Illustrious received ASV radar components for her replacement Swordfish while carrying an air group of 47 aircraft. Engineers aboard also converted a fixed-wing Martlet I into an aircraft with folding wings. This work depended on the engineering facilities built into British carriers. Spare wings, engines, and fuselages allowed crews to rebuild and maintain aircraft at sea. Those components did not appear in the air-group total, so the number of assembled aircraft concealed some of the carrier's capacity to sustain operations.
Notable Point · 1:01:22-1:03:04
Shipboard workshops convert a Martlet's wings
A folding-wing conversion and stocks of spare aircraft components show how carrier workshops supported sustained operations.