# The most secret weapon of the Luftwaffe



## pampa14 (Nov 7, 2015)

I share with you a lot of pictures, some of them previously unreleased, rare and never before seen by me, referring to one of the secret weapons of the Luftwaffe. We are talking about the Horten flying wing. Perhaps, the aircraft of the Second World War the most ahead of its time than any other, went into production too late to be put into service. Do you think if he had gone into production would have changed the course of the war and history? Visit the link below and give us your opinion about it.


Aviação em Floripa: A mais secreta arma da Luftwaffe


Best Regards.


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## fastmongrel (Nov 7, 2015)

Theres a reason why virtually every single aircraft flying today is *not* a Flying Wing. The more the Germans played with VunderVeapons the quicker the inevitable defeat the LW needed more Me262 and Ar234s not an aircraft that after years of development and hundreds of test flights might have been made into a useful combat aircraft.

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## BiffF15 (Nov 7, 2015)

It's the first WW2 aircraft I have seen with an instrument panel the is close to a "modern" or normal layout. Very cool.


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## davebender (Nov 7, 2015)

I disagree. There are a multitude of WWII era wonder weapons which worked just fine. For instance:
Proximity fuze.
HE mine shell.
MG42 machinegun.
Bounding anti personnel mine.
Panzerfaust.
7.5cm/48, 7.5cm/70 and 8.8cm/56 armored vehicle cannon.
Atomic bomb.
120mm infantry mortar.
Napalm.
P-51 long range escort fighter.
Mosquito pathfinder aircraft.
Radar.
Landing Ship Dock (which 1930s Japan called a landing craft carrier).

The hard part involves determining which design proposals have a chance for success and which are simply pipe dreams.


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## gjs238 (Nov 7, 2015)

davebender said:


> I disagree. There are a multitude of WWII era wonder weapons which worked just fine. For instance:
> Proximity fuze.
> HE mine shell.
> MG42 machinegun.
> ...



What does the M-60 offer that the MG-42 doesn't?
Would the US have been better off adopting the MG-42?

Also, it seems many post-war versions reduced the rate of fire.
Does this mean the initial rate of fire was a mistake?


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## GrauGeist (Nov 7, 2015)

Also bear in mind that the Germans were pioneering high-speed aircraft designs. The Allied jet projects all incorporated a form of straight wing while the later German designs (post He280, Me262) were incorporating a swept design: Me262 HGIII, Me P.1101, Ta183, etc.

Also, Dr. Lippisch's delta wing design (DFS194, Me163) had an enormous influence on aircraft design post-war.


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## pbehn (Nov 7, 2015)

fastmongrel said:


> Theres a reason why virtually every single aircraft flying today is *not* a Flying Wing. The more the Germans played with VunderVeapons the quicker the inevitable defeat the LW needed more Me262 and Ar234s not an aircraft that after years of development and hundreds of test flights might have been made into a useful combat aircraft.



I always think that a flying wing is a great idea but to be useful today it must be as big as a jumbo jet flying sideways, something like two times the wingspan of an A380.


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## Gixxerman (Nov 8, 2015)

pampa14 said:


> the Horten flying wing. Perhaps, the aircraft of the Second World War the most ahead of its time than any other



No offence but I just don't get this.
It was a flying wing, that was not unique even in 1944/45.
It had 2 jet engines, again not unique at this stage.

It never flew in production form ( of the 3 prototypes only 2 flew, 1 was a glider the other crashed killed its pilot on its 3rd flight).
That's about as 'prototype as it gets so far off knowing anything much about what it could do as to make, in my opinion, so much of the various comment about it more than a little faintly absurd.

Anyone who has seen the plane can see it's a tubular steel frame with plywood covering, again not exactly cutting-edge advanced.

Interesting but hardly justifying the 'coulda-woulda'shoulda' claims many seem determined to make on its behalf....and lets be honest almost all derived because if you squint your eyes it has a shape a little bit like a B2 Stealth bomber 

( all of which studiously ignores the thousands of hours super-computers spent designing a military FW which worked properly, the thousands of hours spent perfecting fly-by-wire systems which enable the B2 to be properly controlled, the vast difference in scale, the vast resources spent on true stealth etc etc).

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## GrauGeist (Nov 8, 2015)

Northrup's B-2 did borrow from the lessons learned from their B-35 and B-49 projects. The B-2 even had the exact wingspan of the B-49: 172 feet (52.4m).

Northrup, like the Horton brothers, were pioneers in flying wing technology...

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## GregP (Nov 8, 2015)

Later machine guns got slower for a reason. A slower rates of fire allows the shooter to see what his fire is hitting and adjust the aim before running out of ammunition.It isn't so important ona tripod or mounted weapon, but seems to be vital for a hand-held weapon.

When I shot a Thompson, you could point it close and walk your impact point around your target in a figure eight easily.. It was one of the very slow-firing Thompsons. Something like Mac 10 is nothing but a room broom. You can't really hit anything specific with it. No so with a Thompson. Almost anyone can hit with it after a few tries.

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## bobbysocks (Nov 8, 2015)

a lot of the german MGs had a 2 stage trigger....pull one place for ~800 RPM and the other for ~1200 RPM. the latter was used when you had a narrow field of fire and a lot of targets filling it or you were about to get overrun....


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## Airframes (Nov 8, 2015)

MG34 and early MG42 had two-position trigger (_single_ shot and full auto, not slower rate of fire), deleted on later MG42.


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## nuuumannn (Nov 8, 2015)

> No offence but I just don't get this.
> It was a flying wing, that was not unique even in 1944/45.
> It had 2 jet engines, again not unique at this stage.



I'm with Gixxerman about this. There is a lot of hype about this aircraft and most of it has surfaced _after_ the B-2 entered service. There was certainly information about the aircraft before the B-2 made the flying wing fashionable again, but before it, there were no claims about it being the big-secret-the-Luftwaffe-had-that-could-have-won-the-war-had-this-or-that-not-happened yada yada. The whole stealth angle was never examined before the B-2 either, so I think the media is guilty of painting a picture of something that wasn't really there - now there's a first.

The Wonder Weapon tag is a bit of a misnomer for this aircraft, to be honest. The flying wing and jet combination was an abstract approach to what was being worked on - around the world, not just in Germany - at the time. The fact was, aircraft like the Me 262, which to all intents and purposes was a conventional fighter produced as a result of an evolutionary process, was the Luftwaffe's front line fighter at the end of the war was definitely what the Germans had their hopes on (the Me 262's swept wings were as a result of altering the aircraft's centre of gravity/lift, not specifically to improve its speed performance). The Horten was not exactly given a high priority until near the very end when the Germans were desperate for quick solutions - look at the Natter and Me 163. Even the Germans didn't place that much priority on it, so why is the modern media? Placing expectations that didn't exist at the time on something that looks the part, I reckon.

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## GrauGeist (Nov 8, 2015)

There is a certain "romance" to the mysterious machines that Germany was developing. Yes, the Ho.IX was not unique as far as flying wings go and of course, there were other jet powered aircraft at the time. However, the Ho.IX was the first jet powered wing, which did make it unique.

As time passes, the mystique grows...much like World War I was in the spotlight of "romanticism" 40 - 50 years afterward, stirred by the media and such. I recall the fascination they had with the Fokker Dr.I and Zepplins, building them up to legendary status even though the Zepplins were easy kills and the D.VII was a far superior aircraft.

So now, WWI has faded into the background and WWII draws the crowds...

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## Airframes (Nov 8, 2015)

And hyped by authors/writers/TV presenters with little knowledge, into 'secret weapons' placed into 'what if' scenarios, which surely should have made a difference ...... if given a further ten years development, and un-limited resources of man-power, finance, materials, fuel and time ! 
Heck - was that a 'Luftwaffe '46' flying saucer which just flew past my window ..............

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## GregP (Nov 8, 2015)

Some of the Luft 46 stuff makes me laugh; some looks interesting.

NONE of it had a prayer of getting built and flown ... except maybe the Ta 182. It probably COULD have been built and flown, but wasn't. So it's pie in the sky.


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## Milosh (Nov 9, 2015)

GregP said:


> Some of the Luft 46 stuff makes me laugh; some looks interesting.
> 
> *NONE of it had a prayer of getting built and flown* ... except maybe the Ta 182. It probably COULD have been built and flown, but wasn't. So it's pie in the sky.



Finger problems again Greg > Ta182? 

.... but some of the ideas can be found in a/c post war.


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## GrauGeist (Nov 9, 2015)

GregP said:


> ... except maybe the Ta 182. It probably COULD have been built and flown, but wasn't.


Actually, the Ta183 was built postwar as the Brazilian Pulqui II and one of the 4 even saw combat.

If you look at the Ta183 concepts, the most popular design was V1 that people associate with the Ta183. However, after extensive testing and modifications, it was V3 that was decided to produce, but time ran out before anything came of it.

The Russians did get the plans, and it's been said they built and flew it...and apparently, they borrowed several design features although Russian historian Yefim Gordon says that the MiG-15 was completely a native design with no western influence... 

This is the Brazilian "Ta183" AKA the Pulqui:







Hmmm...sure looks familiar, doesn't it?

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## parsifal (Nov 9, 2015)

thanks for posting pampa and very interesting

As far as the new tech question is concerned, new technology is good to have but only of value if you are in a position to exploit it AND your availabilities don't suffer. That's where the Germans fell down many times. much of their technology was well ahead in terms of capability, but that very advantage could be costly and therefore limit the numbers.

The most successful German designs are those examples where attention to "producability" was part of the equation, like the MP38 and the MG 42. where they didn't worry about production costs and production times, their force effectiveness unquestionably suffered, such as with the Tiger tank, and dare I say it, the Me 262. 

Speer criticised the impracticality of many German designs repeatedly and he has good reason to do so. In the case of AFV production for example, a smaller, cheaper mobile ATG was what they needed, not a tank that took about three times as many man hours to produce as their counterparts......

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## fastmongrel (Nov 9, 2015)

GrauGeist said:


> Actually, the Ta183 was built postwar as the Brazilian Pulqui II and one of the 4 even saw combat.
> 
> If you look at the Ta183 concepts, the most popular design was V1 that people associate with the Ta183. However, after extensive testing and modifications, it was V3 that was decided to produce, but time ran out before anything came of it.
> 
> ...



I thought the Pulqui was Argentinian


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## Milosh (Nov 9, 2015)

GrauGeist said:


> Actually, the Ta183 was built postwar as the Brazilian Pulqui II and one of the 4 even saw combat.
> 
> If you look at the Ta183 concepts, the most popular design was V1 that people associate with the Ta183. However, after extensive testing and modifications, it was V3 that was decided to produce, but time ran out before anything came of it.
> 
> ...



That should be *Argentina* not Brazil. It had its own flight problems.


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## tyrodtom (Nov 9, 2015)

Kurt Tank was head of the Pulgui IIs design team. 4 prototypes built, 2 crashed with fatalities.
The only combat one prototype was in being the Coup De'tat against Peron in 1955.

One of the Horton brothers went to work for a aircraft concern in Brazil after WW2. Built several fairly successful glider flying wings, and one unsuccessful cargo flying wing.
I can see no proof that either of the Horton brothers could get anyone interested in continuing development of their WW2 military designs.


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## GrauGeist (Nov 9, 2015)

fastmongrel said:


> I thought the Pulqui was Argentinian





Milosh said:


> That should be *Argentina* not Brazil. It had its own flight problems.


Yep...Argentina!

I have no idea why Brazil got in there and I can't even blame it as a typo 



tyrodtom said:


> ...I can see no proof that either of the Horton brothers could get anyone interested in continuing development of their WW2 military designs.


I think that post war, people were still trying to absorbe the jet concept...a flying wing was a bit much. Think of it along the lines of Udet, who did not trust a jet engine and made that sentiment known when he was shown the He178 for the first time.


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## Gixxerman (Nov 9, 2015)

The Argentinian Pulqui does tend to indicate that the Ta 183, like a lot of the 'Luft 46' stuff, just might not have been the immediate smash-hit some claim.
I suspect the Horten would have been similar.

There's a vast difference between a sketched prototype (like the Ta) or even an actual prototype (like the Horten) and a properly tested combat machine using brand new tech.
Nevermind one with properly understood worked out tactics for it's use (something the Me262 was, of necessity, having to make up as it went along).

Advanced ideas have a habit of taking time to implement properly effectively.

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## drgondog (Nov 9, 2015)

The promise of the Flying wing was reduced Parasite Drag for greater range, payload and speed. The curse (still is ) is lack of stability and control, now achievable with extremely sophisticated Control System feedback managed by computer.

IMO the key 'secret weapons' were
Radar
Asdic/Sonar
Computational gunsights slaving fire control systems and gyro coupled computing gunsights for fighters.
Practical jet engines
Controllable ballistic missiles utilizing rockets
Bazooka/Panzerfaust
Proximity fuses
Long range/high performance escort fighters
Nuclear weapons 

I know I missed some but each of the above were game changers and/or major force leverage's that when introduced, introduced a major upgrade to attack/defense.

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## GrauGeist (Nov 9, 2015)

The Germans were also making a great deal of progress with guided munitions, too. One of the most notable, was the "Fritz X".

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## bobbysocks (Nov 9, 2015)

Airframes said:


> MG34 and early MG42 had two-position trigger (_single_ shot and full auto, not slower rate of fire), deleted on later MG42.



yep...just remembered the double trigger and got confused with CETME Ameli...which looks like the 34/42 style and had 2 rates of fire...by swaping bolts


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## Gixxerman (Nov 10, 2015)

GrauGeist said:


> The Germans were also making a great deal of progress with guided munitions, too. One of the most notable, was the "Fritz X".



I agree, wire guided missiles would become ( to some extent still are) very important munitions. But it's the usual story, too little far too late.
But I do agree, they were pioneering the field.

Perfected in the anti-tank role they might have gone some way to stop the sea of T's, KV's, JS's Su's heading Germanys way.
Unfortunately as far as air-launched weaponry goes even if they were available say a year earlier than they were scheduled to start arriving (June/July 45?) they were just too late would have been stuck with launch-vehicle problems (too few, little fuel too few pilots especially) not to mention skies crawling with so many allied fighters catching them taking off or landing (bit like the Japanese Ohka, an interesting deadly suicide bomb without a credible delivery means).


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## Token (Nov 10, 2015)

drgondog said:


> IMO the key 'secret weapons' were
> Radar
> Asdic/Sonar
> <snip>>



RADAR and SONAR are often quoted as WW II developments or secret weapons of WW II. Yet neither were. Important, yes, secret in detail (as many are today), yes, improved immensely during WW II, yes. But an invention of or as a result of WW II, no.

Both Axis and Allies used and developed SONAR and RADAR before and during WW II. And they knew of the use and development of SONAR and RADAR by the other side.

ASDIC / SONAR was developed in WW I. The state of the art from 1919 to 1940 changed little, but the systems did exist. In WW II they really became good systems.

RADAR is sometimes stated as a “British invention”, but this is not true.

The basic principles of reflecting RF off of a target, such as a ship, to detect its presence goes back to before WW I and was the subject of many experiments in many nations. From the late 1920’s to the late 1930’s the associated technologies matured enough to support more research into this. This happened more or less concurrently in several nations around the World, including the UK, the US, Russia, Germany, Japan, Italy, France, Netherlands, and others. Every one of these nations had at least prototype working RADAR systems before 1940, and most had them before 1938.

The British where, by a very small margin of time, the first to successfully show what could be called “modern” RADAR in mid 1935 in a repeatable fashion. The US Navy had done essentially the same thing several months earlier (Dec 1934), but had problems repeating the experiment, and the detection ranges were much shorter. About 11 months after the British, and independent of them, NRL had their first operational and repeatable RADAR prototype that had been demonstrated to detect aircraft at significant distances.

The Japanese were arguably ahead of the rest of the World with regards to early RADAR antenna design and magnetron design, at least prior to the widespread use of microwave frequencies. And while they had operational RADAR systems during WW II they never seemed to embrace the technology as the force multiplier it can be.

T!


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## pbehn (Nov 10, 2015)

For Radar the "invention" was the oscilloscope and the electronic gubbins. It had been noted that aeroplanes interfered with radio waves for years all that was needed was to see if anything was reflected and magnify it and make sense of it et viola RDF (radar).


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## parsifal (Nov 10, 2015)

For both radar and asdic, it was not the invention itself that was the secret. Both sides knew of it, and in some respects the germans were technologically superior to the allies. The secrets were the manner and ways that these devices were used, and put simply the allies just put the hammers dowen and were never seriously challenged in either of those fields. Japan and italy, for example,. were about 5-10 years behind the allies in the development of radar, mostly because of an under-developed electronics industry.

Germany too, whilst enjoying an impressive R&D base for the technology never came close to the application of radar as the allies did. Sonar for example, the allies managed to solve its blind spot problems by 1943, which married to the ahead throwing technologies developed in the mid war period, really went a long way to defeating the U-Boats

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## pbehn (Nov 10, 2015)

As I said, the "invention" is turning a wave into an electronic pulse, link that to a timing device and you have the basis of many technologies. I was an ultrasonic technician for a while, I was taught by one of the pioneers of ultrasonics in the UK. He ran the school in his home (a massive garage conversion) and still had 1950s ultrasonics sets there, they were very similar to what you see in the Battle of Britain movie. 

Not an invention at all or even a weapon but a "key strength" for the allies was the obtaining and processing of information and intelligence quickly. That goes from Dowdings integrated defence of the UK, to the massive joint effort in aerial photo and weather recon over Europe, the ultimate being Bletchley park and all the services around it. I read that the Germans were not really surprised that enigma was broken, they were very surprised at it being broken on an industrial scale almost in operational real time.

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## Ascent (Nov 11, 2015)

My understanding (and I could be wrong here) was that another key strength of the Allies was putting the technoligies into use.

The Germans tried to perfect it before putting it into use whereas the Allies would cobble something crude together that could be used while they worked on better stuff for the future.


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## fastmongrel (Nov 11, 2015)

Ascent said:


> My understanding (and I could be wrong here) was that another key strength of the Allies was putting the technoligies into use.
> 
> The Germans tried to perfect it before putting it into use whereas the Allies would cobble something crude together that could be used while they worked on better stuff for the future.



The Germans were very dimissive of a British mobile radar they captured in France. The German radar experts called it crude and poorly made compared to German radars. This opinion ignored the fact that Britain had dozens of mobile radars plus a complete early warning and control radar system in the Chain Home, whereas Germany had a grand total of eight land service radars and they were being used for training and experiments.

A breadboard rig in the field is worth any number of radars that can't be used.


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## pbehn (Nov 11, 2015)

fastmongrel said:


> The Germans were very dimissive of a British mobile radar they captured in France. The German radar experts called it crude and poorly made compared to German radars. This opinion ignored the fact that Britain had dozens of mobile radars plus a complete early warning and control radar system in the Chain Home, whereas Germany had a grand total of eight land service radars and they were being used for training and experiments.
> 
> A breadboard rig in the field is worth any number of radars that can't be used.


I agree.

You could say that Chain Home was 1936/7 technology in 1940 true but that is what time it takes in peacetime to get something out of a lab and working all around the country. By 1940 the British were working on airborne radar so cant have been far behind the Germans,

Dowdings control system with Chain Home contained no marvellous technology in 1949 just the imagination to link everywhere up by telephone and sort the information quickly so the guys in charge knew what was happening.

Maybe the flying wing was a great theoretical idea that didnt overcome many practical problems.


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## Token (Nov 11, 2015)

Ascent said:


> My understanding (and I could be wrong here) was that another key strength of the Allies was putting the technoligies into use.
> 
> The Germans tried to perfect it before putting it into use whereas the Allies would cobble something crude together that could be used while they worked on better stuff for the future.



I think your first statement wraps it up well, but your second is a common misconception.

The Axis forces seem to have never put the emphasis on these kinds of technologies that the Allies did. Possibly this was not a weapon in the traditional sense, and so it did not "fight" the war, and more effort went to things that went fast and caused a bang.

The Allies radar in WW II was neither crude (for the time) nor cobbled together. They were developmentally ahead of the curve in relationship to the Axis in every way in the field of radar from about 1936 on, despite everyone being on pretty even footing in about 1934.

For example, the German Seetakt, Freya, and Wurzburg, radars were the equal to or even slightly ahead of their operational Allied counterparts on the days of their individual introduction to operational service. They were not ahead of what the Allies had in development and prototyped. The Germans used these radars by the thousands, and made gradual improvements to them along the way.

The Allies made the CXAM/SCR-270/271 and SCR-268 (these compared well to the Seetakt and Freya at the time of their introduction) and used them by the thousands. Instead of making large improvements to these radars the efforts tended to be more minor improvements, and "lets build a new radar while we keep these models in operation". They developed a good radar, fielded it, and instead of improving it (other than required improvements to correct deficiencies) they continued its production while starting up more advanced programs in the background. Remember the SCR-270 detected the Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor on the way in with lots of warning time, but that information was not used / interpreted correctly.

By 1943 the comparative acceleration rates of the Axis and Allies in this field was pretty obviously leaning towards the Allies. The Germans were largely maxing out the ability of their existing systems, with few new systems fielded in any number, and the Allies were introducing whole new systems with new technologies. An example of this: what would become the SCR-584 started development roughly one year after the Wurzburg development started, and was operational by early 1943, 3 years after the first Wurzburg. It took longer to develop because it was doing new things in new ways. This effort paid off handsomely, as the -584 was far superior to the improved Wurzburgs of 1943. The -584 was trailer mounted and could be quickly set up (in minutes) in a new location. The -584, despite having a more compact antenna, had greater tracking accuracy. The -584 had search modes the Wurzburg did not have. The -584 had the ability to automatically track a target, were the Wurzburg was an operator intensive aided / manual track. The -584, with the M9, resulted in greater gunfire accuracy for larger numbers of guns.

The SCR-584 was in its spring with lots of headroom to grow at the same time the Wurzburg (and similar German systems) was in its fall. While aspects of the Wurzburg designs were used in very limited numbers after WW 2 the SCR-584, in various incarnations, is still in use today. The Russian built Fire Can radar (SON-9) was a copy of this radar developed from the SCR-584's given to Russia during Lend Lease and is likely still in use with several militaries around the world. It was for sure shooting down American aircraft as late as 1973.

The last time I personally had hands on an operational SCR-584 was in the early 1990's.

T!


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## Koopernic (Nov 12, 2015)

Token said:


> I think your first statement wraps it up well, but your second is a common misconception.
> 
> SNIP
> The Allies radar in WW II was neither crude (for the time) nor cobbled together. They were developmentally ahead of the curve in relationship to the Axis in every way in the field of radar from about 1936 on, despite everyone being on pretty even footing in about 1934.
> ...




Deliveries of Wurzburg D to the Luftwaffe started in June 1941. It gave the Luftwaffe a radar with 0.3 degree accuracy elevation/azimuth accuracy with conical scan and 25m accuracy in range with transfer to the FLAK predictor by Synchro. These figures assume a high elevation angle so that there would be no interference with the ground plane otherwise 0.5 degree and 40m. This was the finest anti aircraft gun laying radar in the world till mid/late 1943 when SCR-584 was rushed to Anzio Beachhead because the Germans were jamming the SCR-268. There was nothing like it in the allied arsenal for 2 years. Wurzburg-Riesse, with a giant 7m dish had twice the angular accuracy again and when this fixed radar as a FLAK radar was a very accurate blind fire radar to defend cities and high priority targets. Wruzburg-C (early 1941) had the conical scan but lacked the range precision and synchro transmitters and the Wurzburg-A of 1940 lacked the conical scan entirely.

SCR-268 was 2.5 times less accurate in bearing accuracy and 3.5 times less accurate in range to Wurzburg-D. That made it essentially ineffective for pure blind fire.

Around late 1943 as SCR-584 was entering service the Germans introduced the Mannheim FuMG 64 radar. As it also had a 3m dish it is often confused with Wurzburg. Output power was doubled, power drive was added, precision electronics for tracking was added and range accuracy was 10m. The second issue of this radar of early 1944 added electronic tracking and reduced ranging precision to 6m. It could track through windows once a target was found.

This radar compares very favourably with SCR-584. However the Germans had stayed on a 53cm wavelength instead of 9cm microwaves so there radar beam was wider and more vulnerable to receiving jamming energy.

In mid or late 1944 they field tested a few Rotterheim radars consisting of LMS10 magnetrons (copied from captured British CV64 but set to 8.4cm instead of 9cm to avoid interference with German passive detectors) using a Mannheim station and a Wurzburg dish. Worked quite well and was not jammed. However by late 1944 the war was going badly. The Sanitas works that made the Magnetrons was bombed and so the Germans lost all of their mass production output of magnetrons. The Hareaus Vacuum Foundry was bombed which means they lost their capability of producing permanent magnets and forcing them to modify the magnetrons for electromagnets and adding an unwelcome precision power supply.

This pretty much destroyed the deployment of microwave radar for the Germans though they managed to get up to 100 in service including on naval installations.

Below is a picture of the Marbach Egerland radar system. The flat antenna is a PPI 8.4cm microwave radar. The parabolic dish was a 4.5 m dish also on 8.4cm. The PPI radar could observe multiple targets. A pip could be placed on a target and the parabolic dish would slave to the correct direction and scan for height. Up to 7 targets could be tracked. The parabolic dish could also direct FLAK. Power output was only 16kW but 500kW and 1MW magnetrons were in the lab.






As far as Seetak goes this was the finest radar of its type till about 1943 as well and matched allied systems till the end of war.

Early versions had only 1.5kW output power, they then switched to 8kW power and shortly thereafter added what is incorrectly called lobe switching for full blind fire capability (about 0.2 degrees) it seems in 1941 on FuMo 27. Whereas the lobe switching of American Battleship and cruiser radar switched both the transmitting beam as well as the receiving the Germans had worked out a way of switching only the receiving dipoles in a procedure call raddle peilung (rattle direction finding) named after the rattling sound made by the mechanical switch of the receive dipoles. This reduced the beam width, hid the lobe switching pattern from jamming techniques and made the antenna smaller. The lobe pattern on US Battleships was so wide (15 degrees) it could confuse nearby targets.


The whole Scharnhorst sinking reinforces the myths. The Scharnhorst was observing radar silence and passive sensors had mistaken Burnets cruisers for a distant convoy though a short 30 second 'action stations' was sounded indicating the Scharnhorst had detected them probably by passive means. The short fire fight damaged Scharnhorst forward radar meaning she was no longer able to detect Duke of York in the latter encounter though again there was an action stations before DoY fired.

The German radar was 8kW at the time and was equal in performance to the British 25kW radars. The Germans had a much longer pulse of lower peak power so the range was about the same since the energy was the same. Because they used grid instead of anode modulation they could synchronise the phase of the transmitter to receiver and recover phase information for recovering resolution and accuracy. In the case of Duke of York the Type 284M radar had just been upgraded from 25kW to 125kW so the British were now outranging the Germans. The rear facing German radar could probably detect and range the British ship but at long range it probably couldn't pick up shell splash which is needed for correcting fire. At one point the Duke of York had to stop firing because it couldn't pick up shell splash as the range opened up. Scharnhorst was 50% of Germanys capital ships and was not quite the radar priority but they had planed to upgrade to 120kW power.

On the day she was sunk Tirpitz detected the Lancasters 30 minutes out at 150km *over land* using her own radar. This long range indicates she had been upgraded to 120kW. She also had a Hoehtenweil PPI radar added by then and a FuMo 81 Berlin 9cm microwave radar. If Tirpitz had of ended up in one of those Iowa/Missouri fights the Tirpitz would not have been outperformed in the radar area. (To be fair H class battleship is same Generation as Iowa)

The failure to intercept the Lancasters is now thought due to treachery as the commander of the German Wassermann radar station which had detected the Lancasters was a traitor along with two colleagues they misreported the Lancasters heading. The men were latter extracted by Norwegian resistance and had planned to shoot their own officers and surrender in case of an allied invasion thus proving they had turned.

Me 109's were scrambled but were delayed further by 5 minutes due to a Ju 52 transport landing and a few minutes by being dispersed at the wrong end of the runway due to headwinds. They missed the Lancasters by 2 minutes.


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## parsifal (Nov 12, 2015)

Its silly to argue that german radar at sea in 1943+ was equal or superior to that of the allies. By 1943 their surface fleet was largely laid up in ports with occasional heroic, but futile sorties that at no point showed any marked or clear superiority in terms of the detection systems they carried. In terms of ground based radars it might be a different story, but at sea , there is no instance after 1943 that demonstrates a clear superiority of german surface air search or fire control radars.

Overwhelmingly, the main battle at sea with the Kriegsmarine throughout the war, but moreso after 1942, was with the Uboats. Allied small ships possessed radar capable of detecting a Uboat periscope from 1941. They possessed an ASV set with an effective range able to detect a perisope at ranges out to aboput 5miles from the end of 1942. by 1943, the Uboats, whilst belatedly being fitted with a surface radar, were hopelessly behind the allies in terms of what they could stuff into a small package and make it reliable enough for operational use in a heaving Uboat. They did do it, and it worked, but it was nowhere near as effective as the allied short wavelength surface and airborne radars being fitted into allied warships and a/c at that time, and which they found themselves facing up to. if they had been equal to the task, it becomes impossible to explain why in the space of less than 60 days in 1943 they lost more than 60 Boats. If their radar had been equal or superior to the late war allied suite, the slaughter of their kind could not have been achieved.

The Kriegsmarine was in fact investing in passive detection systems, namely Metox and Naxos. For a time these passive detectors gave the Uboats early warning of allied active radars, but they were sucessively countered and overcome by the allies each time.

Germany had some very superior radars in development in the latter part of the war. Several of her ships were fitted with these radars, but standing operating policies largely negated the advantages these modern radars might otherwise have given


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## nuuumannn (Nov 12, 2015)

Regarding radar, you could be a bit more specific and argue the case for the cavity magnetron.

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## Koopernic (Nov 12, 2015)

Everyone in the world was aware of type of magnetron called a split anode type, roughly could be regarded as having two semi circular cavities. The Germans used one in 1935, quite successfully, on their testbed seetakt.

The British invention consisted of 6 multiple cavities that were round and had a narrow slit. The dimension were exactly that of a 0.38 inch revolver and indeed were made on tools for that revolver. More powerful at high frequencies.

The early British microwave radar had considerable limitations in accuracy because of the way the pulse is formed. These problems and the problem of detecting shell splash meant the RN never abandoned its type 284 nor did the USN (and they fixed the beam width issue). However they could be installed on small escort corvettes where they had separate transmit and receive antenna and had to use coiled up coax cable. I was very primitive, no PPI for instance and inaccurate but sufficient for detecting u-boats. PPI took a long time to be issued probably late 1943 as the priority was H2S. Seetakt from the very beginning of war could be fitted to a destroyer due to its refined antenna technology and relatively high frequency. Remember the microwave radar never led to a deployable British microwave Anti Aircraft radar, there was some Canadian work, for the British and the American work wasn't ready till 1943 either.

Hence the Germans didn't have so much incentive to develop a crude microwave system as their systems worked quite well. It wasn't until mid 1943 with the deadly Hamburg fire bombing where windows was used and which that killed 40,000 people that the worst problem became apparent. IE with reasonable sized antenna the beam width intercepted to much jamming energy.

The key features of the British invention were understood by the Germans. Multiple Circular cavities with narrow slits was a feature of a German magnetron of 1940 by Lorentz. If you have $25 you can download the paper by Doering on German microwave tube development which has a picture. It was however designed for generating small signals only. A larger tube by Santias, also from 1940 good for 200W continuous and probably 2kW pulse had all the features but the circular cavities, they were square. The French experimental 16cm radar was based on this square cavity type of multicavity magnetron and some features of its emissivity coatings ended up greatly improving the British tube.

The German quest for higher frequencies was directed at developing highly refined existing technology. Although they had developed the tubes required which were known as ceramic disk triodes (lighthouse valve in the US). with this they produced a 5.5kW 21.5cm radar in 1940 called eisbaer (ice bear or polar bear) and had planned on deploying a FLAK control radars in about 1943 at about 27.5cm. The set was called Mannheim-K to operate at 120kW, a 50kW version for fire control with a reduced size antenna was probably deployed at the end of the war, It was called Euklid. Lorentz's was described as 80cm complete in 1942.

One reason for these systems is that the Germans had developed a habit of using one advantage of these 'triode' devices in that the frequency and phase could be precisely controlled and they were keen not to give it up leading them to focus on difficult and complex devices.

Due to resource issues and the problems of setting up new production lines these efforts were mostly abandoned just development of fieldable devices seemed imminent. The technicians were drafted into the German armed services. A engineer called Peter Schwann who emigrated to the US is interview by the IEEE and he notes it took months to get the experts back from the field after the British magnetron was discovered in a shot down sterling.

Using engineers technicians and engineers in front line units was very common for the Germans. Combat exposure was highly expected and skilled men were sometimes rotated back and forth between industry and the services. Apart from the obvious disadvantage of plundering German industry of its skilled manpower these men often were captured and so were an enormous intelligence risk.

The manpower shortage can not be underestimated. Nevertheless German radar was as good in some cases better till 1943 when the superiority of microwave systems showed up in some critical areas. The Germans did effectively catch up technically in 2 years and field devices within 1.5 years. There is a statement by one of the British radar developers tasked to analyse the German development (Lovell I think) and he says they had essentially caught up and that the advantage of radar would now switch to the defenders.

The Japanese actually beat Randall and Boot to a magnetron by 1 year. The tested their surface search sets on a pair of cruisers around then same time. They however only slowly rolled it out and then only in the navy. Nevertheless their Type 22 was an effective surface search radar and there would be no sneaking up on them. They only developed it into a blind fire radar right at the end of the war.


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## Koopernic (Nov 12, 2015)

parsifal said:


> Germany too, whilst enjoying an impressive R&D base for the technology never came close to the application of radar as the allies did. Sonar for example, the allies managed to solve its blind spot problems by 1943, which married to the ahead throwing technologies developed in the mid war period, really went a long way to defeating the U-Boats




*The active sonar that the German navy equipped its destroyers with never had a blind spot problem,* it was significantly superior. The passive sonar was vastly superior, they used a phased array to point the beam.



parsifal said:


> For both radar and asdic, it was not the invention itself that was the secret. Both sides knew of it, and in some respects the germans were technologically superior to the allies. The secrets were the manner and ways that these devices were used, and put simply the allies just put the hammers dowen and were never seriously challenged in either of those fields. Japan and italy, for example,. were about 5-10 years behind the allies in the development of radar, mostly because of an under-developed electronics industry.





*The Germans invented radar first not the British.* Clearly though the British developed theirs independently. In the key milestones they were ahead of the British by 1 year to a month. Mention should also be made of a pulse echo radar altimeter the USA had developed and demonstrated in 1925 that would have detected aircraft and that once the US had the idea its General Electric SCR270/268 radars were more useful than Chain Home and based entirely on US technology.

If the following is used as the determinant *it was the Germans that first detected and found the range to an aircraft *(rather than just measure its presence as Watson Watt did a few months later as his proof of concept) and *they were the first to detect a seaborn target some time before*. All dates in Harry von Krogge’s “GEMA, Birthplace of radar”.

Radar was an invention of the German Navy. It was the brainchild of Freiherr von Kunhold an Admiral and the Physicist in charge of the signals Branch of the German Navy. After finding fundamental physical limitations in using sonar for blind fire control his idea is to extend the pulse echo techniques in sonar to the radio frequency field.

After being somewhat insolently rejected by Dr Runge of Telefunken (which would cause future problems) he approached two companies “Tonograqphie” that produced sound recording equipment for training sonar operators and that when incorporated became the GEMA that produced Seetakt and a company called Pintsch.

Pintsch produced a 13.5cm microwave radar that eventually grew to 0.6W output power and could detect a destroyer at about 1km. It used microwaves but the Barkhausen-Kurz vacuum tube was incapable of higher power outputs. No suitable magnetrons existed anywhere in the world at the time that could operate at centimetric frequencies. The value of microwaves was understood by some in Germany but the only tube that could generate them anywhere in the world was the Barkhausen-Kurz.

Tonographie initially used a commercially available 50cm split anode magnetron from Philips soon replaced by a more powerful Telefunken unit producing 4kW. This could range ships and aircraft to about 10km. The Germans could even use lobe switching in 1936 to 0.05 degrees for blind fire but the idea was rejected as too complex at the time.
When the Germans entered the war they had a radar that could fit on a destroyer with a narrow beam width that could detect and accurately locate a periscope or submarine conning tower. It took the British 2 years to come up with something as capable. It required microwave radar.

Instead of persisting with the 50cm split anode magnetrons of they changed to pair of acorn valves with a resonator printed on a ceramic printed circuit board operating at (tunable 70cm to 90cm) because 50-60 was reserved for FLAK radar.

Allied radars created their pulse by dumping a huge 'spark' like an automotive ignition coil into the tube. The Germans turned the tube on and off via its control grid and so were able to precisely control frequency and phase which was locked with a oscillator. They had less power but could get the same range an accuracy and some other information to boot such as Doppler.


Allied radar pulled ahead only after early 1943 and by late 1944 the German had caught up.


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## parsifal (Nov 13, 2015)

> The active sonar that the German navy equipped its destroyers with never had a blind spot problem,[/B] it was significantly superior. The passive sonar was vastly superior, they used a phased array to point the beam.



ah nope. British submarines operated in the confines of the European shallow waters of which 19 were lost to the Germans. 10 of these, give or take were lost to mines. germans built 200 dedicated ASW platforms, principally their type 1935 MSWs and derivatives and about the same number or R bootes, plus well over 250 trawler conversions, to protect about 3.5 million tons of german and captured shipping.

Im not going to undertake a breakdown of sinkings attributable for the entire war by the RN. But in 1940-41, the entire detection and sinking campaigns really did rest on the ability of the RNs ASW fleet and the ASDIC it was using. In 1940 there was an average of 220 escorts available, whilst in 1941 this figure rose to just over 400 ships. The majority were still extemporised trawler conversions and the like, and air power really wasn't all that decisive until 1942. In that period, whilst defending over 30 million tons of shipping (not all that successfully to be honest) along supply lines vastly longer and more exposed than those of Germany, the surface escorts managed to sink 56 enemy subs, of which about 45 were from the depth charges or the guns of the escorts. 

There were an average of around 40 British subs in enemy northern European waters during the war, whilst the average daily availability for the DKM Uboat arm in 1940-41 was just 18 boats....by any measure you want to apply, the efficiency of the allied escorts at finding and sinking Uboats was heavily in favour of the British..... 



> *The Germans invented radar first not the British.* Clearly though the British developed their independently. In the key milestones they were ahead of the British by 1 year to a month. Mention should also be made of a pulse echo radar altimeter the USA had developed and demonstrated in 1925 that would have detected aircraft and that once the US had the idea its General Electric SCR270/268 radars were more useful than Chain Home and based entirely on US technology.





> Okay, but the germans were not able to match the radar performance of their uboats against that of their opponents in the critical years 1941-45. much of the time, the uboats had no radar at all, when they did finally start to receive it, it was mismanaged by faulty doctrine, and always found inferior to those fitted to the escorts they were ranged against. to be fair they didn't need to be. A uboat closed up and operating with conning tower only able the waves is a much more difficult target to find than a surface escort. even so, its a lay down mezzaire. by 1943, both surface escorts and airborne radars were easily outperforming those of the uboats, and that's the test that matters.
> 
> 
> Radar was an invention of the German Navy. It was the brainchild of Freiherr von Kunhold an Admiral and the Physicist in charge of the signals Branch of the German Navy. After finding fundamental physical limitations in using sonar for blind fire control his idea is to extend the pulse echo techniques in sonar to the radio frequency field.
> ...


Okay....and in the words of my son....'and then what'?



> When the Germans entered the war they had a radar that could fit on a destroyer with a narrow beam width that could detect and accurately locate a periscope or submarine conning tower. It took the British 2 years to come up with something as capable. It required microwave radar.


No DKM DD was fitted with radar until midwar, and just one RN submarine was ever definitively located and destroyed by radar location at the hands of the Kriegsmarine. No british submarine was ever lost to attack from aircraft guided solely by ASV. There was just one example of an airborne kill (the cachalot from memory) , which relied on crypto-analysis work done just after April 1940 

If the germans had superior DD and airborne ASV radars they sure didn't know how to use it....... 



> Instead of persisting with the 50cm split anode magnetrons of they changed to pair of acorn valves with a resonator printed on a ceramic printed circuit board operating at (tunable 70cm to 90cm) because 50-60 was reserved for FLAK radar.



okay if you say so. Don't really care unless it can be demonstrated by operational results that it made any difference. it doesn't does it......



> Allied radars created their pulse by dumping a huge 'spark' like an automotive ignition coil into the tube. The Germans turned the tube on and off via its control grid and so were able to precisely control frequency and phase which was locked with a oscillator. They had less power but could get the same range an accuracy and some other information to boot such as Doppler.



Maybe, but whereas the Allies achieved an impressive kill ratio of German submarines, the Germans did not achieve the same in revers, despite having a HIGHER density of escorts, and more opportunities to combat the allied submarine effort. During the Norwegian campaign, it is a little known fact that the british subs sank more than 40% of the available german Merchant marines. Despite quite massive densities of escorts to shipping for a time they could not prevent this. 

In the med, the Italians relied on german supplied ASDIC gear, although the Germans I believe did not provide them with enough radar to make a difference. Here the results were even less satisfactory. Similalry, in the Pacific the floundering Japanese efforts at development of radar was meant to be helped by the germans so called "advanced" radar system. None of it measured up operationally. Suggest to me the original suppliers weren't as 'advanced as its "ra ra" squad would have us believe.

Germany never produced an ahead throwing ASW technology, because its radar and sonar was either non-existent, or not up to the task. 



> Allied radar pulled ahead only after early 1943 and by late 1944 the German had caught up.


In theory.........


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## fastmongrel (Nov 13, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> When the Germans entered the war they had a radar that could fit on a destroyer with a narrow beam width that could detect and accurately locate a periscope or submarine conning tower. It took the British 2 years to come up with something as capable. It required microwave radar.



Yaaaawnnnn Luft46 Bullcr*p Yaaaawnnn.

If only the the Germans had done something to something and built something at the something factory then they would have had Hypersonic swing wing sub orbital fighters with 500 megawatt Disrupters and fire and forget Photon Torpedoes.

Seriously where do you get this S**t from tell me which Destroyers had this wonder radar which was obviously way better than anything NATO had in the 1950s when the USN and the RN struggled to detect a Snort mast in anything other than a flat calm.


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## GregP (Nov 14, 2015)

The IAe.33 Pulqui II is NOT a Ta 183 (yeah, finger problems). It is a similar design but different. The test reports from the time do not specify the issues that prevented production. I have a feeling the engine was part of it, but not all.

The IAe. 33 was not the only good-looking design from Argetine development efforts. The IAe.30 Namcu was solidly rooted in WWII design, despite being first flown in 1950.







Looks like an improved metal mosquito derivative, doesn't it? And it wasn't alone. They also flew some neat flying wings transports and some other rather innovative designs.


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## Gixxerman (Nov 14, 2015)

GregP said:


> The IAe.33 Pulqui II is NOT a Ta 183 (yeah, finger problems). It is a similar design but different.



Indeed GregP, it was by the same guy who designed the Ta183 but later (presumably with the benefit of all the then research then some) - and still it wasn't exactly the most amazing fighter design of the times.
I'm not knocking anyone or anything but the regard some hold these 'Luft 46' possibilities in seems to me to be very exaggerated deeply suspect.

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## fastmongrel (Nov 14, 2015)

Gixxerman said:


> I'm not knocking anyone or anything but the regard some hold these 'Luft 46' possibilities in seems to me to be very exaggerated deeply suspect.



I agree some of the proponents of these VunderVeapons seem to be a bit too keen on the Master Race. If they want to wear SS brand underpants thats fine by me it takes all sorts to make the world but trumpeting fantastic weapons that exceeded the capabilities of 1960s or 70s weapons is just daft. Anyway I am sure some of these fantasies came about because there was a choice for the designer, design a 1,000 ton flying tank or pick up your rifle and pack and start marching to Russia.

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## fastmongrel (Nov 14, 2015)

GregP said:


> The IAe.33 Pulqui II is NOT a Ta 183 (yeah, finger problems). It is a similar design but different. The test reports from the time do not specify the issues that prevented production. I have a feeling the engine was part of it, but not all.
> 
> The IAe. 33 was not the only good-looking design from Argetine development efforts. The IAe.30 Namcu was solidly rooted in WWII design, despite being first flown in 1950.
> 
> ...



That Port Aileron looks a bit odd. Bird strike or FOD possibly?


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## GrauGeist (Nov 14, 2015)

Gixxerman said:


> Indeed GregP, it was by the same guy who designed the Ta183 but later (presumably with the benefit of all the then research then some) - and still it wasn't exactly the most amazing fighter design of the times.
> I'm not knocking anyone or anything but the regard some hold these 'Luft 46' possibilities in seems to me to be very exaggerated deeply suspect.


One of the problems with the Pulqui II, was that it's development was hurried on a limited budget and then cut short before any real maturing of the engine/airframe could be worked out. So in a twist of irony, the Pulqui II followed in the footsteps of it's WWII predecessor.

The Ta183 design III did have merit and many second generation jets used design features that the Huckbein had.

I find it a little amusing that many of the "luft 46" detractors fail to realize that several of the maturing projects were influential in future aircraft design. And while they're laughing away, they forget Japan, the U.S., Britain, Italy, the Soviet Union and other aircraft producing nations had a great deal of whimsical, ridiculous and in some cases: downright stupid designs, of their own...


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## fastmongrel (Nov 14, 2015)

GrauGeist said:


> I find it a little amusing that many of the "luft 46" detractors fail to realize that several of the maturing projects were influential in future aircraft design. And while they're laughing away, they forget Japan, the U.S., Britain, Italy, the Soviet Union and other aircraft producing nations had a great deal of whimsical, ridiculous and in some cases: downright stupid designs, of their own...



I am not laughing at any Luft 46 designs even though some make Grimms fairytales seem like modest real life tales. German designs in certain areas were miles ahead of anything outside of Germany particulary in Transonics, Rocketry and Chemistry. The Me262, Ar 234, Electroboote, STG44 and on and on were brilliant designs that were well ahead of equivalent Allied efforts and I respect the designers and engineers that did such brilliant ground breaking work.

I just feel like headbutting the keyboard when people ascribe performance that sometimes took 20 years and a Cold War to acheive in a repeatable manner. Claiming that Germany had a Radar capable of accurately spotting and ranging on a periscope ready for fitment to Destroyers in 1939 is just barking mad, I used to be a Lifeboat volunteer and on joint RAF/RNLI excersises with a Lifeboat with millimetric band switching radar and a Helicopter with Anti Submarine Radars we used to have real actual hard times (not fairystories) spotting a volunteer man overboard in a survival suit and a radar reflective helmet. Thats with 2000s solid state Radars that used computer generated Algorithms to spot anomalies. 

A 1939 radar that used crude Magnetron generators, Vaccum tubes and miles of comparitively high oxygen content copper wires would be lucky to spot a Sub on the surface amongst all the ground returns.


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## GrauGeist (Nov 14, 2015)

I hear you in that regard.

I've had people actually tell me that the German "1946 fantasy" designs are a product of delusional people and "fortunately, the Allies had better designs" and so on...

I will be the first to admit that a great deal of the German "paper projects" were completely asinine and defied logic. However, there was a percentage of those that were either in the works or on the drawing board that held a great deal of merit.

But we can also take a look at the Allied "Luft 46" designs and there were a great deal of them that rivaled the German's designs for the "idiot of the day" award. And some of these were actually built! (see the Whacky Allied Projects thread)


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## pbehn (Nov 14, 2015)

GrauGeist said:


> But we can also take a look at the Allied "Luft 46" designs and there were a great deal of them that rivaled the German's designs for the "idiot of the day" award. And some of these were actually built! (see the Whacky Allied Projects thread)



Since this is an aviation forum I feel bound to point out that the whole idea of flight and especially heavier than air flight was at one time considered not only whacky but almost a sign of insanity. The best military operations are always those that one side considers whacky and the other side figures out a way to perform.


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## GregP (Nov 15, 2015)

Hi Gixxerman,

I said the Ta-183 was possible to produce. I didn't say it would be successful. In fact, the design is suspect in my mind. It has a horizontal stabilizer, but no elevator. The pitch trim was from the wing control surfaces. I don't know if the Ta-183, as designed, would have been a success or not. Since the later IAe.33 was not, I suspect the Ta-183 of being another failure or semi-failure, but have no opinion one way or the other. 

Wartime development is NOTHING like peacetime development, and many planes that were abandoned in peacetime might have made formidable opponents in wartime by virtue of intensive "problem solving," otherwise known as "development."


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## Koopernic (Nov 15, 2015)

parsifal said:


> ah nope. British submarines operated in the confines of the European shallow waters of which 19 were lost to the Germans. 10 of these, give or take were lost to mines. germans built 200 dedicated ASW platforms, principally their type 1935 MSWs and derivatives and about the same number or R bootes, plus well over 250 trawler conversions, to protect about 3.5 million tons of german and captured shipping.
> 
> ...



British sonar was not better and an operational advantage in radar did not develop till early 1943 and then only in certain areas. German active sonar lacked a blind spot and had a beam that could locate the target in 3 dimensions. The low losses of british subs relates to their different use.

The microwave radar you so proudly speak of was not deployed on British submarines till the dying days of the war.
For instance the Type 291W radar of the T class submarine operated at 1.4m (twice the wavelength of seetakt). A microwave set the type 267W was not introduced on Royal Navy subs until the very end of the war though the US subs hand something a little earlier.

Here is the truth about submarine radar. *Submariners were scared to use it and rightfully so since both side had detectors*. The only folks who dared were the Americans with 3cm radars at the end of the war with the Japanese as the Japanese seemed to lack detractors, their own 10cm radar could detect the US 9cm radar but not 3cm.
The German sub radar was
1942 Seetakt FuMO 29, forward pointing phased array for detecting targets ahead
1943(early) Seetakt FuMo 30, rotating antenna for all round scanning, retracted pneumatically.

Equipment - Radar of German U-Boats




Above: U-643 (type VIIC) showing her FuMO 30 antenna. On the port side of the conning tower you can see the
UAK symbol given to the boats built in the Blohm Voss yard)

1944 Hohtenweil U FuMo 61 rotating 50cm radar with PPI, automatically retractable in conning tower
1944 (late) or early 1945 Berlin FuMo 84 microwave radar in sealed lenticular antenna could operate while under water.
1944 (late) or early 1945 FuMo 391 Lessing, single whip aerial could clear the area for 30km around the U-boat in a single undetectable pulse prior to surfacing.
1945 a automatic trscking microwave anti aircraft radar was tested called ballspeil on a U-boat.

In terms of the low number of British submarine losses, this is due to their lower number and different employment

1 German U-boats had to operate on the surface a high percentage of the time. The indiscretion ratio, the ratio between time on the surface recharging and that underwater on electric power was very high. This was because of the high speed required to approach a convoy.

2 British submarine was used for ambushes in coastal shipping, reconnaissance. For instance a T class submarine could charge its batteries as fast as possible, in say an hour and a half, and then spend the next 2-3 days submerged cruising at say 2 knots. 

3 While allied anti sub warfare resources were concentrated the Germans had to disperse theirs.

When U-boats operated in shallow coastal waters again at the end of the war their losses dropped since it was possible to hide on the bottom.

There were of course far fewer British submarines, a rare case of the Germans not being out numbered.
****

From 1943 the deployment of microwave radar gave the allies an advantage in a limited number of areas.
1 Ground mapping radar, eg H2S
2 Air to surface vessel microwave radar was slightly better than metric and produced by broadening the beam of H2S. Certainly better around a convoy. It took the Germans about 6 months to produce a detector called Naxos.
3 The 1943 introduction of SCR-584 gave the allies their first FLAK radar. Its big advantage was jam resistance.
4 About 1944 microwave radar made possible low drag installations of radar in night fighters.

It took the German about 1.5 years to catch up, you can argue 2 but one must remember their industry was being seriously disrepute by bombing just as they were planning deployment.

The Germans were surprisingly slow to adapt their radar for ASV search but did so by early 1943. Hohtenweil on Fw 200 and Ju 290 could detect a convoy at 150km, a periscope at 6km and a life raft at about 10. It could detect individual ships and see aircraft taking of from aircraft carriers at 100km.

The allied advantage between mid 43 and late 1944 was crucial as the lack of microwave made it easy for the allies to jam the German FLAK and AI radars.

Much of that had to do with German resource shortages and bombing that the allies did not face. Nevertheless they did catch up.


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## GrauGeist (Nov 15, 2015)

GregP said:


> Hi Gixxerman,
> 
> I said the Ta-183 was possible to produce. I didn't say it would be successful. In fact, the design is suspect in my mind. It has a horizontal stabilizer, but no elevator. The pitch trim was from the wing control surfaces. I don't know if the Ta-183, as designed, would have been a success or not. Since the later IAe.33 was not, I suspect the Ta-183 of being another failure or semi-failure, but have no opinion one way or the other.
> 
> Wartime development is NOTHING like peacetime development, and many planes that were abandoned in peacetime might have made formidable opponents in wartime by virtue of intensive "problem solving," otherwise known as "development."


The Ta183 had full control surfaces, both in the mainwing and in the horizontal stab surfaces...






The Pulqui II


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## GregP (Nov 15, 2015)

The Ta 183 did NOT have elevators. The plan you posted is design III, which was so far along in the design as to be irrelevant. Design II was already not going to be produced.

Go read about it. It was a flying wing with a stabilizer for more than 75% of its lifetime, which was short in any case.

The Pulqui II was never a Ta 183. It was a modified design with shoulder wings, elevator, and other changes. Evolutionary? Yes. Same design? No ... and it failed.

Here's a quote: " In late 1942, Focke-Wulf engineer Hans Multhopp headed up a design team that started aerodynamic studies for a new turbojet fighter. This culminated in 1945 as a fighter project known as "Huckebein" (a cartoon raven that traditionally makes trouble for others), also known as Project V (Project VI in some references) or Design II at Focke-Wulf and later to be given the designation Ta 183. The Ta 183 had a short, squat fuselage with the air intake passing under the cockpit and proceeding to the rear where the single He S 011 turbojet was located, although the first three prototypes were to be powered by Jumo 004B jet engines. A provision was made in the early studies for the aircraft to be equipped with a 1000 kg (2205 lbs) thrust rocket engine to assist interception duties, with the fuel for a 200 second rocket burn being located in underwing drop tanks. The wings were very thin, swept back at 40 degrees and were mounted in the mid-fuselage position. A tapered main wing spar constructed of two duraluminum I-beams with steel flanges formed a torque box, with the attachment at the fuselage consisting of a single bolt. The wing structure was completed by adding bonded wooden ribs with a plywood covering. Each wing panel contained six fuel cells totaling 1565 liters (345 gallons). The huge fin was swept back at 60 degrees, with the tailplane mounted on the top of the fin. The tailplane also exhibited considerable dihedral. *Wing elevons and the rudder provided control, the tailplane control surfaces only being used for trimming*."

It's from here: Focke-Wulf Ta 183 Luft '46 entry

But I have virtually the same quote from more than 5 sources.


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## GrauGeist (Nov 15, 2015)

When the Ta183 concept was first put on paper (design I), it was proposed, the design II is what was given the "Ta183" designation (as described in the quote) however, it was design III that was the final product.

In any case, design II AND design III had full control surfaces. I've read several sources that contradict Luft46, and while I appreciate that website for their enthusiasm, I prefer to rely on credible publications 

Ta183 Design II


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## GregP (Nov 15, 2015)

No ... it didn't. Ta 183 was without elevators in ALL primary documentation. Not Luft crap; I used it as an example only. Go look at the design documents that are NOT post war Luft-o-file stuff. No control surfaces on the tail. ALL of them say that. The tail was a trimmer only.

And I don't claim it could have changed the war. I said only that it could have been built at the time.


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## GrauGeist (Nov 15, 2015)

I don't have time to effin' argue with you, Greg...

But I'll tell you what, I'll sh!tcan all of my books and from now on, I'll use you as a reference, if you don't mind...since you're such a pillar of absolute knowledge


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## GregP (Nov 15, 2015)

Thanks Graugeist, you've always been gracious, if nothing else.

I don't think a proposed redesign of a design that was never built in the first place is all that significant in any case.

The one with the low-set horizontal tail plane was WAY late in the effort and was ... again ... paper only, with no metal ever cut. By the time Kurt Tank got to Argentina, he had gone over the original design by Hans Multhopp and had revised almost everything including wing placement, tailplane, internal layout of major components, and landing gear.

It had potential, but Argentina was unwilling to pursue it. Since it *flew*, one has to wonder why. History doesn't record the reasons for not proceeding with it, but money is probably at or near the top of the list. I DID see one report that was critical of the flight characteristics, but the source was not very apparent and the report did not elaborate on it. I tend to distrust any document without a document or report number that can be corroborated independently.

I'm sure you agree, at least with that part.

The wind tunnel models the German tested were all design number one, as far as I can tell. I only see designs number 2 and 3 in drawings, perhaps all post war ... no pics of even test models; just un-numbered drawings with vague references to Germany. You can Google the images as easily as I can.

Why not post facts? 

Actually, I'd post pics but my new PC is Windows 10 and every single pic I try to post from the web creates an error (thanks Microsoft!). I have to download it and save to CAD as a JPG and THEN post it. It isn't worth the trouble. Too easy to find on your own.


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## fastmongrel (Nov 15, 2015)

I know nothing about aerodynamics or aircraft design but the Ta183 in whatever variant looks wrong. Its not an opinion based on anything but there must be a reason why no one built anything similar.


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## parsifal (Nov 15, 2015)

> British sonar was not better and an operational advantage in radar did not develop till early 1943 and then only in certain areas.


Then why did German Asdic fail to deliver any outstanding results of any note?

I would say this as a qualifier to my own argument. Asdic even today is reliant upon the expertise of the operator, and also on the absolute necessity to work as a team. 

Both sides lacked these critical abilities at the beginning, and it was the allies who developed the tactics needed to make the available technologies work. However, if as you say the Germans had superior sonar in 1939, then there would have been higher ratio of sinkings by the germans. It never happened, whereas, the allies, as they slowly solved their other issues, did dramatically increase their rate of sinkings (of Uboats). 

If your claims were correct, one could expect a higher rate of sinkings of British submarines. There is no evidence of this ever occurring. Your explanation of why that might be is just plain wrong Im afraid, Says a person who learnt this as job. 



> German active sonar lacked a blind spot and had a beam that could locate the target in 3 dimensions. The low losses of british subs relates to their different use.



In what way? British submarines by the end of 1940 had sunk crippling losses of german controlled shipping. German supplied sonar for her major maritime partners also never delivered much in terms of results. You need to back this claim up, but i can tell you, categorically, that it is a baseless claim. 



> The microwave radar you so proudly speak of was not deployed on British submarines till the dying days of the war.


According to The Defeat of the German U-boats: The Battle of the Atlantic By David Syrett, "From March (1941) the allies began to pull ahead of the Uboats technologically as new electronics and tactics began to render increasingly unworkable the tactics of the surfaced attacks from withiin the convoy. Two electronic devices , HF/DF and radar rendered Uboat surfaced attacks unworkable, though they would continue for some time in other parts of the battle front. Once the escorts were fitted with radar , which occurred gradually from March 1941 on) Uboats found it nearly impossible toi emply their favourite tactics as successfully as they had. Under good conditions it was sometimes possible to detect periscopes with allied radar......" 

For instance the Type 291W radar of the T class submarine operated at 1.4m (twice the wavelength of seetakt). A microwave set the type 267W was not introduced on Royal Navy subs until the very end of the war though the US subs hand something a little earlier.



> Here is the truth about submarine radar. *Submariners were scared to use it and rightfully so since both side had detectors*. The only folks who dared were the Americans with 3cm radars at the end of the war with the Japanese as the Japanese seemed to lack detractors, their own 10cm radar could detect the US 9cm radar but not 3cm.
> The German sub radar was
> 1942 Seetakt FuMO 29, forward pointing phased array for detecting targets ahead
> 1943(early) Seetakt FuMo 30, rotating antenna for all round scanning, retracted pneumatically.
> ...



All this yielded what for the Uboats. Im not making any claims from a technology point of view. My claims are made purely on observed results? What result can all this technology you are quoting actually deliver for the Uboats.....ah nothing..... 



> In terms of the low number of British submarine losses, this is due to their lower number and different employment


Nope. Maybe later in the war, but at the beginning, 1939 to 1941, there were, on average a greater number of British Boats operating against the germans than German boats operating against the British. 

In 1940, the average Uboat availability in the Atlantic was somehere between 10-12 boats per month, whilst for the allies it was 15-18. Not only were there British Boats to contend with. From September we see added to the allied OB the Polish, then the Norwegian, then the Dutch Navies. The French operated 2-3 full flotillas of boats in the North Sea and the Kattegat. Some of which remained in British service after the French surrender. In terms of new construction, British and German construction through to the end of 1940 were almost identical. After 1940, German construction slowly began to pull ahead, but their loss rates also skyrocketed, whilst british losses sharank to virtually nothing. . 



> 1 German U-boats had to operate on the surface a high percentage of the time. The indiscretion ratio, the ratio between time on the surface recharging and that underwater on electric power was very high. This was because of the high speed required to approach a convoy.



Actually this relates to wolfpack tactics and with one exception, these werent employed until September 1940. Until then, Uboats concentrated on ambush attacks on independant sailings. By contrast, Allied subs remained bound by the stop and search policies until March 1940. Only then did they finally adopt an unrestricted attack policy, and then only against german flagged shipping. Until after June 1940, most British attacks were done on the surface, because ROE limits prevented them from doing otherwise. 

Moreover, after slaughter of early April 1940, virtually all German shipping travelled in heavily defended convoys. Many allied and neutral flagged shipping remained independant sailings until September. After that virtually all shipping, including neutral shipping had to be convoyed because in August '40 the germans declared that all ships in all zones would be sunk on sight. 

There was greater risk for the Allied subs operating until June 1940 than for the Germans. Even after this date, the threat remained higher, as the ratio of escorts in the German convoys remained very high, and much of the shipping lanes were fully protected by the Norwegian Leads, backed up by defensive mines . 



> 2 British submarine was used for ambushes in coastal shipping, reconnaissance. For instance a T class submarine could charge its batteries as fast as possible, in say an hour and a half, and then spend the next 2-3 days submerged cruising at say 2 knots.



Ah no, British submarines did not operate that way early in the war. They would detect a convoy and chase it in the same way as the Germans had to, except that the British subs tended to do it submerged. The Royal Navy type "T" submarine had an underwater navigation speed of up to 16 knots, but at that speed an endurance of less than hour. At 2 knots it had a maximum endurance of 40 hours. At 2 knots the chances of achieving a firing solution against a 10 knot convoy was virtually zero. Recharge time was about 12-14 hrs. 

Plus all this is irrelevant to the fact that German escort densities were far higher than for the Brit convoys. Typically in 1940 a convoy in the western approaches (the main killing field) with 45 ships would have 2 DDs and 2-3 corvettes as escort. SC-7 for example, in October, had 4 escorts defending 50 ships. By comparison the typical attacks against the german convoys in the Kattegat were 10-12 escorts for a 3 or 4 ship convoy....

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## parsifal (Nov 15, 2015)

> 3 While allied anti sub warfare resources were concentrated the Germans had to disperse theirs.


I dont know where you are getting your information, but its the opposite actually. 1940-42 the BDU enjoyed almost complete knowledge of escort dispositions. Occasionally the allies would get a lucky break and be able to re-route their convoys around U-Boat concentrations. During the Happy times, August -November 1940, nearly all the Uboat sinkings were in the western approaches, this concentration of effort continued (slightly to the west) in 1941. Once the Germans gained control of the French Atlantic ports, and began to introduce new longer range Boats the Allied escorts thinned even futher.

By comparison, the German only really ever had to worry about limited sections of the Norwegian and Baltic coast. From May 1940, the Baltic was effectively closed, so the entire campaign had to be fought from limited "fronts" so to speak, through choke points, because of the effects of the norwegian leads. This greatly assisted the German escort by using natural features to great advantage. Still they were unable to prevent the rupturing of their merchant service. 



> When U-boats operated in shallow coastal waters again at the end of the war their losses dropped since it was possible to hide on the bottom.


what????? Placing a submarine in shallow water is not an advantage or safety measure anyone with any experience in sub warfare would ever consider an advantage. German losses fell away at the end of the war because they were not patrolling in active areas, they were using them to defend places like the Norwegian coastlines. One only has to look at the losses suffered by the Soviets to get an idea of how dangerous shallow water is to a submarine, Or the italians..... 



> There were of course far fewer British submarines, a rare case of the Germans not being out numbered.


Nope, for reasons already explained, dead wrong for the early part of the war. Later in the war, I would need to do the arithmetic, but losses were so high that again I doubt they had any advantage of numbers after 1943. For example at the end of 1945, Germany surrendered with 200 subs, which is almost the same as the British, but then you need to add the allied subs supporting them. 




> The Germans were surprisingly slow to adapt their radar for ASV search but did so by early 1943. Hohtenweil on Fw 200 and Ju 290 could detect a convoy at 150km, a periscope at 6km and a life raft at about 10. It could detect individual ships and see aircraft taking of from aircraft carriers at 100km.



Surprisingly slow and unable to achieve much either.....no allied sub, or perhaps one, sunk by German ASV radar. Something like 50 Uboats were lost to these sorts of attacks.....Hmmmmm


HyperWar: Axis Submarine Manual (ONI 220-M)

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## GregP (Nov 15, 2015)

From what I have read, Fastmongrel, the Ta 183 (design one: the only design that seems to have been built as a model during the war) was basically a flying wing that had a small fixed horizontal tail at the top of the fin for trimming purposes only. It looks strange to me aerodynamically, but not if you think if it as a flying wing. It had the potential to be either a really neat airplane or an abject failure. I believe the Ta 183 had reached the wind-tunnel test stage when the war ended.

Wiki, that paragon of reliable data, has this to say: 

"The first of the "flying" IAe 33 prototypes, (No. 02) built in 1950, [N 5]completed its maiden flight on 27 June of that year, with Captain Edmundo Weiss at the controls. On the second flight, ex-Focke-Wulf test pilot Otto Behrens encountered severe lateral stability problems at speeds over 700 km/h (435 mph) and returned to the airfield as a precaution. Landing at very high speed, the aircraft bounced with sufficient force to cause the right main undercarriage strut to fail. During repairs to the aircraft, in order to rectify the "tricky" landing characteristics, the front undercarriage strut was increased in length, which served to alter the angle of incidence of the aircraft, while the shock absorbers were adjusted to have a greater "throw". Although never considered docile, the modifications improved the takeoff, landing and low-speed characteristics of the IAe 33. More serious aerodynamic problems persisted, stemming from tip stall— in which the wingtip stalled before the wingroot resulting in an unpredictable "rolling moment"— leading to a change in the wing leading edge near the wingroot, while the rudder was modified in an attempt to resolve the interminable lateral instability issues. In addition, the canopy was reinforced with two external frames and a small fairing was installed above the engine exhaust."


I believe that I they HAD built the original Ta 183 during the war, and if it had encountered problems that were flying-wing related, then the design might have had a larger horizontal tail fitted with an elevator. However, that is pure conjecture on my part as they never built the Ta 183. It just seems like a logical problem-solving step to me ... but perhaps not to the designer, had the aircraft been proceeded with. Sometimes what seems logical to someone many years later is NOT obvious at the time when things are being developed. The designer might have been keen to stay with the flying wing design and correct the issues while retaining the flying wing concept, even as the war was rapidly being lost. 

What Germany needed was an advanced fighter built RIGHT NOW in numbers, not an advanced fighter that was an innovative flying wing that never got built even as a prototype.

It would have been very interesting technically for someone to have actually built and flown one, even post-war. I have looked for fight test reports on IAe.33 Pulqui II for years unsuccessfully. I did find one report that mentioned some "handling quirks," but they were not described in a meaningful way. The report I saw certainly did not say what Wiki claims above. The Pulqui II's development was comparatively problematic and lengthy, with two of the four prototypes being lost in fatal crashes. 

I surmise that the Pulqui II had a few issues that were not simple fixes. Then again, maybe all it needed were simple wing fences, as on the MiG-15! Probably someone like Bill Marshall could look at the design and infer some flight characteristics. However, tipstall has historically been addressed with washout, slots or slats, wing fences, or a combination of same. More recently, outboard vortex generators have also been tried successfully, but not at jet speeds as far as I know.


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## tyrodtom (Nov 15, 2015)

How can you call the Ta-183 a flying wing, when the very definition of a flying wing states " A tailless fixed wing aircraft, with no definite fuselage.

A lot of flying wings may end up with some vertical control surfaces, but I think most would agree that the Ta-183's very definite fuselage
would be stretching the definition just a bit much.
Having elevons like a flying wing, doesn't make it a flying wing.


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## GregP (Nov 15, 2015)

Technically it had a small horizontal trim surface, but the aerodynamic controls were all on the wing. So whether or not it is technically a flying wing, it was controlled as one. So it probably would have had all the issues of a flying wing, had it been built.

Whether or not it was technically a flying wing is a question that is meaningless to me ... call it whatever you want and it's just fine. The flying characteristics would have been exactly like a flying wing, so that's how I think of it aerodynamically. 

The original design used a T-tail, with a notably long vertical stabilizer and a seemingly undersized horizontal stabilizer. The vertical tail was swept back at 60°, and the horizontal tail was swept back and slightly dihedralled. The horizontal surface's small "elevator" surfaces were used only for trimming, the main pitching force being provided by the ailerons, which were well behind the center of gravity — their trailing edges' tips virtually even, horizontally, with the jet engine's exhaust orifice — and thus could provide both pitch and roll control, functioning as elevon control surfaces, as Messerschmittt's Me 163 tailplane-less Komet rocket fighter already did. Many problems beset the project, including the chance of a Dutch roll.

Interestingly, when Kurt Tank was working on the IAe.33 Pulqui II, the glider model built to investigate it was built by Reimar Horten of flying wing fame.


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## Koopernic (Nov 15, 2015)

GregP said:


> Technically it had a small horizontal trim surface, but the aerodynamic controls were all on the wing. So whether or not it is technically a flying wing, it was controlled as one. So it probably would have had all the issues of a flying wing, had it been built.
> SNIP
> Interestingly, when Kurt Tank was working on the IAe.33 Pulqui II, the glider model built to investigate it was built by Reimar Horten of flying wing fame.



The Hortons were rather good at making wooden models.

Most of the German "Luft46" designs were workable. One has to remember that these books and publications cover designs developed around 1941 as well as 1944-1945 when the Germans knowledge had grown.
Remember they were struggling with integrating the new propulsion with the new aerodynamics.

The prevalence of the tailless design as well as the high T tail reflects two imperatives. The first one is that the Germans wanted to avoid the problem of shock wave impingement on the tail elevator. The second less obvious one is the problem not faced by post war allied designers. This was the relative low power of the engines and the need to produce a Mach 0.9 design.

The low power meant the aircraft had to have low 'wetted area' ie low skin surface area to volume. It also compelled a requirement for short intake and exhaust ducts since long ducts lead to pressure loss in then duct and possibly engine stall issues.

The Pullgui II could have been successful but the Argentinians ran out of money and will power to develop an aviation industry, they lack one even today. The Pulqui-II was replaced by extremely cheap second hand F-86. The Pulqui had big advantages over the F-86, MiG 15/17 and Meteor. It had a much greater range and superior service ceiling.

Two Pulquis were lost during the test program. One to the failure of a weld in the wing box and the other due to a pilot error resulting from a preposterous acrobatic display by an Argentinian pilot designed to impress dignitaries. Wing box weld in a mature airframe industry with tools and skills should be necessary and premature displays of acrobatics by inexperienced test pilots are foolish.

An interesting note about the Ta 183 and the Pulqui-II is that neither initially had slats or strakes. German aerodynamicists had understood the advantages of wing sweep in the early 30s and had by 1940 understood the advantages in transonic performance and at the same time developed methods that could be used to control the low speed handing problems caused by spanwise flow. These included slats, forward sweep and the crescent wing of compound sweep. They also had wing fences, used on a Bf 109B for testing.

Once the Pulqui-II had the wing fences and added the handling improved and the addition of nose ballast got rid of the super stall problem.


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## tyrodtom (Nov 15, 2015)

It's not me or you who makes the definitions.
Since the only way the Ta-183 flew was as a scale model in a wind tunnel, just what do we really know about a full size flying aircraft would have been like ?

Aircraft usually change a great deal from preliminary drawings and models. Who could say if the developed Ta-183 might not have ended up close to the Pulgui II.


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## GregP (Nov 15, 2015)

Hi Koopernic,

The Pulqui II had a service ceiling of 49,200 feet and range of 1,920 miles. The F-86F had a service ceiling of 49,600 feet and range of 1,525 miles. Earlier Sabres had a service ceiling about 1,000 feet lower ... not much of an advantage or disadvantage for either plane. Service ceiling seems about the same for the F86F and the Pulqui has a slightly better range, enough to maybe make a difference. We KNOW the combat history of the Sabre and it is excellent. The Pulqui II is an unknown that might have been a great plane. The F-86 was definitely a great plane, if ever there was one.

I think the Pulqui II had potential, but I would not ever say it was going to eclipse the F-86, with a pretty darned good combat record and a long service life. It might have had the possibility of being as great as the F-86 had Argentina built and exported them, but Argentina has not participated in many conflicts across the globe otherwise. So if they had built it, the plane would likely have been a local "great" player, but not a global player of particular note.


You're as pleasant as ever, Tom. They'd have to have made at least one Ta 183 to have ended up even close to the Pulqui II since the Pulqui II actually flew. Production of the Ta 183 was overtaken by a major event; the end of the war. So it's development had all the future potential of the Ta 152 ... nothing. The end of the war ended it. The Pulqui II was very possibly an evolution of the Ta 183 concepts, but I'd be surprised if even one component was common to both of them.

I look at the Luft 46 designs as a pretty good fantasy world with nothing rooted in reality. If any of the designs were even CLOSE to reality, someone would have been interested enough to fund one, build it, and fly it. They built almost everything else in the 1950's. Why not a design with good potential that was almost already designed? It's much more likely that the Luft 46 stuff is mostly modern fabrications of half-completed drawings salvaged from German design houses. Where were all these designs in the 1950s and 1960s? I never saw them at the time and I was very interested in early jets.

Whatever the case, they weren't built and it's really tough to argue intelligently about planes that never flew. So I won't even try. I'll just say their website is interesting and let it go at that. I look at it once every 2 - 3 years when I have nothing better to do and want some entertainment.


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## cherry blossom (Nov 16, 2015)

parsifal said:


> ...snip ...
> Ah no, British submarines did not operate that way early in the war. They would detect a convoy and chase it in the same way as the Germans had to, except that the British subs tended to do it submerged. The Royal Navy type "T" submarine had an underwater navigation speed of up to 16 knots, but at that speed an endurance of less than hour. At 2 knots it had a maximum endurance of 40 hours. At 2 knots the chances of achieving a firing solution against a 10 knot convoy was virtually zero. Recharge time was about 12-14 hrs.
> ...snip...


You are correct that some of the later T Class submarines could make 15 knots submerged but that was after being modified from 1948 by (according to Wikipedia) "the removal of deck guns and the replacement of the conning tower with a "sail", a smooth-surfaced and far more symmetrical and streamlined tower. An extra battery was installed, and a new section of hull inserted to accommodate an extra pair of motors and switchgear." The T Class during WW2 were limited to 9 knots submerged.

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## tyrodtom (Nov 16, 2015)

When the Pulqui II first flew in 1950, it did have a better top speed than the F86a, that first flew in 1947.

But the Pulqui II was 4000 lbs lighter, and had a engine with about the same thrust as the F86a, so surprise, surprise, it was faster.
It had a disappointing rate of climb though, even the A model Sabre was about 50% better.

But by 1950, the Pulqui II was up against later models of the Sabre, and by the time the 4th prototype Pulqui flew in 1959, it's development was so far behind nobody needed it.


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## Token (Nov 16, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> Around late 1943 as SCR-584 was entering service the Germans introduced the Mannheim FuMG 64 radar. As it also had a 3m dish it is often confused with Wurzburg. Output power was doubled, power drive was added, precision electronics for tracking was added and range accuracy was 10m. The second issue of this radar of early 1944 added electronic tracking and reduced ranging precision to 6m. It could track through windows once a target was found.



Once radars went to conical scanning then auto track was a near given. Con scan was, like several other aspects of radar technology, more or less independently discovered by several efforts around the same time.

The FuMG 65 track through chaff / window, do you have any specifics on it? How this was achieved? There were a couple of systems during WW2 that had an ability to do this, and I believe they all did it the same way, however the details are not easily found.

In general the way early systems (and still some today) tracked through chaff required a radar to achieve auto lock / track before the chaff event occurred. At the time chaff was dispensed the operator recognized the event by the “bloom” of the target and the separation of the chaff from the actual target in the A or J scopes (this is easily seen and recognized by even a crudely trained operator) and manually activated a button / control and the radar entered a “coast” mode. In this mode the angles and range rates in the track loops continue at their last values. If the target did not change vectors the radar could reacquire auto track as soon as the operator recognized the aircraft was through the chaff and allowed the radar to track.

Other radars tried to automatically recognize the bloom of the chaff and set the coast mode, but this was typically less successful than allowing the operator to decide it was time to use the technique.



Koopernic said:


> *The Germans invented radar first not the British.*
> <<snip>>
> Radar was an invention of the German Navy. It was the brainchild of Freiherr von Kunhold an Admiral and the Physicist in charge of the signals Branch of the German Navy. After finding fundamental physical limitations in using sonar for blind fire control his idea is to extend the pulse echo techniques in sonar to the radio frequency field.



“Who invented radar” is an argument that is very difficult to back up. As I said before, it was something that happened in multiple places at about the same time when the general level of technology supported its realization. You can talk about who detected a ship first, or who detected an aircraft first, but that gets really unclear for some events depending on what is meant by detected.

I contend that it is almost impossible to say that any one nation or individual invented radar.

Radar, then and now, is not limited to pulsed type systems or air defense. The first radars were CW systems, and did not yield range, yet they were what we would call radar today. Many people experimented with this prior to 1925, and several systems could be said to be operational by then. By about 1925 the concept of pulsed radars was being experimented with for various applications. For sure Breit and Tuve did this in the US in 1925, but their system was obviously not a usable air defense radar type of device. Still, it was a pulsed radar and it did function, it was only a matter of further developing the technique specifically for air defense.



Koopernic said:


> Allied radars created their pulse by dumping a huge 'spark' like an automotive ignition coil into the tube. The Germans turned the tube on and off via its control grid and so were able to precisely control frequency and phase which was locked with a oscillator. They had less power but could get the same range an accuracy and some other information to boot such as Doppler.



Many radars today still use a high voltage pulse to generate the RF from a magnetron or other high power keyed oscillator. In general this results in an incoherent pulse (although there are ways to make it coherent, such as RF pumping, as well as semi coherent systems) but this is perfectly adequate for detecting and tracking targets. A really good thyratron for switching at the power levels required for radar was not available until the end of the war, but other techniques of soft-keying the transmitter worked well enough to do the job.

The MOPA (Master Oscillator Power Amplifier), or PAT (Power Amplifier Transmitter), technique you describe was not unique to the Germans, although they tended to make greater than average use of it for radar applications at the time, when later in the war many Allied radars were keyed-oscillator types.

Turning a tube on and off via the control grid exhibits no control over frequency or phase, one could take an ungridded amplifier and have the same frequency control via master oscillator. Phase noise may be higher with an ungridded tube, but the phase is just as controlled. Also the power of a radar has little to no impact on range accuracy, other than as a factor of raw SNR (Signal to Noise Ratio), in which case lower power for a given technique is almost always less advantageous. Less power simply means that a radar will detect a given RCS target at less range for a given level of receiver processing technology.



Koopernic said:


> Allied radar pulled ahead only after early 1943 and by late 1944 the German had caught up.



You can argue about if they ever really caught up or not, and then you have to talk about did they catch up on the developmental front or the applied and operational front? The Germans had some great minds working on some great things, however by late 1944 the war was going poorly for them, and as time went on fewer and fewer of these new things made it into actual service. This was exactly why I said of the Germans “with few new systems fielded in any number”. The late war wiz-bang radars were fielded in the tens or few hundreds numbers, compared to the early war thousands.

It was not in raw technology that the Germans lagged, but rather in the applied technology actually making an impact to the war effort. I still contend the Germans started (lets say in 1940) with a lead in some significant ways but that by mid to late 1943 that lead was gone, and they played catch up from then on. Even early war they never had a technology lead in the development front, only on the operational front.

T!

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## parsifal (Nov 16, 2015)

A very good summary. its times like this I wish I had the technical background to support the history


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## drgondog (Nov 16, 2015)

GregP said:


> Technically it had a small horizontal trim surface, but the aerodynamic controls were all on the wing. So whether or not it is technically a flying wing, it was controlled as one. So it probably would have had all the issues of a flying wing, had it been built.
> 
> *The primary issues regarding a 'flying wing' was that high lift to edge of stalling did not develop a sufficient Pitch down moment even with the typical reverse cambered/reflexed trailing edge. If the small horizontal 'trim surface was not connected directly to the trailing edge of the wing then it did indeed perform pitch control functions similar to an elevator or flying tail.*
> 
> ...



Directional stability (not pitch) was the primary role of spoilerons, ailerons and spoilers on which the drag of the inboard wing was altered to cause the bank and manage the turn to minimize form drag.


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## GregP (Nov 17, 2015)

Hi Bill,

The small horizontal tail was connected to a trim wheel. The control stick was connected to the elevons. So technically the small H. tail DID perform pitch trim, but wasn't used in maneuvering flight. I'm not really sure how to classify it and, since it wasn't ever built, never did decide how I'd classify it. To be conventional you'd have to have some primary pitch control with the H. tail ... I think ... not just pitch trim to a trim wheel.

In the end, it matters little since it wasn't built. When they build such a beast, then perhaps it will mean something. I don't think anyone else ever built a flying, full-scale pitch control system. If they have I haven't heard of it. That's not to say it hasn't been dome. If they HAVE, then perhaps the inventor already classified it. I haven't seen a classiciation by Messerschmitt in everything I've read about it other than the unusual fact of having only pitch trim on the H. tail while primary pitch was elevons. There was a war on and I'm not sure they cared what it was. Just whether or not it could be built in numbers quickly. Apparently it couldn't be done.

In point of fact I find the design interesting since it was rather obscure in never being built in full scale, but I think the second and third designs would probably have flown better with conventional controls. Just a hunch; no analysis and no firm opinion either way.

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## cherry blossom (Nov 17, 2015)

If I may be forgiven for continuing to pursue the off topic issue of sonar



parsifal said:


> Then why did German Asdic fail to deliver any outstanding results of any note?
> ...snip....


I think the situation was that Germany was testing a very good sonar over 1938-9 but that it was not generally deployed. The main difference between the Type VIIB and Type VIIC submarines was that the Type VIIC were slightly longer to accommodate the S-Gerät but the first Type VIIC submarines were completed without the S-Gerät. Thus in November 1940 at least, few sets were available. Similarly, Whitley's book on German Destroyers notes on page 85 that Riedel was fitted by August 1940 and Ihn was running trials with her new set in February 1941. Whitley conjectured from the comment that two months later Ihn was stationed ahead of the raider Thor and two other destroyers, Heinemann and Steinbrinck, to "use her S-Gerät" that the other destroyers had not yet been fitted. 

The situation changed by very late 1941, when some sets were supplied to Italy, and over 1942. By the end of 1942, GEMA had completed over 1500 of their sonars according to page 125 of GEMA: Birthplace of German Radar and Sonar by Harry von Kroge. The Italian torpedo boat Circe received one of the sets and I wanted to argue that this was reflected in her success in sinking the submarines HMS P38 and HMS Tempest in February 1942. However, Circe had earlier sunk HMS Grampus and HMS Union before acquiring the German sonar, suggesting that she had an unusually competent crew.

Of course, even if German sonar was up to or beyond British standard in 1942, the RN soon moved ahead again with new designs to work with Squid.


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## Tracker (Nov 17, 2015)

A bit of a deviation; but from the pictures from the first post is it just me or does anyone else see the similarities in design? Not the Horton flying wing but the head on design (omitting the nose on the attached aircraft).


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## tyrodtom (Nov 17, 2015)

That's a Cf-100 isn't it. I just don't see nothing in common, other than 2 engines.
Horton, two engines buried in the thick wings with the intakes on the wing leading edge, cockpit centered behind the intakes, nose wheel up front.
Cf-100, two engines on top of the thin wings, intakes about 6-8 feet in front of the wings leading edge, cockpit forward of intakes, nose wheel, where nose wheels usually are, forward, just not all the way forward.


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## GrauGeist (Nov 17, 2015)

Tracker said:


> A bit of a deviation; but from the pictures from the first post is it just me or does anyone else see the similarities in design? Not the Horton flying wing but the head on design (omitting the nose on the attached aircraft).


That head-on view and the configuration looks alot more like the proposed Heinkel He P.1080 project than the Ho.IX


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## parsifal (Nov 18, 2015)

> If I may be forgiven for continuing to pursue the off topic issue of sonar
> 
> I think the situation was that Germany was testing a very good sonar over 1938-9 but that it was not generally deployed


. 



> The main difference between the Type VIIB and Type VIIC submarines was that the Type VIIC were slightly longer to accommodate the S-Gerät but the first Type VIIC submarines were completed without the S-Gerät. Thus in November 1940 at least, few sets were available.



Uboats relied principally on hydrophones for their detection systems. The principle of hydrophones was simple enough. It consisted of two pairs of underwater microphones which listened to the sound of ships’ propeller noises. By measuring the amount of time it took for sound to arrive at each of the microphones, the device could triangulate the bearing of the vessel from the U-boat. The radioman could also tell if it was a merchantman or warship, but not the range, direction or speed it was moving. Because sound travels much further underwater, hydrophones could pick up distant convoys traveling up to 100 kilometers away. For maximum effectiveness however, the U-boat had to submerge and stop all engines while the hydrophones listened in for a few minutes. It also had an added bonus of being passive. Its technically incorrect to refer to these as a SONAR. They are actually sophisticated listening devices and derivatives are still used today

Gruppenhorchgerat (GHG)

The standard U-boat hydrophone, the GHG (Group Listening Apparatus) was installed in U-boats from 1935 onwards and used throughout the war on some boats. It consisted of two sets of hydrophones mounted on each side of the bows, covering two arcs of 140 degrees on the sides of the U-boat. Because the hydrophones could not be rotated, the triangulation was most effective with sound sources coming from the sides, with deteriorating accuracy as the source moved to the front or rear of the boat. Consisting of 24 hydrophones, the GHG could pick up lone vessels up to 20 kilometers and convoys up to 100 kilometers away. The detection range however was also dependant on sea conditions. 

Kristalldrehbasisgerat (KDB)

The KDB (Crystal Rotating Base Apparatus) was an improvement of the GHG in that it was rotatable and hence able to provide more accurate readings from any direction. The disadvantage however was its extreme vulnerability to depth charges. 

Balkon Great

The Balkon Great (Balcony Apparatus) was an improved version of GHG. Where the previous had 24 hydrophones, the Balkon had 48 hydrophones and improved electronics, which enabled more accurate readings to be taken. The Balkon was standard on the Type XXI and was also fitted to several Type VIIs. 

Torpedowarn (TAG)

Designed as an early warning system for incoming torpedoes, the TAG was installed on the Type XXI and intended for future generation U-boats. It was connected to a loudspeaker inside the pressure hull which would give audible warnings on an approaching torpedo. It functioned by listening in to certain pre-programmed sounds, which would trigger the alert status. 

Sondergerat Fur Aktive Schallortung (S-Gerat)

The S-Gerat (Special Apparatus for Active Sound Location) was essentially sonar. It transmitted sound pulses and timed the returning echo to detect underwater objects. Because it emitted sound pulses which also broadcasted the U-boat’s location, this device was not very popular. It could detect objects up to 4,000 meters away. it was also out classed even by the early allied ASDIC in terms of effective range, and because it was an active system was not often used 

Sonderapparat (SU-Apparat) – Nibelung

This device was one of the latest sensors being installed on the Type XXI, which coupled with the acoustic torpedo, would enable the boat to launch its torpedoes blind from up to a depth of 50 meters. 
The SU-Apparat (Special Apparatus for U-boats) or also known as Nibelung functioned as an active/passive sensor. It consisted of two basic elements – a hydrophone and a sonar device. Once the hydrophone picked up the bearing of a surface vessel, the sonar would ping in that direction to determine range. Up to three short pulses may be needed, which when plotted together, enabled the operator to determine the target’s speed, range and direction. An acoustic torpedo could then be programmed and fired at the target. The maximum range was 4,000 meters, and also depended on sea conditions. 




> Similarly, Whitley's book on German Destroyers notes on page 85 that Riedel was fitted by August 1940 and Ihn was running trials with her new set in February 1941. Whitley conjectured from the comment that two months later Ihn was stationed ahead of the raider Thor and two other destroyers, Heinemann and Steinbrinck, to "use her S-Gerät" that the other destroyers had not yet been fitted.



From April through to the end of November, DKMs destroyer fleet consisted of just 4 Destroyers. 3 were added at the end of the year, and a further 2 in the first half of 1941. 

Torpedo boats were down to 9 effective units by the end of the Norwegian campaign. A further 9 or so Type 1935 TBs were added 1939-40. The type 1940 began to enter service in 1941. TBs did not have radar in 1939.

S-J boats (literally subchasers) were mostly ex-trawler conversions. They were fitted with sonar, but not usually radar. They constituted the overwhelming majority of the german ASW fleet until 1942. Because they lacked radar, British subs were able to recharge on the surface at night with relative impunity .

There were about 40 Raum-Boats in 1940, also usually fitted with some form of ASW detection gear, but not radar until later. These boats were also the major element of the DKM ASW Fleet. 

German sonar was available, but based on its operational results, it was unremarkable.


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