

[bomb whistling and exploding]

then Britain’s airfields…

then the aircraft factories,

and finally to order
indiscriminate bombing

of the towns and cities.

An RAF pilot might be sent up five times
a day to fend off the relentless onslaught

of the Luftwaffe, who were making up
to 1800 sorties in a 24 hour period.

It was exhausting work for the pilots
who were as young as 19,

but they readily admitted the real heroes
were the mechanics

and ground crew who quickly repaired,
re-fueled and re-armed their planes.

[piano music plays]

The officers were bringing
the mechanics food, eh?

How often would you get that then?

And I know everyone, everyone sees
the mechanics, don’t they?

Oh, he’s only a fitter, only a mechanic,
only a fitter,

but these have got the officers bringing
the mechanics food, so obviously

the officers appreciated,
not just appreciated, they knew

that without the mechanics
that was it, nothing happened.

[narrator] Air superiority depended
on speed, and the mechanics

had a trick up their sleeve to eke out
every last mile per hour.

[Guy] He said, "The servicing I did
was a 100 percent.

The riggers and I were always polishing
because we were told the pilots could get

an extra four mile an hour that way."
These lads are polishing,

because they think it’ll get
another four mile an hour out the plane,

eh, that’s pride in your work is that,
isn’t it?

Let’s see what else we can find.
We’ve got a bit of reading to do.

[engine revving]

[narrator] The Spitfire had enough fuel
for around an hour’s flight,

and enough bullets for 14 seconds
of firing.

The ground crews took great pride
in how quickly

they could perform a pit stop
to refuel and re-arm

even though they were targets
for bombing themselves.

Guy persuades some of his Duxford
colleagues to see if they’re a match.

They say a team of four blokes
could re-arm a Spitfire.

Was it 2400 rounds in three
and a half minutes, right.

So get hold of these boxes,
scarper up there, have it fixed.

[man] I'll give it a go.

Right, so we’re going for it.
I’ll just follow what you boys do.

I don’t really know what I’m doing,

All ready? Are we starting now?
Are we starting the stopwatch now?

[woman] Go!

-[Guy] I’m not much of a runner.
-[man] Don’t overtake me! [laughs]

-[Guy] Right, where do you want me?
-[man] He’s carrying a camera

-and he’s quicker than me.
-[Guy] Where do you want me?

[Dave] First of all,
you whip on that long paddle. Yeah.

-[man] Come on, Guy!
-He’s trying his best.

If I miss the screwdriver and scratch
the paint, these boys'll never forgive me.

-[Dave] Undo this one.
-[Guy] All right.

-[woman] Ten minutes.
-[Dave] Put that down there.

-Pull that, right?

[clang]

That’s the used bullets, so they’ll have
been spent on a lot of Germans.

-[Dave] Okay.
-All right?

[woman] Two minutes...

[narrator] With two of the three
and a half minutes gone,

they’re only just threading
the first ribbon to help guide

the belt of bullets into the gun.

[Dave] Must have been difficult
in those times to do what they were doing,

quick turn rounds, looking up at the sky,
thinking when are they coming over

to drop bombs on you...
yeah, brave people.

[Dave] Shut the lid.

[jazz music playing]

-[Dave] Move it back. Yeah.
-Like that?

-[woman] That’s three minutes.
-[Guy] That's three minutes.

This is just putting the bullets in
because you’d have another team cleaning

all the breaches and the barrels as well.

-Yeah.
-There’d be other people checking radios.

Another one would be walking round seeing
if there’s any damage on the aircraft.

[man] Ten, nine, eight,
seven, six, five...

-four, three...
-Pull all three, yeah.

...two, one. Time’s up.

[Dave] Or just carry on then.

[Guy] We’re nowhere near done,
but we’ll carry on.

-Okay, gun cocked.
-[Guy] Is that us?

[Dave] Yeah, that’s us,
we’ll panel up now.

So that’s taken us, what,
we’ve done two boxes in what the thick end

of five minutes I suppose.
And those boys were doing eight boxes

-in three and a half minutes.
-They were.

I’d say it’s impressive, but as impressive
as that is, if that was your job

you would make sure you was the quickest
in the world, wouldn’t ya?

Yeah, it’s all about getting them
back up in the air, wasn’t it?

Yeah, it is impressive,
is impressive. It is impressive.

[indistinct chatter]

[narrator] It’s time to get back to work.

The next stage
of the project will be crucial

in trying to make N3200
the greatest flying Spitfire.

Building the wings that give the plane
its outstanding advantage in combat.

[engine roaring]

[propellers revving]

Guy Martin is helping out
on a two-year project to remake

one of the rarest Spitfires of all,
a MARK-1.

As you can see,
we’ve got a lot of work to do.

[narrator] It was salvaged from a Dunkirk
beach after a crash landing in 1940.

[Guy] And that was when it was dug
out in 1986.

[narrator] The anonymous
owner has insisted everything is done

as authentically as possible,
using original techniques.

-No, that’s not right. It’s not perfect.
-It needs to be a bit tighter.

[Guy] I’m starting again, it’s not right.

I’m rushing it. [sighing loudly]

[Guy] It doesn’t matter which panel
you lift up or where you look,

it's just attention to detail.

It’s absolutely perfect
in every single way.

[narrator] The project is 10 months old
and the fuselage is ready to be painted.

John Loweth has 20 years’ experience
and does the entire process freehand,

as it was done originally.

The only difference is that these days
there’s no lead in the paint.

To do the four coats of top coats...

it would take about an hour.

[narrator] Early Spitfires fought mostly
over England’s fields

during the battle of Britain,
so were painted brown and green.

Later, as the fight was taken
to the enemy across the channel,

they were painted grey and green
to better blend in to the sea.

[John L.] I’ve done probably
about ten aircraft.

This one I’m, I’m quite pleased with.

I do like this one.

[narrator] The plane is now ready
for its most intricate parts,

which will test Guy’s engineering ability
to the limit. The wings.

[Mo] This is Spike,
he’s the wing team leader.

[Guy] How are you, Spike?
-[Spike] All right, mate.

-[Guy] How’s it going? All right, mate?
-All right, yeah.

All right, what’s the plan?

Right, now, here we go, 1936 drawing.

This is basically what we call
a general assemble drawing--

[Guy] Yeah.

[narrator] Building a wing begins
with the internal framework of supports

called ribs.

Each rib is hand-made,

and must be strong enough to withstand
the stresses of a Spitfire’s 400mph dive.

-[Spike] We’re making a--
-[Guy] What’s it, number five?

-Rib five, center portion...
-Yes.

[Spike] You’re forming that boom,
which is called a top boom.

[Guy] Yeah.

[narrator] They start on the shrinker.

[Spike] In you go... that’s it.

[narrator] The Spitfire’s responsive
handling relied on the precise curves

of its wings, and here the bends
of its frame are made by pulling

the metal fractionally inwards.

[Spike] That’s it, just move it along
every half inch or so.

By doing that, that’s gently curving
that material...

[Guy] Without putting it under any stress.

[Spike] Without putting it
under any stress. That’s it.

Is that it? Right, very subtle then.
Very, very subtle. Bloody hell.

[narrator] When they put the beam
on the layout board...

[Guy] That up there, like so...

...Spike's experienced eye spots
a problem.

Well, as I can see from this,
from here

-to there, that’s slightly over curved.
-Yeah.

-[Guy] Right, so wants a bit taken out.
-Okay, they’d want a bit taken out, now,

-[Guy] Is that all right?
-[Spike] Yeah.

That’s fine, that’s just undoing
everything that was done over there.

[buzzing lips]

You can’t, you can’t teach someone that,
can you? Eh? Just like...

How many years have
you been doing this?

-Thirty years I’ve been in the game, yeah.
-Same on the bottom.

[Spike] Yeah, just same on the bottom.

If you don’t get it right, it don’t fly.

Or even worse still, wings could fall off
or break up, there’s no substitutes

in for the correct fasteners
and procedures.

You do it right or you don’t do it at all.

Basically, that’s a goer.

[narrator] The first part is complete,

but each rib can contain
up to 20 different parts.

[Guy] To get to that there
would take a week, right?

In a whole Spitfire there’s 124
of them, eh?

It's a week to make one.

You can see we’re gonna be here a day
or two can’t you, eh?

What do you reckon, Spike, what’s next?

[narrator] One wing is made up
of 3,000 different parts,

and each must marry up perfectly
to the next.

Once the ribs have been completed,
the largest parts can be fitted…

[Guy] Right, where do you want me?

[narrator] ...the exterior skins.

Two hundred and fifty pins are screwed in
so the wing can be fine-tuned

before it's permanently riveted.

So yeah, the whole idea is getting
this edge here to line up perfectly,

you see it? Look there,
that’s spot on there, isn’t it?

But up here we’ve got a bit of a gap
and then it closes up back up there.

We’ve taken it off five times already,
it’s been on and off five times today

and probably another five more times
just to get it,

just to get it perfect. So perfect.
It has to be perfect, no if's,

but's or maybe's. Perfect.

[Terry] Sometimes it can take forever.
[chuckles]

It's just being a bit
of a perfectionist on the side I think

where you're just not happy
until it is exactly right.

You need that little bit of mentality,
I think.

The repetition of the job is probably
one of the hardest parts of it,

so it's very laborious but it's got
to be done right.

[narrator] The work continues...

Back off again, back off again.

[narrator] ...unpinning, shaving, shaping,
re-fitting, unpinning, shaving,

and shaping again.

Bit nervous.

[narrator] In 1940, it took just days
to make a wing. Not today.

A year per wing, a year per wing.
So, you don’t get fed up with it?

-Not really.
-[Guy] No?

-No.
-[Guy] Do you?

-No, no no.
-[Guy] No.

[Guy] Good lads.

-[narrator] It's finally perfect.
-Work of art.

[narrator] The section is then attached
to the rest of the wing framework.

it will take another six months’ effort
to complete.

[propellers revving]

It was during the three and a half month
long battle of Britain

where that sleek wing design helped
make the Spitfire so effective.

[reporter over recorder] The Germans have
lost one plane every 42 minutes.

How’s that, Mr. Goebbels?

[narrator] The plane was incredibly
responsive,

helping it out to outmaneuver
German fighters

more easily than its battle
of Britain brother, the Hurricane.

[John] The Hurricane wasn’t bad,
but it was more like the carthorse

than the racehorse.

[John A.] The Spitfire was the one
you wanted. It looked better.

It was a very beautiful aeroplane.
It was better at altitude

than the Hurricane
and it performed better.

There’s no doubt about that.

It did perform better. I’ve flown both.

[narrator] Although the Hurricane shot
down more planes overall,

its job was to target
the slower German bombers,

and that was only possible
because the Spitfire had first gunned down

the more difficult to hit
German fighter escorts.

But the real key to success was the chain
of radar stations along the south

and east coasts

which meant the RAF knew exactly
where the Luftwaffe were going to be.

They could set a course to intercept,
wait at altitude for the German planes

to appear, then dive to shoot them down.

[high pitched hum]

[dramatic music playing]

[narrator] To experience what
those British fighter aces went through,

Guy is about to take a once
in a lifetime flight.

I feel rather official,
and to be honest a right lucky bugger.

I’m having a go in a Spitfire,
I’m having a go in a Spitfire.

I know Spitfires are only single seaters,

but in the late 40s, the training planes,
there was a load of twin seaters made

and that’s what I’m having a go in.
A converted MARK-9.

I’ll give you a turn. What do you reckon?

Do I look like I know what I’m doing.
I’m only the passenger.

We’ll go have a word with Cliff,
'cause Cliff knows what he's doing.

-Right, Cliff, how’s it going, mate?
-[Cliff] We’re off.

You’re the man.
You know what you’re doing.

[narrator] Retired Air Marshall
Cliff Spink has flown

Spitfires for 21 years,
and straps Guy into his parachute.

I’m sort of a little bit nervous.

A little bit nervous,
but I’m more excited.

Clipper up! Okay, we’re starting. Contact.

[engine stutters]

-[Cliff] Right, let’s rock and roll then.
-[Guy] Brilliant.

[propellers revving]

-[Cliff] So we ease the power up...
-[Guy] Yeah.

[Cliff] ...feed in a bit of right rudder.

-[Cliff] So what do you think, Guy?
-Absolutely brilliant.

[Cliff] We’re doing
just over 200 miles an hour.

[Guy] What a job! What a job!

Right, put your hand
on the control column.

-Yes, okay.
-You have control.

As the nose comes up,
just push the stick forward. That’s it.

I can’t believe how sensitive it is.

[Cliff] The left wing goes down,
move it to the right.

That's it.

And by the way, look forward
and you’ll see my hands are up here.

I can see you, yeah.

-You’re flying a Spitfire.
-[Guy laughs]

That’s jolly good, well done!

-Okay, I’ll take it back, I have control.
-Thanks very much. Thank you.

[engine revving]

[narrator] Meanwhile,
completely unbeknownst to Guy,

a Messerschmitt prepares to take off…

and turn this pleasure flight
into a dogfight.

[rotor blades turning]

-Look over your right shoulder.
-Yeah.

[Cliff] Because we might be about
to get a surprise.

Go on, what have you got planned?
What’s this?

[Cliff] You’re about to see what it was
like to be on the wrong end

of a Messerschmitt.

[narrator] Guy Martin is about to get
a pilot’s eye view of a battle of Britain

dogfight, between a Spitfire
and a Messerschmitt 109,

the plane tasked with escorting German
bombers over the south coast of England.

[Cliff] You’re getting nervous now
and you’re thinking...

"I know the bad guys are around."

[Cliff] See that?

-Yeah, I can see him.
-If you’ve got that rolling

into your six o’clock,
it’s very difficult to see him, isn’t it?

Now what would you be doing now
in a fight situation?

[Cliff] Well, if you didn’t see him
and you weren’t moving your wings

about, you’re bound to get shot down.

So what do you do, do you dive?
Do you...

Yeah, well, I’ll show you that
in just a second.

[Cliff] I’d do that!

[Geoffrey] Never stay still.

If you stayed still...

straight and level for more than
about ten seconds, you were killed.

I realized that if I could see
my antagonist,

I felt I could out-fly him in a Spitfire.

[Cliff] You can see him
from the other side now.

-Yeah.
-It’s us bouncing the 109.

[dramatic music playing]

-Right, now we really are in a tail chase.
-Brilliant!

[narrator] The art of dog fighting is
to fly faster

and turn tighter than your opponent,

so you can maneuver them
into your sights.

[Guy] You’ve done this before,
haven’t you? [chuckles]

[narrator] Compared to the 109,
early Spitfires had less ammunition,

weren’t as fast and couldn’t climb
as quickly.

But they had two crucial advantages,

they were less tiring to fly and had
much better high speed maneuverability.

[Geoffrey] If you got into a dogfight,
the flying manual went out of the window.

Be brutal with it, chuck it around,
yeah,

and a Spitfire would respond.

[Guy] Yeah, I like that, I like it!

[narrator] In extreme maneuvers,
it was possible to pull 6G,

enough force to ripple the metal
on wings and severely affect the pilot.

[John A.] Pulling out of a dive, you can
hardly lift your hand from the stick.

And you feel your eyes going
and you can blackout.

There was one time when I was right
behind a 109,

and it’s you or him
and you’d rather it was him.

I don’t know anybody who felt
that they had killed someone.

They had shot down an aeroplane,
not a pilot.

[Cliff] I’m now coming up
to about 400 yards,

[Guy] Now that is close.
That is close.

[propellers revving]

About now I’m going [imitates gunshots]

and hopefully I’d have hit it.

[Guy laughs]

[Cliff] It’s very noticeable
when you’re flying with people

who have got an empathy with machines.

They do get very quickly into the sense
of the aeroplane.

I mean, I could have given that
to somebody else

and they would have been
all over the sky, so well done you.

Thank you very much, I’m honored
that you let me fly, I’m honored.

[Cliff] And that was really good
and you can say you’ve flown a Spitfire.

Yeah, that’s not a lie,
I’ve flown a Spitfire. It’s not a lie.

[propellers revving]

[narrator] The mission to create
the most authentic Spitfire

since the war has reached
a landmark stage.

It's time to fit the aeroplane's heart,
the 27 liter V12 engine.

[Guy] The engine it had in it
is the Rolls Royce Merlin,

the legendary engine,
and I’m that into 'em.

I bought my own Merlin. I’ve got a Merlin.
It's going in me front room and it runs.

[starts with a cough]

[narrator] The engine for N3200 runs
as good as new.

[Mo] The original core engine was sent
down to a company in Gloucestershire

where it was completely stripped,
every part is measured to make sure

it's within tolerance and will hopefully
give 250 hours of service

before it needs dismantling again.

[speaking indistinctly]

[narrator] But before the engine
is fitted, its frame must be attached

to the bulkhead.

[hammering]

[Guy] How many hours in making
this frame?

-Probably about 400.
-Four hundred hours!

[whispering] Bloody hell...

[narrator] The engine weighs more than
half a ton,

so the four bolts which support
the frame must fit securely.

[Bob] I was an aircraft fitter

and I always remember
these tapered engine bolts...

where there used to be bolts
about that long

and it was turned on a taper and then

ground, radial ground...

It kept me rather busy.

[narrator] To keep the bolts in place,
a hole is drilled in the head to accept

a locking pin.

It’s very easy to snap such
a thin drill bit

and the consequences are costly.

If you break the drill off,
or drill off line,

then these are a special bolt which have
to be made in the machine shop, so,

they’ve got quite a long lead time,
about three months in all,

so if we mess that up, we won’t be able
to put the engine in.

[Bob] We used to get gee’d up sometimes
and they would be short of a certain item

and then they used to come down
and mark it up on the board,

"Red Hot" they used to put on a part
that was missing.

I think it was head down
and get on with it.

I enjoyed it and I’d do it all over again.

[Mo] Your turn.

[drilling]

[narrator] If Guy snaps the bit,
the project will grind to a halt.

But his steady hand does the job…

Wow.

[narrator] And the bolt is locked in place
with a split pin so it can’t come undone.

[cranking]

The 1000 horsepower Merlin 3,
the same type of engine

that was originally fitted to N3200,
is hoisted into place.

Guy’s Spitfire is one step closer
to returning to the sky.

I’m getting excited.
You’re not beating that, are ya?

I can fit as many Scania clutches.
I can fit as many Volvo turbos,

but nothing's gonna beat that
with a Spitfire.

It's more exciting. Are you excited?

-I’m always excited putting an engine in.
-It's always exciting.

[Bob] I’m quite proud
of the engineering side of it.

I think everybody was proud of it,
everybody, even the old ladies

in the street, "Spitfire, oh, yes."

It was an iconic plane.

Absolutely iconic.
I’m very proud of the old Spit.

[sobs]

[narrator] The decisive battle of Britain
offensive came on September 15th, 1940.

Germany launched two huge waves
and Britain scrambled

every fighter it had.

The RAF shot down 60 planes...

and lost 26 of their own.

Germany was due to invade
just two days later,

but with the RAF clearly still
at full strength,

the invasion of Britain was called off.

The Spitfire had been instrumental
in inflicting Hitler’s first defeat,

the first turning point in World War II.

But it wasn’t the last time the Spitfire
played a crucial strategic role.

Constantly updated to become more powerful
and better armed,

its versatility saw it serve
in the Mediterranean,

Burma, and the Pacific.

In 1944, it provided an overwhelming force
when the allies took the fight to Hitler

on D-Day, and was the first plane
to touch down in liberated France

before soon taking off to press home
the attack.

But star pilot
Geoffrey Stephenson was missing out.

After crash landing N3200 in Dunkirk,

his letters home tell of what happened
to him as a prisoner of war,

including this Nazi dossier revealing

he spent three weeks
in solitary confinement.

[Guy] So wherever they’d put him,
he’d escape and then he’d get captured

and they’d put him in other places,
he’d escape.

So then the Germans got hold of him
the last time and says, "Right,

Geoffrey Stephenson,
we’ve had enough of you, mate.

You’re off to Colditz.
And we’ve heard of Colditz, haven’t you?

You’re not getting out of there
in a hurry."

And who did he meet in Colditz,
Douglas Bader,

his old mate, and that’s when they started
concocting this fancy glider,

in the loft of Colditz,
planning this dramatic escape,

which never happened, it never happened,
but it’s the British spirit, isn’t it?

[narrator] Even when imprisoned,
he was a thorn in the Nazis' side.

Stephenson’s old plane is
three quarters of the way

through its painstakingly
accurate rebuild.

[Guy] She’s taking shape.
Wing skins are on.

She’s had a lick of paint.
She is looking like an aeroplane.

[narrator] Even the oil unions,
the very first parts Guy ever fitted,

have been plumbed in.

Today she’s ready to have
her wings bolted on

with seven pins measured
to a thousandth of an inch.

[Guy] Each wing, they have
three at the top, four at the bottom.

Just a normal bolt, you can see,
you’ve got a thread there,

that’s the main shank and that’s,
that screw head there to hold it in place.

The only problem is, is that the fit
is absolutely critical.

The diameter we’re going for
is 937 and a half thou. You see that.

There’s a 1000 thous in an inch,

a thou is about the thickness
of a human hair.

This is the bolt and what we’ve got here
is 945.4 of a thou.

So it’s about eight hairs,
we’ve got to take off that, so yeah,

uh, eight thou, not nine thou,

not eight and a half thou, eight thou.
We’ll get cracking, we’ll go see the man,

we’ll go see the man,
see how to steer the machine.

[Paul] Okay, that into there.

[narrator] Paul Wilson is in charge
of the cylindrical grinder,

similar to the machine that would have
been used for this job originally.

[quiet music playing]

[narrator] It takes an hour to try

and carefully shave off
the necessary eight widths

-of a hair.
-[Guy] Will that be your last cut?

Guy’s workmanship impresses Mo, the boss.

His standard is perfect.
Give him a job tomorrow without a worry.

[Paul] And you could quite happily let him
do most things on the aeroplane.

You know, he’s got the feel for it.

[narrator] But despite the care
and attention, the pin's too tight to fit.

[Mo] That’s because you’ve been holding
it in your hand for the last few minutes.

[Guy] I know, I know.
We’ve just been stood there,

we were stood there talking about,
what were we talking about?

The price of fish!

And I’ve had that in me hands
all the time, feel that.

Feel how warm that is.

-It's really warm.
-Feel how warm that is.

-It’s stone cold.
-Yeah.

Obviously, it’s been warm
it's gonna expand,

but the heat of my hands has made it
expand enough not to go in the hole.

That tells me it's three tenths oversize
from what we made it on the machine.

So the heat with-- with him holding it
in his hands for the last 15 minutes

has, has grown that by three tenths.

After a half an hour, that will cool down
enough and be perfect.

[narrator] Once cooled,
Guy tries the pin again.

[distant drilling]

It fits, and Mo was brought over
to inspect.

-[Mo] Yeah, so far so good.
-[Guy] Yeah?

[Mo] Thirteen more to go.

[narrator] Each wing weighs the same
as two men.

[Mo] Guy, go for another push in,
that’s it.

Look at that, it’s like a glove.
Like a glove.

[narrator] Guy is left to make
the final fixings.

[dramatic music playing]

The Spitfire may have invoked love
and affection from all who saw it,

but it existed
for one sole deadly purpose.

It was a mobile gun platform.

[engine revving]

In the early days, it was fitted with four
browning machine guns in each wing,

but the relatively small .303 rounds
soon struggled

to penetrate the ever-improving armor
of enemy aircraft.

So later the guns were upgraded
to a larger 50 caliber bullet.

[engine revving]

[propeller humming]

Guy wants to witness the destructive
power of these machine guns for himself,

and is meeting up with old friend,
Dave Main, a historic armorer.

-[Guy] Now, mate.
-[Dave M.] All right, how's it going?

[Guy] All right, how about you?
Go on, what we got here.

Right, 50 caliber machine gun,
developed in 1921.

This is now, still in service, so it’s got
a life of 92 years...

[narrator] This very gun was once used
in a Spitfire,

and has now been adapted
to use a hand trigger.

[Dave M.] So what you do is you get
in behind your target area,

then line it up and then obviously
fire it.

And then keep your fingers on the trigger.
[imitates gunfire]

Okay.

Your go.

[Ray] The tracks would hold
roughly 300, 350 rounds of ammunition

which would last firing continuously
of about 14 seconds.

That’s all they would get.
Some of the dogfights were perhaps

from 25,000 feet down to 5,000 feet,

and just seen briefly an enemy aircraft
flash by and I went down on them

and just give it a quick burst.

[mimicking gunfire]

That was it, that would be about
ten or 15 rounds of ammunition gone

in a fraction of a second.

[high-pitched humming]

You never thought about anyone being
at the end of it.

It never passed our minds...
It was all part and parcel of the job.

[garage door unlocking]

[narrator] To see how much damage
such a short amount of firing time can do,

Guy needs a target.

I’m finding this sacrilege to be honest.

But we need something to simulate
enemy aircraft. We’ve found a scrap car.

It just happens that it’s a BMW.
They made engines for the Luftwaffe.

Just a coincidence, just a coincidence.
It pains me. It’s got good tires on it,

it’s got parking sensors.
The paintworks not bad. But it’s German.

We’re going to get our own back.
She’s having it. She’s having it.

[narrator] Guy Martin is about to find out

what damage a Spitfire machine gun
could do.

[tense music playing]

[gun clicking]

[cranking]

[Dave M.] Ready?

-Ready?
-Yep.

-Is she having some more?
-[Dave M.] Yep.

[loud firing]

It put the windows through!

[Dave M.] Okay. You want to traverse
one click.

[Guy] Yep.

-[Dave M.] Come down slightly now.
-[cranking]

-[Guy] Okay?
-Yep.

[gunfire]

[narrator] The browning fires
around six bullets a second.

In the heat of battle, new pilots would
often hold the trigger open

as soon as they saw the enemy,
wasting all their bullets in one go.

[Guy] Yeah, you’d get the young ones
and you’d just go in there,

shoot your load.

Get it all over and done with.
You’ve only got ten seconds.

You get it all over and done
with straightaway.

But then if you were
an experienced pilot,

they knew to get as near
as you could and only shoot

two second blasts. Go in there,
[imitates gunfire] yeah.

[Dave M.] One two-second burst.

[gun fires]

[Guy chuckles] I meant business there,
she was having it.

-[Dave M.] She certainly was.
-[Guy laughs] And again?

[Dave M.] And again.

[narrator] Firing from a static position
at a static target is one thing.

Firing from a moving platform
at a moving target is far harder.

They’re coming towards you...

at 300 miles an hour,
you’re doing 300 miles--

That’s 600 miles an hour, and you only,
it would happen very, very quickly,

it was just a [mimics gun fire]
and that was it, you were through.

[bullets whistling]

[narrator] With 100 rounds fired,
Guy inspects the damage.

[tense music playing]

Well, it doesn't look...

absolute carnage, does it?

It was all right, the bullet going
through, but when that bullet's gone

through your Messerschmitt,
like it’s gone through your Heinkel,

it would take bits with it and those bits

then become like another bullet
and they just create carnage. Look here.

Look, as that bullet's come through,
it's picked up the shrapnel

and it’s just gone everywhere, look.
It’s ripped the bloody radio out.

It’s ripped the bloody radio out.

And look, I’m just gonna have
a look under the bonnet.

It's crackers. Come and have a look here.
Come on, come and have a look.

It’s ripped half the engine out. See?
And that’s what pilots were trained to do.

You know, go for the pilot
or go for the engine.

They were the two things that were gonna
stop the plane the quickest.

Let’s have a look round there,
the other side, it's just mad.

I mean, look, we’ve nearly turned it
into a convertible,

eh, and then you look at that door.
Look at the--

That sort of sums up it, doesn’t it?
As beautiful as the Spitfire was,

and we can call it beautiful, can’t we,
really, it was just a killing machine...

Bloody... [exhales]

[narrator] Guy returns to Duxford to fit
the final part to N3200.

[quiet music playing]

[narrator] A brand new propeller has been
made by a company in Gloucestershire.

A problem here could prove costlier
than any other part of the project.

[Guy] Go on, is it expensive then?

It is, yeah,
it’s about 150,000 pounds worth.

And heavy too, roundabout 200 kilos.

[Guy] Okay.

[Mo] Another one. Got it.

Bit more, go on. Up, now down. Okay.

Have you ever heard
of a prop dropping off while in flight?

I have when they’ve been testing.
If we get it on it won’t come off,

but if we tear the seal,
it will just leak on

and spray all the screen and everything.

You don’t need that on a maiden voyage.
No good rushing at this time.

[narrator] When positioned, the prop
head has to be fastened to the shaft.

Making sure it’s tight enough requires
some extra leverage.

[Guy] If I’m hung on the end of that,
you know it's tight,

you know it's tight, FT, FT,
we would call it, yeah, she’s tight.

-[Guy] Okay. Yeah.
-[Mo] All right.

[Guy] I worked it out, you know,
about six foot just hanging on it,

then I’ll hit it with a hammer.

[Mo] Okay. That’s very tight now.

[Guy] Wow. So we’re getting
there now.

[Mo] Yeah, that’s good.

[narrator] Once the engine covers are
back on,

the aeroplane will be complete.

N3200 will be ready to be flown
for the first time

since Geoffrey Stephenson
crash landed in her.

In 1945, the Americans liberated Colditz
and Geoffrey Stephenson was released.

The war was over.

Stephenson resumed
his distinguished career,

serving both King George and the Queen
in the honorary role of Aide-De-Camp,

assisting them at military events.

[reporter] Air Commodore Stephenson
commanding the static display

escorts Her Majesty.

[Guy] So yeah, pilot for King George.

Bit of a helping hand for the Queen, eh?

He weren’t playing at it, was he?
He wasn’t playing at it.

[narrator] Then in 1954, Stephenson was
selected as a crack pilot to test

the supersonic Sabre jet fighter
in the USA.

But having survived dogfights,

a crash landing and being
a prisoner of war,

this peace-time project was to be
his final mission.

An early design fault led
to him losing control

and crashing before it was possible
to eject.

Geoffrey Stephenson died aged 44...

leaving two daughters,
Veryan and Victoria.

[Guy] He was the boy,
he was the boy, yeah.

Listen, whatever we do here, we’ve got
to do the job right, haven’t we?

[moving music playing]

[narrator] It's two years and two weeks
since Guy first started work on N3200.

He’s about to see if she’ll fly.

If everything goes well,
she’ll be granted a permit to fly,

and be one of just four airworthy
MARK-1s in existence.

[Guy] Is she looking a treat?
She’s looking a treat.

[narrator] To add to the occasion,
Guy has invited along some

rather illustrious guests related
to the plane’s pilot, Geoffrey Stephenson.

Geoffrey’s daughters, both of them,

Geoffrey’s daughters, Vey and Victoria...
You all right, ladies?

-[Veryan] Hello.
-[Victoria] Good morning.

[Guy] Pleased to meet you, ladies,
pleased to meet you.

[narrator] Victoria was seven
when her celebrated father died,

while younger sister Veryan was just five.

[Victoria] Our father was a very kind,
but strict...

person and it's a great shame
he died so soon.

[Veryan] We’ve never really sat around
and talked about my father,

so to be here with Tor, you know,
and-- and remember, you know, Daddy,

and experience this together,
that’s quite special for me.

Right, ladies, are you ready?

-Yes.
-Are you ready for this?

There’s other planes, it’s the one,

-it’s the one there.
-Okay.

-Ready lads?
-Yeah.

[Guy] Open the door, please.
Cheers. Right.

[Veryan] Wow.

[Victoria] Beautiful!

Ooh.

Gorgeous.

[Veryan] There was a plane that,

you know, it was part of his life,
that he sat in

and flew all those years ago,
and it just looked,

I don’t know, friendly.

-Want to go up and have a look.
-Yes, please.

[Guy] Yeah, just as a MARK-1 should be.

[Victoria] And I thought,
"What a beautiful plane."

Not big and of course,

looking spiff, it was-- yeah, great.

[Guy] And just looking there was a picture
of the plane on Dunkirk beach,

and you could see from there that
there was this rear view mirror there.

-Can you see that mirror on the ground?
-Yeah.

That’s not a standard thing on a Spitfire,
but they say your dad had this idea

he wanted a rear view mirror
so that was nicked off an MG car

and they could see from this picture,
there was a German stood on it like proud

as punch, that's what I replicated
so that’s not on any other,

that’s just on this, just on your dad’s.

I don’t know, I can almost feel him
here at the moment actually.

I can almost, I mean...

[exhales]

[stammers] He just loved getting in there.

Seeing all this, and seeing the Spitfire
and seeing

Tor in the Spitfire particularly.

[Guy] Like father like daughter, eh?

[Veryan] I mean Tor has the same
coloring as Daddy,

has the same bone structure,
obviously a little bit smaller.

How do you start it? Is there a key?

[Veryan] It’s brought it all home
and I don’t know, it...

you know, I was so young when it all,
when my father was no more,

and now... Gee, I feel like you know,
I know a lot more about who he was

and what his passions were

and aeroplanes, which was the major part
of his life, aeroplanes.

-[Victoria] It’s remarkable, absolutely.
-[Guy] You’re happy?

[Victoria] I’m happy,
and I’m sitting in it right now.

[Guy] Sitting in your dad’s plane.

[narrator] When this plane left Duxford
in 1940, it never came back.

Now it’s time to see if she can return
safely to the skies.

[intense music playing]

The honor of flying squadron leader
Geoffrey Stephenson’s newly built

Spitfire in front of his daughters
Victoria and Veryan, goes to John Romain.

He’s one of the most experienced
Spitfire pilots in the world.

[John] There was an American pilot
in one day flew a Spitfire

and somebody said to him,
"What’s the big difference?"

And he said the big difference
is that you,

you get into an American fighter,
but you pull a Spitfire on.

[Victoria] It’s all too good
to be true, really.

[Vey] It’s great, isn’t it?

[narrator] The starting procedure
is the same today as it was

when N3200 made its last flight in 1940.

The stick is pulled back so the plane
won’t nose over upon starting.

The gas primer is pulled to warm
the engine.

Both tanks are checked for fuel.

A small amount of throttle is applied…

The ignition switches are flicked...

Right, I reckon this is it.
I heard the word...

[narrator] …and the starter button
is pressed.

[propellers revving]

[Guy] I’m not an emotional person.
To get an emotional response out of me

would take a fair bit of doing really,
but what done it for me was just to hear

the Merlin ticking over and the plane
shuddering, I genuinely thought that,

I genuinely got a shiver down my spine.

[dramatic music playing]

[controller]
Spitfire Golf Juliet runway 24.

Take off at your discretion.

Surface wind estimated
two-six-zero degrees

one-five knots and good luck.

[narrator] And so after a two-year build,
at the very same runway it last flew

from 74 years ago, they’re about to see
if this Spitfire can fly again.

[engine revving]

The canopy is left open to make an escape
easier should anything go wrong.

[woman hoots]

[intense music playing]

[Veryan] It’s just all a bit magical.

That’s your dad’s plane. Eh?

A little tinge of sadness too, I suppose.

[narrator] Wearing its original
Duxford squadron marking of QV,

Geoffrey Stephenson’s plane
is responding perfectly.

[Victoria] All this effort, it's just...

remarkable, and I’m so glad
that it was...

it’s... been focused on my father.

[Veryan gasps] Look at that!

-[Guy] Yeah, look at that.
-[Veryan] Look at the speed!

[Veryan cheers]

-God, it's exciting, isn’t it?
-[Guy chuckles]

-[Guy] Eh?
-That is something.

[intense music playing]

He would have just been overjoyed
to think that it’s up and flying again.

That was beautiful.

[Veryan] Yeah, yeah.
It’ll take it a while to sink in, I think.

[sighing]

-Bit quiet.
-Yeah.

I don’t know what to say, really.

It’s amazing that they’ve done this,
these folks.

Put it all together, once again.

[Guy] I’ve got goosebumps now.

[Victoria] When he got out
of that aeroplane, it was sort of...

very... moving.

Thank you so much.

[all chatter]

He looks like my father did
and, uh, like, "Oh!"

This came out all right, you know.

How was that?

Absolutely amazing,
thank you very much indeed.

-[Veryan] What was it like?
-[John] Lovely.

One of the best they’ve ever built,
I think. [chuckles]

-You can say you did it.
-[Guy] So, mate.

-Spot on, mate.
-That was good.

I think it’s lovely seeing it fly
after all the...

your involvement with it.

My bit of involvement.
Just the amount of time

-and effort your boys have put into this.
-Yeah.

And actually it is, I think, one
of the best they’ve ever built,

it’s absolutely stunning.

So is it gonna get a certificate to fly?

-Oh, most definitely, yeah.
-Yeah?

-Brilliant job, thank you very much.
-[chuckles] My pleasure!

[intense music playing]

There’s three bits here. You know,
it’s like a tribute to Geoffrey Stephenson

and I think that’s great, and number two,

we have restored a MARK-1 Spitfire
to perfect condition.

Where do we go from there? That is it.
And then the third one,

the job satisfaction. What a set of lads!

None of those boys are dragging
their heels to work.

[Dave] It's the boyhood dream
to work on something like this.

[Terry] It’s such an iconic aircraft
as well, you know?

Working on it, you couldn’t get
anything better, could you?

[Spike] The N3200 to me
is my favorite of all time.

It’s just a beautiful looking aircraft.

[Mo] We’re all normal guys doing what
we enjoy doing, but at the end of the day,

we’ve been given the task to make
a MARK-1 Spitfire the best we can,

and it’s turned out... pretty good.

[Guy] It’s been emotional,
it’s been emotional, it’s been emotional.

I love it.

[engine revving]