# Why Did the He 177 Fail?



## SpicyJuan11 (May 31, 2015)

Hello, I am quite confused as to why the He 177 failed. I originally thought that it was due to the "welded together engines", but reading through a couple threads, I actually heard that the coupled engines actually worked fine and quite reliably, but the issue was that Heinkel failed to produce a good engine cowling/nacelle(?)which led to improper cooling and engine fires, not to mention that the air-frame was burdened by the dive-bombing requirement. Is this true? Any help would be greatly appreciated.


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## tyrodtom (May 31, 2015)

Just think you've got 2 inverted V-12s side by side, the center 6 exhaust manifolds of each engine are either shared or very close together, in the bottom of the engine nacelle .

No engine is perfect. Some of them have tiny leaks, any leaked oil or any oil residue left from hurried routine maintenance, is going to end up at the bottom of the engine nacelle, which happens to be where the hottest area is.
If you look at a cutaway of the He177, see if you can see a firewall between the engine and the main spar of the wing. If there is no firewall, a engine fire won't take long to cause main spar failure. Also the engine oil tank is right behind that main spar, but they usually are close to the engine.

I'd say poor design decisions on both engine builder and airframe builder part.


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## SpicyJuan11 (May 31, 2015)

tyrodtom said:


> Just think you've got 2 inverted V-12s side by side, the center 6 exhaust manifolds of each engine are either shared or very close together, in the bottom of the engine nacelle .
> 
> No engine is perfect. Some of them have tiny leaks, any leaked oil or any oil residue left from hurried routine maintenance, is going to end up at the bottom of the engine nacelle, which happens to be where the hottest area is.
> If you look at a cutaway of the He177, see if you can see a firewall between the engine and the main spar of the wing. If there is no firewall, a engine fire won't take long to cause main spar failure. Also the engine oil tank is right behind that main spar, but they usually are close to the engine.
> ...



So what would it take to make it successful (the engine in the airframe and the aircraft itself)?


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## pbehn (May 31, 2015)

Impolite to answer a question with a question but where could it have been successful?


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## SpicyJuan11 (May 31, 2015)

pbehn said:


> Impolite to answer a question with a question but where could it have been successful?



The question is not if it could have been operationally successful, rather technically successful. Also, it's best to ask this question in another thread, I'd rather not have this thread get off topic.


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## Greyman (May 31, 2015)

> During interrogation of Dr. Ernst Heinkel at the end of WWII, I suggested to him that his organisation seemed to enjoy more success with smaller aeroplanes than with large ones. His face displayed some annoyance when he replied that I must be referring to 'that accursed 177'. He associated Ernst Udet, the former Generalluftzeugmeister, in his mind with the whole disastrous story, and in particular the demand for a 60-degree diving attack capability which he blamed on Udet's influence.
> 
> Heinkel himself had not been very closely involved with the original design of the He 177. Dipl-Ing Heinrich Hertel had been Heinkel's Technical Director and Chief of Development during the initial development of the bomber but had left the Heinkel organisation in March 1939, and his departure at this juncture had not augured well for the future of the aircraft. In fact, in 1942, Hertel had returned to Heinkel as Reichsluftfahrtministerium Deputy with full powers to reorganise the development of the He 177. But it proved to be a case of closing the stable door after the horse had bolted, and Ernst Heinkel summed up his feelings when he said to me: 'I even look more kindly on the He 111Z than that 177!'



- Eric Brown




SpicyJuan11 said:


> So what would it take to make it successful (the engine in the airframe and the aircraft itself)?



I think, as Heinkel said, the basic design was cursed and a return to the drawing board would be needed.


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## tomo pauk (May 31, 2015)

Methinks that choice of powerplant was the main problem. The dive bombing request and its implementation was not easing the situation either.


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## Denniss (May 31, 2015)

The dive bombing requirement forced Heinkel to strengthen the airframe to withstand the stress of dive bombing. This caused extra weight and required the use of two engines as the wing was not able to cope with stress caused by an outer wing engine in a 4-engine setup. Due to insufficient power from a single engine they used the coupled engines. The coupled engine was tightly integrated into the wing and that is one major cause of the issue with engine fires (too tight, improperly shielded), I can only assume this was initially made to reduce/limit CoG shifts (which would have forced even more weight in the rear to counter this).
The DB 605 as base engine of the later DB 610 couple added its own share of problems but those should have been solved/reduced by late 1943.

The aerodynamically good/clean design (also caused by twin engien setup) had positive aspects - the aircraft had rather high speeds which could be improved by using a shallow glide approach to target and away from it. During operations over England in 43/44 the He 177 had the lowest loss rate of the involved bombers, most likely due to their speed advantage.


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## GregP (May 31, 2015)

I have jeard other people call it a shallow glide approach but it wasn't at all.

It was a shallow dive approach with power on. A glide is either engine off or power at idle.

The B-29's also used this approach in Japan when bombing accuracy from 30,000 feet wasn't all that was desired. It gave them an over-the-target speed of 330 mph or so, making them very difficult to catch and even they did get caught, the attacker had one pass at best and then was fuel limited for a second pass in large part.


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## SpicyJuan11 (May 31, 2015)

Greyman said:


> I think, as Heinkel said, the basic design was cursed and a return to the drawing board would be needed.



So what changes had to be made on the drawing board? Or would there have been so many changes that it would've been an entirely new aircraft?



tomo pauk said:


> Methinks that choice of powerplant was the main problem. The dive bombing request and its implementation was not easing the situation either.



But didn't it work reliably in tests?



Denniss said:


> The dive bombing requirement forced Heinkel to strengthen the airframe to withstand the stress of dive bombing. This caused extra weight and required the use of two engines as the wing was not able to cope with stress caused by an outer wing engine in a 4-engine setup. Due to insufficient power from a single engine they used the coupled engines. The coupled engine was tightly integrated into the wing and that is one major cause of the issue with engine fires (too tight, improperly shielded), I can only assume this was initially made to reduce/limit CoG shifts (which would have forced even more weight in the rear to counter this).
> The DB 605 as base engine of the later DB 610 couple added its own share of problems but those should have been solved/reduced by late 1943.
> 
> The aerodynamically good/clean design (also caused by twin engine setup) had positive aspects - the aircraft had rather high speeds which could be improved by using a shallow glide approach to target and away from it. During operations over England in 43/44 the He 177 had the lowest loss rate of the involved bombers, most likely due to their speed advantage.



So could the engine cooling, etc, have been resolved by a redesigned nacelle? How about a pusher/puller such as on the Do 335 and Do 215/216?


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## Shortround6 (May 31, 2015)

If you are going to use push-pull you better decide at the start. Shifting a pair of engines from the front of the wing to the back plays havoc with the CG.
It also pretty much dictates tricycle landing gear as a tail dragger with props on the back of the wing either needs stilts for landing gear or very small props.


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## SpicyJuan11 (May 31, 2015)

Shortround6 said:


> If you are going to use push-pull you better decide at the start. Shifting a pair of engines from the front of the wing to the back plays havoc with the CG.
> It also pretty much dictates tricycle landing gear as a tail dragger with props on the back of the wing either needs stilts for landing gear or very small props.



Well obviously the wings will need some redesign like the He 177B, but it shouldn't be too much of an issue, right?


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## kool kitty89 (May 31, 2015)

tyrodtom said:


> Just think you've got 2 inverted V-12s side by side, the center 6 exhaust manifolds of each engine are either shared or very close together, in the bottom of the engine nacelle .
> 
> No engine is perfect. Some of them have tiny leaks, any leaked oil or any oil residue left from hurried routine maintenance, is going to end up at the bottom of the engine nacelle, which happens to be where the hottest area is.
> If you look at a cutaway of the He177, see if you can see a firewall between the engine and the main spar of the wing. If there is no firewall, a engine fire won't take long to cause main spar failure. Also the engine oil tank is right behind that main spar, but they usually are close to the engine.


Wouldn't a lot of those problems have been avoided if upright V orientation had been adopted rather than the inverted V?


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## Koopernic (May 31, 2015)

SpicyJuan11 said:


> Well obviously the wings will need some redesign like the He 177B, but it shouldn't be too much of an issue, right?



Quite a few successful Dornier sea planes flew with the push-pull arrangement. One of them the Do 26 was one of the longest ranged aircraft ever built.

The He 177's problems stem from a number of situation unique to the German predicament
1 The lack of resources to develop competitive alternatives and flyoffs. EG the UK had Lancaster, Stirling Halifax, the US B-17 and B-24.
2 The need for tactical aircraft to deal with difficult neighbours already on the border.
3 Certain psychological factors associated with risk management of complex projects.
4 Funds sunk into the highly ambitious Bomber B project which had effectively heavy bomber range and bombload which failed to mature due to overly ambitious engine requirements.


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## johnbr (May 31, 2015)

Me I think the redesign was the he-274.


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## davebender (May 31, 2015)

Primary reason for failure of engine cowlings on early model He-177A was due to a poorly designed oil tank. Vibration caused fatigue cracks which allowed oil to drip onto hot engine and exhaust system components. After that engine fire is only a matter of time. The problem was fixed after 145 production aircraft. 

For comparison purposes...
Avro built 202 Manchester bombers before technical problems were fixed resulting in the Lancaster bomber. 

Boeing built 120 early model B-17s before the extensively modified B-17E entered production. 

If we are comparing to contemporary heavy bombers the He-177A teething problems were not particularly bad. Difference is He-177 program received crumbs for funding compared to Lancaster and B-17. So Heinkel did not receive funding to build 7,000+ perfected He-177A heavy bombers after teething problems were fixed as Avro Lancaster and Boeing B-17 did.

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## Shortround6 (May 31, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> Quite a few successful Dornier sea planes flew with the push-pull arrangement. One of them the Do 26 was one of the longest ranged aircraft ever built.



They only built six Do 26 aircraft. A little hard to tell how successful it might have been. A couple of reasons for the Push pull on the Do 18 was ease of maintenance, engines are over the hull and wing giving mechanics a place to stand.




another was the fact that such an arrangement helped keep the prop/s out of the spray. 
Did the Do 26 achieve such range because of the push pull arrangement or is spite of it?


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## pbehn (May 31, 2015)

Denniss said:


> During operations over England in 43/44 the He 177 had the lowest loss rate of the involved bombers, most likely due to their speed advantage.



Did they hit anything of note? Night bombing needed a huge investment not only in aircraft but in training and technology. The He177 may have had the lowest losses but they were unsustainable for the LW and also the same loss rate would have been borderline long term for the RAF/USAF. If they continued the losses would have increased when the surprise factor was lost.


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## Greyman (May 31, 2015)

Were there any German pilots that spoke of it in a positive light? The only real commentary I have read is from Eric Brown - and he was not fond of it ... to put it mildly.


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## SpicyJuan11 (May 31, 2015)

Greyman said:


> Were there any German pilots that spoke of it in a positive light? The only real commentary I have read is from Eric Brown - and he was not fond of it ... to put it mildly.



Werner Lerche thought that the He 177 airframe was great.


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## stona (Jun 1, 2015)

Bad management of the project by the RLM/Luftwaffe from Goering downwards.

Dishonest, or at least 'economical with the truth', feed back from the manufacturer to the above. This was not a problem unique to Heinkel, in fact it plagued the German aviation industry at the time.

The above essentially illustrate the difference between the He 177 project which whilst producing over 1,000 aircraft was operationally insignificant and the Manchester/Lancaster project, which produced over 7,000of one of the most operationally influential aircraft of the war.

The He 177 was just another spectacularly dropped catch by the Germans. It consumed considerable resources for a negligible result. It could have been very different indeed, it just needed some clear and concise decision making from it's inception until it entered service, something that time and time again was a problem for the Nazi system which seemed to specialise in moving goal posts.

Cheers

Steve

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## blueskies (Jun 1, 2015)

Yes, Heinkel allocated significant manpower to the He-177.

In my view is was a project saddled with to many requirements, which shifted too frequently and led to engineering compromises that took a substantial amount of work to get right.


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## tomo pauk (Jun 1, 2015)

RLM/LW tried to be too smart with He 177, and that backfired badly. A little bit of conservatism would've meant having an useful bomber force.
Having 4 individual engines of 1500 HP class meant also having the possibility of installing some other engines in case the original ones encounter issues.


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 1, 2015)

tomo pauk said:


> RLM/LW tried to be too smart with He 177, and that backfired badly. A little bit of conservatism would've meant having an useful bomber force.
> Having 4 individual engines of 1500 HP class meant also having the possibility of installing some other engines in case the original ones encounter issues.



Yeah, IIRC the whole He-177B program was just insurance that was never used.


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## Shortround6 (Jun 1, 2015)

As a general rule of thumb _most_ airplanes that are "designed" to be multi-purpose are usually not very good at some of the intended roles and sometimes not very good at any of them. On the other hand many (not all) single purpose planes have been adapted fairly well to other roles, sometimes several roles.

Perhaps in the first case too much "stuff" is added in the beginning for the various roles and performance suffers too big a hit right out of the gate leaving the plane playing catch up in many of it's roles. In the second case a good design may have a bit of "extra" performance which can be traded for the extra weight/drag in some of the alternative roles. 

It just seems to be one of those quirks of aviation History.


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## fastmongrel (Jun 1, 2015)

A Camel is a Horse designed by a committee to be multi purpose.

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## kool kitty89 (Jun 1, 2015)

Shortround6 said:


> As a general rule of thumb _most_ airplanes that are "designed" to be multi-purpose are usually not very good at some of the intended roles and sometimes not very good at any of them. On the other hand many (not all) single purpose planes have been adapted fairly well to other roles, sometimes several roles.


Targeting maritime patrol, short and log range heavy bombing operations, both night and day seem among the more reasonable overlapping service targets. Going beyond that certainly seems to have crippled the aircraft though, not just operationally but in terms of slowing development by adding in unnecessary engineering hurdles.


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## Juha (Jun 1, 2015)

IMHO one reason was that He 177 was a much more complicated a/c than e.g. He 111 and the LW wasn't made made enough preparations for that (training, resources etc) so the units needed extraordinary long times to convert to the type and still ground crews had problems with maintenance and many pilots had difficulties in handling the rather delicate DB 610s.


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## rinkol (Jun 2, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> The He 177's problems stem from a number of situation unique to the German predicament
> 1 The lack of resources to develop competitive alternatives and flyoffs. EG the UK had Lancaster, Stirling Halifax, the US B-17 and B-24.
> 2 The need for tactical aircraft to deal with difficult neighbours already on the border.
> 3 Certain psychological factors associated with risk management of complex projects.
> 4 Funds sunk into the highly ambitious Bomber B project which had effectively heavy bomber range and bombload which failed to mature due to overly ambitious engine requirements.



Number 3 would have also been a factor with the Me 210. I've noticed that situations do arise in large organizations where it is politically difficult or impossible to make a decisive decision to either cancel the project or implement the major changes needed to eliminate a problem. The people who were responsible for the original decisions defend them and everyone else, loathe to admit that things have gone wrong, desperately hopes that some quick and easy work around can be found that will make the problem(s) go away.

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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 7, 2015)

This doesn't really pertain to why the He 177 failed, but thought I shouldn't start another thread for this simple question: What are the dimensions of the He 177's bomb bay? Any help would be greatly appreciated.


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## Koopernic (Jun 8, 2015)

SpicyJuan11 said:


> This doesn't really pertain to why the He 177 failed, but thought I shouldn't start another thread for this simple question: What are the dimensions of the He 177's bomb bay? Any help would be greatly appreciated.



The He 177 did have a sub-divided bomb bay, but it was only subdivided longitudinally. 

A typical load out might be 4 x SC1700 bombs (3750lbs each) which were carried fully internally. This is 6800kg of bombs or 15200lbs. Another loadout was 2 x SC1800 bombs (1800kg each or 4000lbs), although 4 couldn't be carried, due to bomb length, this left room for smaller bombs such as incendiaries or 8 packs of SC50 bombs.

The SC series were light case bombs.

The diagrams in "Griehl" don't show it but armour and semi armour piercing bombs such as a pair of PC2500 (2500kg or 5500lbs) would likely be carried as these heavy case bombs are actually much smaller.

The criticisms of the He 177 subdivided bomb bay are over stated by it seems mainly British authors recalling the far more restrictive and problematically sub divided bomb bay of the Stirling and its 2000lb restriction.

An SC2500 could be carried externally. 

For deep ground penetrations the Luftwaffe had a rocket boosted bomb and if one can imagine the Luftwaffe gaining air superiority and attacking say capital ships at berth in Portsmouth (as the RAF did on the Tirpitz) then a string of say 4 x PC1700 armour piercing bombs would likely get 2-4 times as many hits as a single tallboy and cause quite devastating damage as well.

The Luftwaffe didn't have ultra light case bombs like the finless 4000lb 'cookie' which must have had considerable dispersion compared to a precision made finned bomb but it did have LMB or Luft Mines which had a capsule shape and used a stabilising parachute in lieu of fins. One must not regard these as having giant billowing parachutes and the bomb randomly and irresponsibly drifting down. The drogue 'parachute' was generally only slightly bigger than the bomb itself. It substituted for fins and a aerodynamic tail and also slowed the bomb enough such that the detonators initiated the explosives before they spilled out.

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## Juha (Jun 8, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> ...
> The Luftwaffe didn't have ultra light case bombs like the finless 4000lb 'cookie' which must have had considerable dispersion compared to a precision made finned bomb but it did have LMB or Luft Mines which had a capsule shape and used a stabilising parachute in lieu of fins. One must not regard these as having giant billowing parachutes and the bomb randomly and irresponsibly drifting down. The drogue 'parachute' was generally only slightly bigger than the bomb itself. It substituted for fins and a aerodynamic tail and also slowed the bomb enough such that the detonators initiated the explosives before they spilled out.



And where you got that info? The parachute of the LMB was 27ft (a bit over 8 m)diameter, IMHO a substantially bigger than the mine and yes it was a area weapon because of that, fairly "randomly and irresponsibly drifting down" see: Non-Contact Parachute Ground Land Mine Type GC (MUN 3509)


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## Juha (Jun 8, 2015)

SpicyJuan11 said:


> This doesn't really pertain to why the He 177 failed, but thought I shouldn't start another thread for this simple question: What are the dimensions of the He 177's bomb bay? Any help would be greatly appreciated.



Outer dimensions seems to have been 1750mm wide and 900mm deep but i ccould not find the more useful inner dimensions in the limited time I had.

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## wiking85 (Jun 8, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> The He 177 did have a sub-divided bomb bay, but it was only subdivided longitudinally.
> 
> A typical load out might be 4 x SC1700 bombs (3750lbs each) which were carried fully internally. This is 6800kg of bombs or 15200lbs. Another loadout was 2 x SC1800 bombs (1800kg each or 4000lbs), although 4 couldn't be carried, due to bomb length, this left room for smaller bombs such as incendiaries or 8 packs of SC50 bombs.
> 
> ...




Where did you get that the He177 could carry 4 SC1700s internally? I've only ever read that it could handle either 2x 1700 or 1800s plus 2x SC1000s. It could take 2x Sc2500s internally. The LW did has something like the light case bombs IIRC they were the BM 1000s or something like that. Apparently there was a 4000kg light case bomb developed, but not deployed.


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## Koopernic (Jun 8, 2015)

wiking85 said:


> Where did you get that the He177 could carry 4 SC1700s internally? I've only ever read that it could handle either 2x 1700 or 1800s plus 2x SC1000s. It could take 2x Sc2500s internally. The LW did has something like the light case bombs IIRC they were the BM 1000s or something like that. Apparently there was a 4000kg light case bomb developed, but not deployed.



He 177 load outs here;
http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/at...-/45688d1299773437t-177-bomb-bay-load-177.jpg

Third row shows that 4 x SC1700 or 4 x LMB1000 or combination thereof. Last row shows 2 x SC1800 plus smaller incendiaries/bombs.

This must be an early load-out diagram as the "SB1000 parachute" replaced the LMB and has a small stabilising parachute as I described similar to the SB1000 /410

The LMB were anti shipping mines; however if they missed water they would explode by a clockwork mechanism. If they sank in water they would become anti shipping mines i.e. they were a duel purpose weapon that ended up being an effective anti building factory weapon.

It's from either the Creek/Forsyth book or from Griehl, I have both but can't get to my library. I think creek.

I can't see any significant limitations in the load out plans compared to say a Lancaster. An SC3600 could conceivably be made out of an doubled up SC1800. The RAF used such long bombs.

It is conceivable that a Fritz-X or two might have fitted internally into the He 177 despite its wings if there was no longitudinal division. That would be the worst cost. The longitudinal division member no doubt greatly stiffened and strengthened the fuselage.


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## tomo pauk (Jun 8, 2015)

The capabilities of the Hw 177 (and it's bomb bay) were discussed here: thread.


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 8, 2015)

Thanks guys, but I was just looking for the dimensions to compare to that of the He 277 which was 1.75 meters tall, 1.9 meters wide, and 7 meters long.



Juha said:


> Outer dimensions seems to have been 1750mm wide and 900mm deep but i ccould not find the more useful inner dimensions in the limited time I had.



Thank you Juha! If you could, please provide the length of the bomb bay (the two halves inside are unnecessary), many thanks!


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## davebender (Jun 8, 2015)

That misses the point.

He-177A didn't fail, at least not compared to contemporary heavy bombers. It simply didn't receive enough funding to become a significant factor during the war.


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## Capt. Vick (Jun 8, 2015)

Shortround6 said:


> They only built six Do 26 aircraft. A little hard to tell how successful it might have been. A couple of reasons for the Push pull on the Do 18 was ease of maintenance, engines are over the hull and wing giving mechanics a place to stand.
> View attachment 293910
> 
> another was the fact that such an arrangement helped keep the prop/s out of the spray.
> Did the Do 26 achieve such range because of the push pull arrangement or is spite of it?



There were more than 6 x Do 26 built.


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 8, 2015)

davebender said:


> That misses the point.
> 
> He-177A didn't fail, at least not compared to contemporary heavy bombers. It simply didn't receive enough funding to become a significant factor during the war.



Sorry for the poor choice of words dave


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## GregP (Jun 15, 2015)

I thought there were six, too: 
1. Do 26A (D-AGNT Seeadler) and Do 26A (D-AWDS Seefalke.Civil planes.
2. Do 26B (D-ASRA Seemöwe). Civil plane.
3. Do 26C V1. V2, and V3. Military planes with Jumo 205D engines.

I found a reference to a seventh one as "D" (I assume a Do 26D) but many more sources that say six was the entire population.

What do you have as the entire population, Capt. Vick?


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## nuuumannn (Jun 15, 2015)

> perfected He-177A heavy bombers



'Perfected' is not a word I'd use to describe the He 177A. It was a good performer, but the engine fires were not the only issue with the aircraft that prevented it from becoming anything greater than an 'also-ran'.

Comparison with the Manchester and Lancaster is apt, as the Manchester suffered a raft of issues with its electrical systems, aerodynamic problems that caused bad handling - that gawdawful Fraser-Nash mid upper turret and inadequate vertical tail surface area, but the majority of its problems were solved in the Manchester 1A, which benefitted from the design work needed to create the Manchester III, including the larger tail fins and lower profile mid upper turret. Even the Vulture's problems were cured before the Manchester III entered full scale production as the Lancaster. This is where the Manchester could be argued to have been a successful design, as its airframe went largely unchanged to become the Lancaster; the first Lanc, BT308 was actually a Manchester airframe removed from the production line and modified. 

The big difference between the Manchester/Lancaster and the He 177 however, is not the nature of the issues that beset the types, but the time frame in which the change from innovative failure to successful design took place, also the large number of Lancasters built, against which the He 177 could not compete in comparison. Because Manchesters were already moving down production lines, the change to the Lancaster was not as disruptive as it could have been if too many changes to the design were required. The best bits about the Lancaster - apart from its engines were already incorporated into the Manchester.

If you want to make a comparison across a period of time that matches the He 177, then look no further than the Handley Page Halifax. It wasn't for almost three years after it first flew that it became the sort of aircraft that it should have been to begin with in the Halifax III, ironically, its benchmark was the aircraft that the Air Ministry claimed had to be better than the Halifax before it would contemplate continuing its production - the Lancaster. The difference between the Halifax and the He 177 being the industry that supported it; at the time the British needed all the Halifaxes and Stirlings it could get its hands on - mediocre design and performance notwithstanding - the German need for the He 177 never really seemed as pressing; its use in attacks against the UK were desultory and without measurable result; their planning seemed to be more of a hollow gesture rather than a serious campaign. 

The German hierarchy and way of doing things - as identified by others here was perhaps the biggest stumbling block to its success; this is also identified by contemporaries - Hans Werner Lerche states this as being a big cause of its failure, although he didn't state the airframe was 'great', merely that it had pleasant handling characteristics; here's paragraphs from his book Luftwaffe Test Pilot on the He 177 compared to the B-24 and why it failed.

"If I were asked whether I would prefer to have flown a Liberator with its not completely satisfying flying characteristics or a Heinkel He 177 with practically faultless characteristics but unreliable powerplants, I must confess that I would have preferred to pilot the Liberator, to say nothing of the superior numbers and the fighter escort. In fact, the He 177 with the longer fuselage was not difficult to fly at all, and the version with the separate engines could have made quite a decent combat aeroplane. Perhaps an aircraft combining the new He 177 airframe with the excellent American high altitude engines with their exhaust driven turbo superchargers would have made the ideal bomber at the time."

"I myself see other and deeper reasons, rather than the fault of the engineers, for the debacle with the He 177 and other bad planning on the part of the Luftwaffe. The politically false assessment regarding the entry into the war of Great Britain and later the USA, and the underestimation of the Soviet military power, made the development of a long range bomber appear superfluous at that time. Then, when the He 177 became available and held promise of evolving into an efficient combat aircraft, the State Ministry of Aviation insisted that the He 177 also had to be capable of diving attacks to a far greater extent than planned. This led to a whole series of unnecessary structural alterations and reinforcements which, in turn increased weight."

"In the meantime, the first military successes had been achieved and the Russian campaign also appeared to be running to plan. It seems it was not just a bad joke that, for example, the supply of agricultural machinery to the occupied regions of the Soviet Union - and there was even talk of erecting folk museums! - ranked higher than the needs of the Luftwaffe on the priority list. Consequently not only the He 177 but also several other aircraft developments were postponed, or at least delayed."

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## GregP (Jun 15, 2015)

Folk museums? Ha ha ha ha ... 


How lucky could the Allies get? Museums with a higher priority than the Air Force ina cou try at war! It boggles the mind.


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## nuuumannn (Jun 15, 2015)

Yep, bizarre; only in Nazi Germany. The nazis' view of history was cruelly clinical; destroy the offending abscess, then preserve its memory by erecting a museum to it. They even planned a Jewish museum once they had wiped them out.


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 15, 2015)

nuuumannn said:


> 'Perfected' is not a word I'd use to describe the He 177A. It was a good performer, but the engine fires were not the only issue with the aircraft that prevented it from becoming anything greater than an 'also-ran'.
> 
> Comparison with the Manchester and Lancaster is apt, as the Manchester suffered a raft of issues with its electrical systems, aerodynamic problems that caused bad handling - that gawdawful Fraser-Nash mid upper turret and inadequate vertical tail surface area, but the majority of its problems were solved in the Manchester 1A, which benefitted from the design work needed to create the Manchester III, including the larger tail fins and lower profile mid upper turret. Even the Vulture's problems were cured before the Manchester III entered full scale production as the Lancaster. This is where the Manchester could be argued to have been a successful design, as its airframe went largely unchanged to become the Lancaster; the first Lanc, BT308 was actually a Manchester airframe removed from the production line and modified.
> 
> ...



My mistake, I admit I did not read his report myself, but I got my info from this post from a previous thread http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/polls/17-vs-177-vs-lancaster-11308.html::



HoHun said:


> Hi B-17engineer,
> 
> The German test pilot Werner Lerche considered the airframe of the He 177 excellent, but after flying a captured B-24 which he didn't like much, he said that he'd have preferred a He 177 with the reliable, turbo-supercharged B-24 engines.
> 
> ...


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 15, 2015)

nuuumannn said:


> Yep, bizarre; only in Nazi Germany. The nazis' view of history was cruelly clinical; destroy the offending abscess, then preserve its memory by erecting a museum to it. They even planned a Jewish museum once they had wiped them out.



Yes it was, but to reiterate what was said in the soviet thread, could we please keep this discussion to the He 177 and not digress into a discussion of the politics of the Reich? Many thanks.


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 15, 2015)

Sorry, double post.


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## nuuumannn (Jun 15, 2015)

No worries Spicy Juan, not so much a criticism of what you said, more to clarify what Lerche meant and also to emphasise that although the He 177 might have had promise, there were far too many negative factors influencing its design and conception that meant it was only ever going to achieve mediocrity. Lancaster, B-17 and B-24 are in a different league; their production and subsequent careers are testament to this and starkly highlight the differences between them and the He 177.

(You don't need to repeat yourself, I heard you the first time  )

Reactions: Like Like:
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## GregP (Jun 16, 2015)

The He 177 WAS part of the politics of the Reich.


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## Koopernic (Jun 16, 2015)

Its partly just plane bad luck. Lets look at the Manchester/Lancaster

The Manchester was introduced into RAF service in November 1940. It was overweight and therefor underpowered. There was no hope of strengthening the Vulture engines bearings in a reasonable time so 4 separate Merlin engines inside of Beufighter power eggs were installed on a modified wing. The Lancaster thus entered service in February 1942.

Hence the British took 15 months to recognise and fix the Manchester/Lancaster problem.

The He 177 entered service as the He 177A1 in mid 1942 to late 1942 about 18 months after the Manchester. It has experienced delays for structural reasons as well as engine issues. It was a more ambitious and advanced design than the Lancaster/Manchester in regards to range and speed.

Had the problems with the engines been regarded as insurmountable and 4 separate engines fitted from that point on a 15 month period would imply a 4 engine He 177B could be available in late 1943. It seems the fix was always just around the corner. With pilot training, good maintenance maritime patrol He 177 achieved acceptable engine MTBO of 220 hours by March 1944.

The Luftwaffe just didn't have enough time to recognise the problem and alter the aircraft because it had been delayed till mid 1942. If the 'disaster'had of happened earlier the drastic action might have been taken.

Its issues needed to be recognised during testing as insurmountable and radical action taken in Mid 1941 or so irrespective of cost.


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## Denniss (Jun 16, 2015)

The DB 606 engine had always been OK, it was the problematic tight installation causing the major problems/fires. The DB 610 engine in use from the A-3 on had a far better installation but introduced its own set of issue owing to the oil problems in the basic DB 605 source engine (fixed mid to late 43).
With proper maintenance equipment and training + proper pilot training the He 177 A-3 could have been put to good use in later 43. Both Luftwaffe and Heinkel failed in this, missing documentation, training and equipment.


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## parsifal (Jun 16, 2015)

It depends on which mark of the He 177 we are talking about. The prototypes had so many faults it is difficult to catalogue them all. The A-1 series, which was the main 'operational" type to the end of 1942 was the type to which most of the post war criticisms had serious engine, fuel system and structural issues in the wings, which I will get back to in a minute. The A-3 had less problems and the A-5 sub type was actually a pretty good a/c, but did not enter large scale service in the winter of 1943-4. Despite having largely solved the massive technical issue that dogged this a/c losses for the A-5, used mostly in the anti-shipping role, remained high and losses to non-combat causes still remained the highest single cause for losses. Some of the aircrafts reliability problems remained with it until the end really.

Returning to the A-1, some commentators have commented as follows regarding the A-1 "despite the considerable background of test and development, the A-1 proved unacceptable for operations". A Rechlin report dated October 9 1942 states "The examination has shown that the strength of the wings is less than 1/3 those calculated by the company. The reason for this is the uneven rigidity of the individual members with consequent deformation under load. This condition was not recognised by the company at the proper time, the failure tests having been undertaken too late in view of the size of the structure".

The minutes of a Generalluftzeugmeister meeting held a week later included the following comment "He (Heinkel) is aware of the difficulties expereienced with the He177. He is aware that the most significant problems are associated with insufficient testing". This, after more than two years of flight trials and numerous losses to the protoypes.

The basic problems are associated with the engine couplings, the leaking fuel system, the poorly designed engine manifolds , poor design in the wing struts and fasteners. These are not minor issues for the aircraft and the basic problem, in my opinion was that it was an aircraft with so many new innovations, a procurement apparatus at war with the company, and fluctuating and listless interest in the whole project by the Luftwaffe hierarchy. Its problems, in other words were very deep seated and not just the result of technical over reach


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 16, 2015)

GregP said:


> The He 177 WAS part of the politics of the Reich.



GregP, please, you know what I meant.


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 16, 2015)

Denniss said:


> The DB 606 engine had always been OK, it was the problematic tight installation causing the major problems/fires. The DB 610 engine in use from the A-3 on had a far better installation but introduced its own set of issue owing to the oil problems in the basic DB 605 source engine (fixed mid to late 43).
> With proper maintenance equipment and training + proper pilot training the He 177 A-3 could have been put to good use in later 43. Both Luftwaffe and Heinkel failed in this, missing documentation, training and equipment.





parsifal said:


> It depends on which mark of the He 177 we are talking about. The prototypes had so many faults it is difficult to catalogue them all. The A-1 series, which was the main 'operational" type to the end of 1942 was the type to which most of the post war criticisms had serious engine, fuel system and structural issues in the wings, which I will get back to in a minute. The A-3 had less problems and the A-5 sub type was actually a pretty good a/c, but did not enter large scale service in the winter of 1943-4. Despite having largely solved the massive technical issue that dogged this a/c losses for the A-5, used mostly in the anti-shipping role, remained high and losses to non-combat causes still remained the highest single cause for losses. Some of the aircrafts reliability problems remained with it until the end really.
> 
> Returning to the A-1, some commentators have commented as follows regarding the A-1 "despite the considerable background of test and development, the A-1 proved unacceptable for operations". A Rechlin report dated October 9 1942 states "The examination has shown that the strength of the wings is less than 1/3 those calculated by the company. The reason for this is the uneven rigidity of the individual members with consequent deformation under load. This condition was not recognised by the company at the proper time, the failure tests having been undertaken too late in view of the size of the structure".
> 
> ...



Thanks for the input guys.


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 16, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> Its partly just plane bad luck. Lets look at the Manchester/Lancaster
> 
> The Manchester was introduced into RAF service in November 1940. It was overweight and therefor underpowered. There was no hope of strengthening the Vulture engines bearings in a reasonable time so 4 separate Merlin engines inside of Beufighter power eggs were installed on a modified wing. The Lancaster thus entered service in February 1942.
> 
> ...



What if the issues were seen early on, and the RLM decided to take up Heinkel's counter-proposal the He 177B in 1939? Could it have been in service earlier, how would it perform?


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## Shortround6 (Jun 16, 2015)

If you want in service sooner you have to figure the state of the art at the time. Figure the lower powered engines, a bit more drag, defensive armament that, shall we say, is lacking. Part of the problem was the ever changing specifications. The V1 having a crew of 3 men and 3 defensive MGs. one in the tail, one above the fuselage behind the flight deck and one in the ventral gondola. The man responsible for the lower and upper guns must have been fairly athletic. 







A 4th man was added on the V2 in the picture. The prototypes may not have carried full armament. The above list of weapons for the V-1 were, in fact, not fitted.

performance was waaay less than expected with the V1 making 286mph and the V-5 and V6 supposedly doing 289mph max cruise and 263mph long range cruise with production "standard" engines. Service ceiling was reported as just under 23,000ft. 

It was Aug 2 1941 when the V6 and V7 Show up on the French coast for operational evaluation. Timing is slipping away. The A-0 and A-1 have five men and a rather amazing collection of defensive guns. 6 guns total of 3 different calibers. Three 7.92s, two 13mm guns and a single 20mm MG FF out the front of the gondola. 
Compare this to the B-17E which first flew on Sept 5th, 1941 and 42 were delivered by Nov 30th 1941. "one 0.30-inch machine gun which could be mounted on any one of six ball-and-socket mounts in the extreme nose. One Sperry No. 645473E power turret in the dorsal position with two 0.50 Browning M2 machine guns with 500 rounds per gun. One Sperry No. 654849-J power turret in ventral position with two 0.50-inch Browning machine guns with 500 rounds per gun. One 0.50-inch Browning M2 machine gun is each of the two waist windows, 400 rounds per gun. Two 0.50-inch M2 Browning machine guns in the tail position, with 500 rounds per gun."

From Joe Baughers web site. I would note that the B-17E was _supposed_ to be able to hit 318mph at 25,000ft although cruising speeds were much lower. The B-17E was incapable of defending itself over Europe with eight .50 cal guns and 4 of themin power turrets. Chances of the He 177 with either 2 props or 4 being able to operate in daylight in areas with enemy fighters without *strong* fighter escort are about zero.


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 16, 2015)

Shortround6 said:


> If you want in service sooner you have to figure the state of the art at the time. Figure the lower powered engines, a bit more drag, defensive armament that, shall we say, is lacking. Part of the problem was the ever changing specifications. The V1 having a crew of 3 men and 3 defensive MGs. one in the tail, one above the fuselage behind the flight deck and one in the ventral gondola. The man responsible for the lower and upper guns must have been fairly athletic.
> 
> View attachment 295073
> 
> ...



Well yes, I was thinking that the best place for them would be on the eastern front where the Soviets air defense in 1941-1942 was also a bit lacking.


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 16, 2015)

Shortround6 said:


> If you want in service sooner you have to figure the state of the art at the time. Figure the lower powered engines, a bit more drag, defensive armament that, shall we say, is lacking. Part of the problem was the ever changing specifications. The V1 having a crew of 3 men and 3 defensive MGs. one in the tail, one above the fuselage behind the flight deck and one in the ventral gondola. The man responsible for the lower and upper guns must have been fairly athletic.
> 
> View attachment 295073
> 
> ...



Well yes, I was thinking that the best place for them would be on the eastern front where the Soviets air defense in 1941-1942 was also a bit lacking.


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## GregP (Jun 16, 2015)

Hi Juan,

Yeah, I knew what you meant and was just poking a little fun.

I don't think the He 177 was EVER going to be a good airplane myself. I think the He 277 could easily have been. I like V-12's but don't think the Allison V-3420 was ever really going to be agreat engine either, for much the same reasons. In the case of the V-3420, it never did get into a mass production aircraft. In the case of the He 177, they tried and found exactly what I woluld have expected.

What the world back then needed was a good, oil-tight gasket and the world today still needs that. When we HAVE one, then a W engine might make some sense. Until then it's an oil fire waiting to happen.

Your experience with any engine will not be the experience of the perfrectlky-maintained and perfectly-flown airplane. It will largely be the experience of the aircraft with average maintenance and operation. And if an average mechanic and pilot can't get reliable engine and airframe operation, the plane will fail in its intended task.


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## nuuumannn (Jun 16, 2015)

> The Luftwaffe just didn't have enough time



I don't think time was the issue in this case, Koopernic, although I agree with your point; the Luftwaffe/Germans had little clearly defined need for the He 177 quite in the same way as the British had for the Manchester, Halifax etc. Also, with ever changing requirements, as Shortround pointed out, it was never going to be satisfactory.

Like I pointed out, the Halifax's gestation into a suitable aircraft took the same length of time and while each subsequent model was a minor improvement, until Merlins were replaced with Hercules' its aerodynamic issues were not going to be cured - the engine was mounted in the wrong position on the wing, which increased drag and also lined the exhausts up with the wing leading edge, which resulted in large trumpet exhausts; the shielding for night ops produced enormous amounts of drag. Interestingly, the Lancaster Mk.II fitted with Hercs had a similar result of higher drag because of the engine mounting location; the Merlin on the Lancaster being mounted lower on the Lanc than the Hali. The Halifax IV was to be powered by Merlin 60s and the engines repositioned on the wing; after experiments done by Rolls Royce, the Halifax IV proved to have excellent performance and would have been a superior aircraft to the Lancaster III, but only one was built and the interim Hali III became the largest produced variant... anyway, I digress. Sorry folks.

A bit like the He 177 though, what if they had done this sooner etc...


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## kool kitty89 (Jun 16, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> Had the problems with the engines been regarded as insurmountable and 4 separate engines fitted from that point on a 15 month period would imply a 4 engine He 177B could be available in late 1943. It seems the fix was always just around the corner. With pilot training, good maintenance maritime patrol He 177 achieved acceptable engine MTBO of 220 hours by March 1944.
> 
> The Luftwaffe just didn't have enough time to recognise the problem and alter the aircraft because it had been delayed till mid 1942. If the 'disaster'had of happened earlier the drastic action might have been taken.
> 
> Its issues needed to be recognised during testing as insurmountable and radical action taken in Mid 1941 or so irrespective of cost.


Major difference being that Heinkel Engineers had preferred a 4-engine design from the start, and would have avoided at least the engine-related difficulties in development had they taken that route. The RAF also had alternate heavy bomber designs to choose from as well and had the Manchester/Lancaster proven remotely as problematic as the He 177 they could have made do with the Halifax and (to lesser extent) Stirling.

In terms of long range heavy bomber and/or maratime patrol aircraft development in parallel with or preceding the He 177, you've mainly got the Fw 200 (not likely to make a good heavy bomber, possibly better potential to be refined into a more satisfactory military patrol aircraft and useful as a transport) and the much bigger example of the Ju 89, 90, and 290 development programs.

The RLM rejecting/ignoring the Junkers Heavy bomber programs prevented a lot of further development in that direction, but had the Ju 89/successors progressed further and more rapidly (including adopting Jumo 211 and/or DB 601 powerplants), it may have ended up with an evolutionary path similar to that of the B-17 both as a bomber and airliner/transport. (or perhaps more like the B-17 had the Boeing 307 been produced in greater numbers and become a major military transport -the DC-4 ending up displacing it in most useful roles)

Long range/endurance maratime patrol would probably be more useful for the LW than long range heavy bomber. Short/medium range bombers capable of very high loads (more akin to British heavy bomber mission profiles than American ones) would be more significant and easier to escort but the Do 217 would at least partially fill that role as well, likely at lower cost than the 4-engine Junkers bombers and much cheaper and easier to manufacture/operate/maintain than the He 177.

Relegating He 111s predominantly to transport and maratime patrol duties earlier in the war probably would have been a more practical use of those aircraft and crews as well. (albeit still plenty of cases where the 4 engine patrol-bombers would be preferable and compliment the twins)

But any better maratime planning would also imply actual serious cooperation between the LW and Kriegsmarine ... let alone giving the Kriegsmarine their own independent air arm.




Shortround6 said:


> If you want in service sooner you have to figure the state of the art at the time. Figure the lower powered engines, a bit more drag, defensive armament that, shall we say, is lacking. Part of the problem was the ever changing specifications. The V1 having a crew of 3 men and 3 defensive MGs. one in the tail, one above the fuselage behind the flight deck and one in the ventral gondola. The man responsible for the lower and upper guns must have been fairly athletic.
> 
> From Joe Baughers web site. I would note that the B-17E was _supposed_ to be able to hit 318mph at 25,000ft although cruising speeds were much lower. The B-17E was incapable of defending itself over Europe with eight .50 cal guns and 4 of themin power turrets. Chances of the He 177 with either 2 props or 4 being able to operate in daylight in areas with enemy fighters without *strong* fighter escort are about zero.


Indeed, you'd need both progression of overall design (including armament advancements) as the B-17 saw and capable escort fighters, though in the maratime patrol role not so much need for heavy escort. 





SpicyJuan11 said:


> What if the issues were seen early on, and the RLM decided to take up Heinkel's counter-proposal the He 177B in 1939? Could it have been in service earlier, how would it perform?



Avoiding the engine problems entirely would help, but not eliminate the other issues related to advanced/complex/new technology being implemented. Something somewhat more rational and conservative (more like Junkers earlier designs) would more likely reach service satisfactorily much sooner. That said, the more reliable/less troublesome and more numerous nature of the Jumo 211 implies that coupled versions of those may have been at least somewhat less troublesome than the 606/610s, but 4 separate 211s should be the most reliable to work with of all the options. (and could parallel Heinkel's nacelle designs used on the He 111 to save time and take advantage of streamlining/drag reduction experience already applied there) It's somewhat notable that the Jumo 211F of 1941 was rather comparable in power and altitude performance to the contemporary Merlin XX series used on British bombers. (though with significantly more take-off power on 87 octane fuel)


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## Koopernic (Jun 16, 2015)

As Parsifal pointed out there were procurement and project management issues between the RLM/Heinkel that were part of the problem. Ernst Heinkel claimed that even after rescinding of the dive bombing specification by an apparently flabbergasted Goering in 1942 that Luftwaffe and RLM officers still continued to talk about dive bombing performance. The Photographs of the prototypes show an aircraft with a circular cross section which was changed to a square cross section for reasons of stability (side area) and bomb bay in addition there were the wing structural issues, a simple miscalculation it seems and an indication of poor drawing officer procedures (engineering review) and the problems with the engine installation point to further issues with testing and design. In some ways these were 'scaling issues' that come out of the false assumption that a 30 ton He 177 is just a slightly bigger 15 ton He 111. The He 177 specification seems little more than a scaled up Ju 88 offering greater range indicating conceptual issues.

It may have been that when the Dornier Do 19 and Ju 89 were cancelled the Luftwaffe denied itself the practical experience in developing heavy aircraft.

The structural and other issues and the resulting delays probably obscured the engine issues from the scrutiny they deserved.

Now, consider the likely outcome of a reaction to abandon the paired engines.

1 Decision point 1939 or so when Ernst Heinkel had first flagged the issue. The He 177B enters service sometime in 1941, probably late 1941 or around the same time as the Lancaster. It makes a big difference to the maritime war and all those Fw 200's become supply aircraft.
2 Decision point mid 1941 or so when serious problems are arising in the He 177A0. The He 177 probably enters service in late 1942 so the Luftwaffe has a pretty good bomber in 1943, the U-boat war is not yet over and this aircraft creates lots of problems for the allies.
3 Decision point Mid 1942. This leads to a 4 engine He 177B by the end of 1943.
4 Decision point Late 1942, more or less what happened, leads to a 4 engine He 177B by 1944, too late.

It's worth examining what a He 177 might have achieved.

In the period between 1940 to 1943 the German navy was not supported by adaquete aircraft including long range aircraft. The Ju 290 comes in small numbers in 1943. It is pretty good.

A He 177 that is available from around the same time as the Lancaster enters service, early 1942, creates huge problems for the allies. The aircraft can show up over vast areas of ocean, over 1300 miles from base creating a similar mproblem as the zero,betty and P51 did with their range and the the need of the defenders tio opread their resources thinly.

A 1942 He 177 with computing bombsight has no problem hitting a merchant ship from 12000-14000ft (3500m) and from 1943 its a threat to warships which can't outmanoeuvre its guided weapons. Only a late model destroyer or cruiser has the AAA defences to have a small chance of deterring such an attack, cheap and numerous sloops and frigates essentially no use. The Fw 200 almost always lost encounters with allied aircraft but it would be different with the He 177. It had a speed for instance to make matters difficult for the Martlet/Wildcat on escort carriers and it can dodge and hurt a beufighter. Only the Mosquito is a problem and I would argue the 20mm gun in the tail of a He 177 might win the day on occasion as well.

The He 177 also creates problems for the Soviet factories.

As far as alttide performance goes, its not going to be a problem. The American 1200hp R-1820 and R1830 radials used on the B17/B24 are more or less flat rated to beyond 25000ft but have weighty and bulky superchargers. One can install a larger and more powerful mechanically supercharged engine and with a single stage engine the benefit cross over point will be around 21000ft to 2400ft (for the DB605A).

Since the Germans don't have two stage or turbo charged escort fighters in 1943/44 they are not going to try 30,000ft raids. If we assume production of our 4 engine He 177B starts in 1942 and ramps to 200/month the Germans might, if careful have built 1800 He 177B by 1943 which might allow a 900 aircraft raid in late 1943 escorted by 900 drop tank equipped fighters. What would be the point of forming up at 30000ft over France, it only gives the RAF 15 minutes extra time to prepare. The UK had neglected its AAA radar and defences in favour of offensive radar and so they have no effective AAA till the US loans them SCR-584 and ships proximity fuses in 1944.

Another point is that a 1942 4 engine He 177B with 4 x DB601/605 or jumo 211 engines prepares the way for a late 1943 aircraft with 4 x BMW801TS or DB603A in mid 1943. Historically the He 177A5 had so much extra work, including a lengthened fuselage for the heavier DB610 engines, it makes little difference going from He 177A3-A5 than going from He 177B with DB605 to one with BMW801 or DB603. 

You now have an aircraft with a speed of 340mph-360mph. The Luftwaffe will sacrifice a little production for speed. The resources would come from shutting down He 111, Do 217 production.


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## Koopernic (Jun 17, 2015)

kool kitty89 said:


> But any better maritime planning would also imply actual serious cooperation between the LW and Kriegsmarine ... let alone giving the Kriegsmarine their own independent air arm.
> 
> Indeed, you'd need both progression of overall design (including armament advancements) as the B-17 saw and capable escort fighters, though in the maritime patrol role not so much need for heavy escort.
> 
> Avoiding the engine problems entirely would help



I think one problem is that the German navy wasn't allowed Marineflieger, its own air arm. The German navy in WW1 operated aircraft, mainly airships admittedly, and the present German defence structure has Marineflieger. To be frank I'm not sure if they are part of the modern German Navy or the Luftwaffe as a command, it seems they are part of the NAVY, but anyone having a go at NATO could find German Marineflieger Panavia Tornado aircraft launching active radar homming Kormorant missiles at them. Essentially equal to Exocet but a bit older. 

The WW2 Luftwaffe seems to have supported the German Army well but the structure didn't work as well as it needed to for the Kriegsmarine.

In frustration the German navy withdrew all support for standard 4 engine aircraft such as the He 177/He 277/Ju 290, Me 264 and threw whatever weight it had behind twined Dornier Do 335 (Do 635) to provide reconnaissance in a platform that might survive allied patrol and carrier aircraft.

Solving the engine issues completely by say Feb 42 (Lancaster service date) certainly sinks a lot of allied shipping just as the U-boats are loosing effectiveness, saves a lot of German sub mariners, disrupts the crucial arctic supply convoys to Russia and liberates quite a few Ju 290 and Fw 200 for supply tasks and causes some soviet factories lots of problems. It probably makes the baby blitz effective as the He 177 could carry enough "windows" foil to disrupt British radar.

However I think the possibility of repeated Allied style mass raids are out given the fuel and pilot training issues. (though the He 177 probably extends and savers bomber crew lives). That could only happen if a successful convoy war on Britain leads to a collapse in production, fuel and food in the UK. 

Now it is perhaps not impossible that the He 177B in the period between 1942 to 1943 might have become a 'scourge' worse than the Fw 200 was in 1940.


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## kool kitty89 (Jun 17, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> In frustration the German navy withdrew all support for standard 4 engine aircraft such as the He 177/He 277/Ju 290, Me 264 and threw whatever weight it had behind twined Dornier Do 335 (Do 635) to provide reconnaissance in a platform that might survive allied patrol and carrier aircraft.


If there had been a Marineflieger established (be it land alone, or if their carrier program had continued), that's one more area the Fw 187 may have been very attractive including in its existing 2-seat Jumo 210 powered A-0 form. (long range/endurance coupled with superior radio than an early-war single-seater)

Without bomb racks it would be limited to recon and escort work, and it might not work all that well for lifting heavier loads until upgraded to Jumo 211 or DB 601 engines (or possibly HS 12Ys -including the Czech made 12Ydrs the Germans had access to prior to the invasion of Poland)


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## syscom3 (Jun 17, 2015)

A maritime version isnt going to sink any ships at all. The USAF proved that with B17's in the Pacific. If you want to hit a ship you got to do it down low. Where it will be increasingly vulnerable to massed AAA from the convoy's in 1943.


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## Koopernic (Jun 17, 2015)

syscom3 said:


> A maritime version isnt going to sink any ships at all. The USAF proved that with B17's in the Pacific. If you want to hit a ship you got to do it down low. Where it will be increasingly vulnerable to massed AAA from the convoy's in 1943.



Not if the 1943 attack by Fw 200 Condors from 15000ft on Convoy Faith is considered.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convoy_Faith

The three Fw 200's were getting hits for around 50% of their attack runs using their Lotfe 7 bomb sights. The misses being either straddles or near misses (20 yards) or so and the latter against warships engaged in evasive manoeuvres. Had this attack been pressed from He 177 with a larger bomb load a denser stick of bombs might have converted the straddles into hit. The Focke-Wulfs returned the next day and achieved a further hit.

There are a few accounts of this
Convoy Faith.

From 1943 both the Fritz-X and Hs 293 are available to attack warships.


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## parsifal (Jun 17, 2015)

The Germans were beginning to use some sophisticated anti ship ordinance by 1943, like the HS293. The A-5 used on anti shiping strikes late 43 to early 1944 had some reults with these pieces of ordinance. 

Im not sure its completely valid to compare with the B-17 under those circumstances


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## Koopernic (Jun 17, 2015)

parsifal said:


> The Germans were beginning to use some sophisticated anti ship ordinance by 1943, like the HS293. The A-5 used on anti shiping strikes late 43 to early 1944 had some reults with these pieces of ordinance.
> 
> Im not sure its completely valid to compare with the B-17 under those circumstances



I know nothing of how the USAAF tried to use B-17's in the Pacific against Japanese shipping. I imagine they were trying to attack fast warships which are fast, typically up to 30 knots, manuverable and have drills and communication systems to make rapid assessment and course changes in response to enemy action. A Merchantman or troop ship (even a converted 20 knot liner) is in a different situation. The Japanese scored hits against the under defended Prince of Wales and Respulse from around 5000 to 7000ft, rather suicidal altitudes had the ships radars been working. Fall time of a bomb from about 12000ft is about 15 seconds, which is not much time to react.

In the Convoy Faith action the Fw 200's seem to have been chased of by the rather slow Catalina with one German airman severely injured. I'd say that wouldn't have happened had this attack been pressed home by a reliable He 177.

The only allied response would be to beef up the escorts with frontline warships with a much better fire control and radar fit out or to provide escort aircraft carriers. The He 177B with BMW801 engines would seem to be able to outrun a Martlet/Wildcat often used on these carriers.


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## GregP (Jun 17, 2015)

Convoy Faith is NOT what I would have called a convoy, Koopernic. It consisted of two troops ships and a frreighter. later, a couple of destroyers joined.

When I think of a convoy, I think of 20 - 150 ships spaced properly, with interl,ocking field of fire, and proper excorts around the perimeter at a suitable distance.

In a war where almost everyone attacked whenever they could, a few successes don't mean a tactic was necessarily any good. The American Indians won a few battles in the old WIld West but, if a bow and arrows were any good as weapons, we'd be speaking Sioux or Apache now. Because they had a few successes with bow and arrows doesn't mean we should take them up to slay our enemies.

Sure, the Condors had some success, particularly when the victims were lone submarines or unarmed ships taht were themselves unescorted. Large-scale successes against proper convoys, which were the norm rather than the exeption, would NOT have been in the works. If you were over a Heavy Cruiser or bigger ship with the usual armament ... 15,000 feet wasn't much protection anyway.


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## GrauGeist (Jun 17, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> I know nothing of how the USAAF tried to use B-17's in the Pacific against Japanese shipping. I imagine they were trying to attack fast warships which are fast, typically up to 30 knots, manuverable and have drills and communication systems to make rapid assessment and course changes in response to enemy action. A Merchantman or troop ship (even a converted 20 knot liner) is in a different situation. The Japanese scored hits against the under defended Prince of Wales and Respulse from around 5000 to 7000ft, rather suicidal altitudes had the ships radars been working. Fall time of a bomb from about 12000ft is about 15 seconds, which is not much time to react.


17 B-17s participated in the Battle of Midway and of all the attacks, not a single hit was scored.


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## parsifal (Jun 18, 2015)

That's true, but its just not that simple guys. At Bismarck 8 transport out of 8 were sunk and 5 DDs out of 8 by 39 heavy bombers; 41 medium bombers; 34 light bombers, using low level "skip bombing" techniques. All of the ships caught in this trap were steaming at absolutely maximum speed, and the DDs in particular were highly manouverable ships, well defended. 

Over the North Sea 1943, CC a/c including LR heavy bombers sank about 1 million tons of Axis shipping. The VLRs also were now accurate enough to hit Uboats with high levels of accuracy. 

probably the zenith of high level bombing came in November 1944, with the destruction of the Tirpitz. 30 bombers release at 16000 ft, at least 3 bomb hits. A ship designed to withstand the heaviest ordinance available stood no chance once the bombs were able to hit. That was the problem. up to that time, the accuracy was too hard to achieve. Some good luck, excellent training (bombs dropped by the elite 617 sqn) state of the art bombing aids made it possible to achieve results that had previously eluded level bombing of this target.

The simple assumption often made is that divebombing and torpedo bombing offer4ed greater levels of accuracy. They probably did, but they also made the aircraft delivering those attacks quite vulnerable. The best outcome was to make high level bombing accurate, that way you get the results without the losses

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## Just Schmidt (Jun 18, 2015)

Parcifal: "probably the zenith of high level bombing came in November 1944, with the destruction of the Tirpitz. 30 bombers release at 16000 ft, at least 3 bomb hits. A ship designed to withstand the heaviest ordinance available stood no chance once the bombs were able to hit. That was the problem. up to that time, the accuracy was too hard to achieve. Some good luck, excellent training (bombs dropped by the elite 617 sqn) state of the art bombing aids made it possible to achieve results that had previously eluded level bombing of this target."

It did help that Tirpitz wasn't moving.


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## GregP (Jun 18, 2015)

Actually I wasn't saying bombers couldn't sink ships.

I was saying bombers can't sink ships reliably from high altitude. Also, there is no point in using a Condor if you are within range of anythign else in the inventory, so the Condor would be stalking ships WAY out of range for fighters and planes like the He 111.

Skip bombing soesn't quite qualify since you would need a plane to do that ... not a Condor. And if a Condor came in at 100 feet it would be a HUGE target that every trained gunner in the conflict would love to see in his sights.

So my point was the Condor would not have great success at FLAK altitude agianst large, well-defended convoys. Once they were in range of shore-based fighters and medium-range bombers, it was a case of who had more firepower and better air cover because once they were range of the Germans, they aere also in range of the British.

The Spitifre typically might not have HAD much range for most of the war, but it DID have range enough to intercept a Bf 109 or plural Bf 109s that was (were) closing on a convoy closer to the UK than the continent.

Don't take things out of context. The Condor was NOT a primary attack plane unless it was out of range for any other warplane. If you are the only game in town, you have a captive audience.


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## Koopernic (Jun 18, 2015)

GregP said:


> Convoy Faith is NOT what I would have called a convoy, Koopernic. It consisted of two troops ships and a frreighter. later, a couple of destroyers joined.
> 
> When I think of a convoy, I think of 20 - 150 ships spaced properly, with interl,ocking field of fire, and proper excorts around the perimeter at a suitable distance.
> 
> ...



If a proper convoy was 20-150 ships then an appropriate attack upon it would require at least an equal number of aircraft, ideally twice as many. No point taking on 100 allied ships with "penny packets". Only 200 Fw 200's were produced but He 177 production was initially set to 100 month, it would have been more bar the problems and bar the problems the kind of numbers plausibly attainable in mid/late 1942. There proably weren't enough B-17E available at midway nor was supply logistics enough.

The introduction of the Lotfe 7 bombsight in early 1942 meant the Luftwaffe now had an accurate way of attacking ships from high altitude. A computing bombsight levelled itself and after tracking the target compensated for the targets motion and the aircrafts wind drift. So mlong as the ship didn't change course it could be hit. 1942 is when losses to U-boats started falling of and 1943 is when U-boat losses started going up.

The Luftwaffe has a superb bombsight but no suitable aircraft to use with it.

The allies would no doubt get the measure of it for a while there was a chance to sink ships when there was still shortages of escort carriers and well away from Mosquito fighters. 

Using a Fw 200 to attack ships was the same as using modified DC3's. It didn't have enough defensive armament, enough armour, enough speed, enough bombs or even enough range.

Convoy Faith was about 3 troop ships/merchantmen and 3 escorts. Only one of the escorts was a destroyer HMCS Iroquois. The Allied escorts were bulked out by low end frigates and sloops that were slow, had poor fire control, reciprocating steam engines instead of turbines, little armament and what there was only manually trained and whose radar was good for surface search of u-boats only. They were all about screening of U-boats using cheap microwave radar and a sonar. Faith it seems was attacked by, it seems, only 4 Fw 200's. There were two other warships in the distance, one of which was attacked. 

Iroquois, the only true destroyer, had a type 291 air search radar that was fine for early warning. It was developed of metric ASV radar and was connected to a PPI display. It also had a secondary role in assisting anti aircraft fire by providing slant range to an accuracy of about 200m, which is pretty miserable.


The fire control on cruisers and the modern American destroyers was better but the many cheap sloops wouldn't cut it and more destroyers would be needed.


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## Shortround6 (Jun 18, 2015)

Like a lot of other things, a major change in weapons/tactics from one side would would provoke a change in weapons/tactics from the other side. 

A much more numerous fleet of long range aircraft attacking convoys at sea would not be met by a wringing of hands and sobbing but a change in priorities with a quicker introduction of AA Frigates for one thing. There was no technical reason the Bay class could not have been built earlier. Providing the additional AA guns would require a change in priorities but the basic hull and powerplants were little changed ( two sets of engines from a Flower class corvette). 
No need for 40-50,000hp steam turbine power plant for shooting at aircraft. 5,500hp worth of reciprocating engines would do just fine. 

A bit more effort put into escort carriers? return of the CAM ship? 

While shooting down a raider in sight of the convoy is great for moral, causing enough damage to keep it from making it hundreds of miles back to base works in the long run just as well. Zipping around at high speed may keep low performing fighters at bay but every minute at high speed is 3-5 minutes worth of cruise. Bombers tend not to accelerate as well as fighters so a bomber caught at cruising speeds may have a several minute window of vulnerability while speed builds up. It took a SPitfire MK V about 2 minutes to from a slow cruise to high speed. A 50,000lb bomber is going to take how long?


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## stona (Jun 18, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> If a proper convoy was 20-150 ships



A quick look at the admittedly limited data I have to hand for the Battle of the Atlantic would imply that, for the RN at least, about 40 merchant vessels (plus of course all the escorts) was a rough upper limit to what was deemed manageable. 

Cheers

Steve.


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## Milosh (Jun 18, 2015)

If one wants to find out how many ships were in a convoy, Arnold Hague Convoy Database


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## kool kitty89 (Jun 19, 2015)

Shortround6 said:


> Bombers tend not to accelerate as well as fighters so a bomber caught at cruising speeds may have a several minute window of vulnerability while speed builds up. It took a SPitfire MK V about 2 minutes to from a slow cruise to high speed. A 50,000lb bomber is going to take how long?


Wouldn't it be useful to cruise above attack height and enter a shallow dive to accelerate more quickly when nearing the target area?

Granted, even if the aircraft's ceiling permits that and situations would still be weather dependent. (clouds are good for hiding, but bad for navigating/spotting, at least once you're in visual range)


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## parsifal (Jun 19, 2015)

Determining optimal convoy size is a very complex exercise. if there is no opposition , the most efficient approach is to have no convoy. Convoys need to bge formed, move at the speed of the slowest ship in the group, are cumbersome to manouvre and take time to load, form, move, unload and disperse. If you have big convoys, you need big port handling facilities, otherwise you end up with loaded merchant shipping swinging around its anchor chains outside the port as it waits for a dock berth in the harbour. Againt air attack, a smaller convoy is generally a better option, if you have a ship with area defence assets like an AA ship. You can cluster your shipping around that centre flak ship and maximise your mutual defences. The ship dispositions are failry loose and determined by the TDZs (Tactical Diameters) of the components. If an attack develops, your ships go into hard manouvreing without too much dispersal. The aim is to present as hard a target as possible whilst benefitting from mutual fire zones 

against Uboats you want bigger convoys packed as tightly as you can. Your ships maintain as fast a straight speed as possible, use zig zag, but dont deveiate from the MLA. No deviations and no stopping. Absolutely dont turn and try and help stricken vessels. If you straggle, tough bikkies. Your on your own and probably a goner. You absolutely need to do exactly as the Convoy Commodore tells you. If you are lucky enough to have a carrier, use the a/c to scout ahead. Best policy is to alter course to avoid any sighted Uboats. Use your CAG to force the Uboat to submerge and keep him down until the convoy is clear. The best cvonvoys were escorted by well integrated groups that knew how to work together. You have your outer screen and then you have a strategic reserve at the corps or at the back, which you use to plug gaps in the defence, or if you feel aggressive to prosecute contacts hopefully until they are sunk. Angels that have your back covered. 

Against surface threats, the tactics are different again. Use the screen to delay whilst the charges scatter as quickly as possible. Use smoke and 9in the modern age) ew to keep the location of the ships as obscure as you can. Call for help. Present yourself as a hard target. Try to confuse your enemy 

The average convoy size in the Atlantic (in the HX convoys was 61 ships. main threat was Uboats. In the med where air attack was the main threat the average convoy size was about 15 ships.


It just depends on the source of the threat, and a whole bunch of other factors like port capacity.

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## Shortround6 (Jun 19, 2015)

kool kitty89 said:


> Wouldn't it be useful to cruise above attack height and enter a shallow dive to accelerate more quickly when nearing the target area?
> 
> Granted, even if the aircraft's ceiling permits that and situations would still be weather dependent. (clouds are good for hiding, but bad for navigating/spotting, at least once you're in visual range)



What "target area"????
A convoy isn't London. One of the main reasons for using _maritime reconnaissance _ planes is _finding_ the convoy/s. If you don't know where the convoy is how do you go into a shallow dive _before_ you reach it? 

Once the convoy is spotted you can turn around and execute an attack run. In order to get a number of planes to attack a convoy the plane that does the initial spotting needs to shadow it to guide the other attacking planes (give position up dates). But the plane doing the shadowing cannot be zipping around at high speed burning up fuel at a high rate. The "strike force" may be able to use a shallow dive on the actual bomb run but even a 40 ship convoy doesn't cover a wide area compared to a city and going into the shallow dive _before_ getting a visual (or radar contact) on the convoy may not work too well. 

Yes the maritime reconnaissance/strike aircraft can also use radar but the chances of the radar in the plane being better/longer ranged than the radar on the ship/s is pretty slim. The _happy time_ for the Condors was between June of 1940 and Aug/Sept 1941. After that their success as attack planes faded considerably. More/better radar on the escorts, more AA guns (granted light stuff but forcing the attacks higher), CAM ships, escort carriers all contributed. 
Using a bomber that is 50-75mph faster in 1942-43 doesn't mean the radar went away, or the even more AA guns, there are even more escort carriers. 
The faster, newer bombers will have lower losses than trying to use Condors but they are not going to return the German success rate to that of late 1940.


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## kool kitty89 (Jun 19, 2015)

Shortround6 said:


> Once the convoy is spotted you can turn around and execute an attack run. In order to get a number of planes to attack a convoy the plane that does the initial spotting needs to shadow it to guide the other attacking planes (give position up dates). But the plane doing the shadowing cannot be zipping around at high speed burning up fuel at a high rate. The "strike force" may be able to use a shallow dive on the actual bomb run but even a 40 ship convoy doesn't cover a wide area compared to a city and going into the shallow dive _before_ getting a visual (or radar contact) on the convoy may not work too well.


Shadowing (let alone cruising) at high speed wouldn't be practical, but in those situations wouldn't staying at higher altitude be preferable anyway? (as long as visual and/or radar contact could be maintained)

Granted, even if maintaining a distance and altitude that made AA defenses ineffective, once escort carriers are on the scene (or anything else carrying useful interceptors) that's another matter entirely. And as you said previously, any effective tactics would spur more aggressive countermeasures from the opposition. 

That said, the Fw 200 itself didn't have particularly good altitude performance, top speed, or cruising speed, so a good deal of room for improvement on all fronts.



> Using a bomber that is 50-75mph faster in 1942-43 doesn't mean the radar went away, or the even more AA guns, there are even more escort carriers.
> The faster, newer bombers will have lower losses than trying to use Condors but they are not going to return the German success rate to that of late 1940.


I was suggesting putting more emphasis on developing a potent long range bomber/recon/patrol aircraft in the first place. Probably with greater emphasis on recon/patrol ability (with strike aircraft carrying out most actual attacks).

And with the Ju 89/90 actually starting development as a military aircraft, I'd think it would be the most straightforward one to continue development in the combat role than the Fw 200. (it does seem like the Ju 89/90 was the better basis for a heavy transport and recon/patrol/bomber than the Fw 200 though) Something intermediate between the Ju 89/90 and 290 in service in 1940 powered by Jumo 211s seems plausible.

Then again, putting greater emphasis on properly strengthening and militarizing the Fw 200 should at very least have been better than what they were working with historically. (and compared to the Bramo radials, Jumo 211s should have helped with both speed and altitude performance as well as improved endurance/range due to improved specific fuel consumption and reduced drag)

In terms of pure maratime patrol/recon work, though, it might have been more effective (and cost effective) to employ something more like a long-range twin engine aircraft like a long-range recon derivative of the Ju 88 or He 111. (high speed Mosquito-like unarrmed recon aircraft might not be all that suitable though given the loiter time required for coordinating a strike force -dropping to a slower cruise speed could be possible, but ruin the primary advantages of a fast, unarmmed recon aircraft; the He 111 might actually make a better basis than the Ju 88 there)

You also have the likes of the Do 26 and far more numerous BV 138 which certainly had the range/endurance advantage to rival or well exceed the likes of the PBY, but with more severe speed and ceiling limitations than the Fw 200 itself. The BV 242 may have been a more compelling alternative to the Fw 200 and possibly more compelling for continued development than the Fw 200 or Ju 90/290 (in the patrol/recon role at least; the 290 would likely remain superior heavy transport).

The Do 26 may have had more compelling speed and altitude performance if adapted to alternate engines (Jumo 207, DB 601, or Jumo 211) but given that extreme range/endurance wasn't as necessary and the BV 242 was significantly faster with a much higher ceiling and land based (while also viable as a seaplane via Ha 139) and likely to remain better performing with comparable engine and armament upgrades, it seems like the more competitive alternative to the Fw 200. (perhaps more of an argument between mass producing the Do 26 and BV 138 )


Strike aircraft could certainly be more optimized for speed, but that doesn't cover the patrol role. (and unless you could manage a WWII equivalent of the P-2 in terms of patrol, strike capability, and range, you'd need more specialized aircraft for strike and patrol)


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## Koopernic (Jun 20, 2015)

What made it possible to successfully bomb the ships of convoy Faith from between 12000ft to 15000ft was the use of a computing bombsight, the Lotfe 7. Sights like the Norden, Lotfe 7, SABS II to work best needed a steady run up in which the relative motion of the target was tracked. The Lotfe 7 apparently did this part very well. The bombardier basically adjusted variable speed drives whose motion was linearized via trigonometric cams to compensate for bomb sight angle and height. This established target velocity and wind drift. The USAAF thought it could hit trains and they probably could with a stick of bombs. The actual run up to the bomb release also needed to be steady. We are talking 10s of seconds though, not minutes.

Diving and accelerating would interfere with the bombsights accuracy.

The RAF's Mk.14 could bomb in a shallow dive but that sight could not compute target motion or offset for wind, that had to be estimated. Likewise the excellent Stuvi 5B with the BZA automate which could bomb in a dive. Late war Nordens could be equipped with a device to handle height changes.

It was theoretically possible to track and bomb while the aircraft was manoeuvring, battleships had the fire control to do this (eg the ford range keepers on USN ships).

You would need a 3 axis platform and a way of tracking the aircraft velocity and heading changes during the tracking, integrating accelerometers would be best but maybe just using air speed and heading would probably do.
That is a lot more mechanical computing to add for 1942. The bombsight would trace a fixed spot on the ground or sea irrespective of motion and the bombardier would make adjustments which would be in fact the wind/target motion.

This is I think beyond 1942 tech.

I do not believe an typical allied escort whether or frigat, sloop or destroyer was much of a threat to a level bomber at 12000ft in 1942. A cruiser would be a different matter but they were relatively rare.

My feeling is that it would be sometime in late 1942 that the allies would respond with better radar, proximity fuses and by then the use of guided weapons from higher altitude would change the game again.

The RAF's accurate bombing of Tirpitz is unremarkable: it was a 800ft by 100ft target. The only thing I find fascinating is how they accumulate the tallboy bombs aero ballistic data.


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## Greyman (Jun 20, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> What made it possible to successfully bomb the ships of convoy Faith from between 12000ft to 15000ft was the use of a computing bombsight, the Lotfe 7.



According to the wiki article; 

_"In his assessment of the action Admiral Charles Forbes, the Commander-in-Chief, Plymouth strongly criticised the troopships for not taking evasive action during the attack."_

I imagine that would help accuracy quite a bit.


*EDIT:*
I'm no bombing/bombsight expert but the procedure for operating the Mk.XIV sight includes entering indicated wind speed and wind direction into the computer. I'm not sure if this is what you were referring to though.


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## Juha (Jun 20, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> ...Convoy Faith was about 3 troop ships/merchantmen and 3 escorts. Only one of the escorts was a destroyer HMCS Iroquois. The Allied escorts were bulked out by low end frigates and sloops that were slow, had poor fire control, reciprocating steam engines instead of turbines, little armament and what there was only manually trained and whose radar was good for surface search of u-boats only. They were all about screening of U-boats using cheap microwave radar and a sonar. Faith it seems was attacked by, it seems, only 4 Fw 200's. There were two other warships in the distance, one of which was attacked.
> 
> Iroquois, the only true destroyer, had a type 291 air search radar that was fine for early warning. It was developed of metric ASV radar and was connected to a PPI display. It also had a secondary role in assisting anti aircraft fire by providing slant range to an accuracy of about 200m, which is pretty miserable...



As I have wrote already once, sloops were rather slow but powerfully armed ships for their size with good A/S AND AA armament, see e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Swan-class_sloop


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## Milosh (Jun 20, 2015)

There was 2 destroyer type vessels in Convoy Faith.

*HMCS Iroquois*, a Tribal-class destroyer that served in the Royal Canadian Navy.

*HMS Douglas*, aa Admiralty type flotilla leader (also known as the Scott-class) of the British Royal Navy.










*HMS Moyola*, K-260, a River Class frigate





*HMS Swale*, K-217, another River Class joining the convoy was also attacked.


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## pattern14 (Jun 20, 2015)

Getting back to the He 177, it was a flawed design, partly due to the twin engined bomber mindset of the Luftwaffe heads at the time. The 4 engined he 277 was a much more promising design. German bombers never had the success of their allied counterparts for a myriad of reasons, although you can trace the root of the problem back to the initial offensives. The Third reich did not envisage having to have an effective long range multi engined bomber force, as they believed in a short war that could be won with existing weapons. Technical woes, material shortages, lack of training and manpower eventually finished them off.


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## fastmongrel (Jun 20, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> The RAF's accurate bombing of Tirpitz is unremarkable: it was a 800ft by 100ft target. The only thing I find fascinating is how they accumulate the tallboy bombs aero ballistic data.



From 10,000ft (not actually sure of drop height) even a big ship like the Tirpitz is still a tiny target, if it was so unremarkable why wasnt everyone doing it. No617 and No9 were highly trained specialised units with possibly more combat and training flight hours than any other bomber squadrons before or since and even they only hit with 2 out of 29 bombs dropped.


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## Shortround6 (Jun 20, 2015)

pattern14 said:


> German bombers never had the success of their allied counterparts for a myriad of reasons, although you can trace the root of the problem back to the initial offensives. The Third reich did not envisage having to have an effective long range multi engined bomber force, as they believed in a short war that could be won with existing weapons. Technical woes, material shortages, lack of training and manpower eventually finished them off.



Part of it the beginning was who the enemy was expected to be and what did you really need to hit the enemy. The He 111 seems to be rather unappreciated. The H-16 model (and earlier H models weren't that different) could haul eight 250kg bombs 1885km or cutting that to roughly 1/3 for a practical radius, about 390 miles. To meet weight limits the fuel tanks were not quite full. Leaving one 250kg bomb out would allow full tanks. 
At any rate it is just about 390 miles from Emden to Manchester. About 380 miles from Heinsburg to Bristol. The Germans could cover a very large part of England from bases near the German border using HE 111s. London was a piece of cake. 
The Germans could also hit large parts of France. Marseille was in easy range, La Rhochelle was a bit of stretch, 440 miles. From Saarbruecken is about 390 miles to Cherbourg. Brest and Bordeoux may have only been reachable with reduced bomb loads (four 250kg bombs?).
The British have a bit of a problem. While they can hit the Ruhr pretty well it is around 260 miles from Emden to Berlin. Many German cities are within range of early British bombers with decent bomb loads but Berlin was not. 
GOing back to the Germans, it is around 600 miles from eastern Poland to Moscow. If we use the range X 1/3 + radius formula then the German 4 engine bomber would need a range of 2900-3000km to hit Moscow after the Germans took all of Poland. Please note that at this range a Halifax II might be carrying about 3000lbs worth of bombs. The Halifax II might not have been the most streamline plane going but it was using Merlin XX engines. A German 4 engine bomber that could hit Moscow in the Summer of 1941 (let alone the Urals) was a pipe dream. 

What was going to do the Germans more good in 1940/41, 400 He 111s or 200 4 engine He X77s?

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## Juha (Jun 20, 2015)

fastmongrel said:


> From 10,000ft (not actually sure of drop height) even a big ship like the Tirpitz is still a tiny target, if it was so unremarkable why wasnt everyone doing it. No617 and No9 were highly trained specialised units with possibly more combat and training flight hours than any other bomber squadrons before or since and even they only hit with 2 out of 29 bombs dropped.



Lancasters bombed from 12,000 ft to 16,000 ft, most between 14,000 ft and 15,500 ft. Cloud hinderance was noticeable especially near the end of the raid many planes lost the sight of the ship before the dropping point.


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 20, 2015)

Hey Juha, would you mind giving me the rest of the He 177 bomb bay dimensions? Many thanks!


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## parsifal (Jun 20, 2015)

Tirpitz was an exceptionally difficult target to hit. She was protected on three sides by steep Fjord walls, had a full regt of flak protecting her, torpedo nets, smoke machines. Attacking aircraft had to either fly high, as was done in the November attacks and only had a short time in which to sight up the target, due to the canyon walls either side, or run the gauntlet up the Fjord itself. 

On the day of the attack, the 617 sqn was lucky. weather was clear, but there were no fighters, cloud cover partially obscured the target, but it was still possible to see her. Blind bombing aids were used to assist in sighting up, but the final bomb releases were done visually. Smoke machines were activated, but the screen was only partial at the time of the bomb releases.

There was probably no better protected warship in the world at that time. And hitting a warship sized target at 16000 feet is never easy


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## Juha (Jun 20, 2015)

SpicyJuan11 said:


> Hey Juha, would you mind giving me the rest of the He 177 bomb bay dimensions? Many thanks!




Sorry but the drawing is on the cross-section of the fuselage, so no info on the lenght of the bomb bay, there might be that info in the text but I don't have time to look it. IMHO the easiest way to find out is to look on a good sideway picture of He 177, measure the lenght of the bomb bay and with the knowledge of the lenght of He 177 calculate the lenght of the bomb bay.


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## kool kitty89 (Jun 20, 2015)

pattern14 said:


> Getting back to the He 177, it was a flawed design, partly due to the twin engined bomber mindset of the Luftwaffe heads at the time. The 4 engined he 277 was a much more promising design.


The 277 was a more advanced late-war design not really feasible as an alternative to the 177. The early proposal for developing the He 177 with 4 engines (namely DB 601 or Jumo 211) would be more practical but likely still suffer from some of the He 177's other teething problems related to advanced features. Still, it would at very least reduce the number of technical hurdles to overcome.



> The Third reich did not envisage having to have an effective long range multi engined bomber force, as they believed in a short war that could be won with existing weapons. Technical woes, material shortages, lack of training and manpower eventually finished them off.


As Shortround06 already noted, the He 111 was relatively long ranged (though not as long as the Wellington), and pre-war the LW did have plans for long range strategic bombing capabilities with the development of the Ju 89 and Do 19 resulting from that. Walther Wever was the major proponent of this and the program died out after his death in 1936. (the subsequent Bomber A requirement that led to the He 177 did share some of the same goals, but even aside from the added dive bombing requirement it pushed a number of other advanced requirements beyond the scope of the older Ju 89, particularly the 500 km/h requirement)




Shortround6 said:


> GOing back to the Germans, it is around 600 miles from eastern Poland to Moscow. If we use the range X 1/3 + radius formula then the German 4 engine bomber would need a range of 2900-3000km to hit Moscow after the Germans took all of Poland. Please note that at this range a Halifax II might be carrying about 3000lbs worth of bombs. The Halifax II might not have been the most streamline plane going but it was using Merlin XX engines. A German 4 engine bomber that could hit Moscow in the Summer of 1941 (let alone the Urals) was a pipe dream.


A developed Ju 89 should have been able to manage Moscow (though likely not the Urals). The Fw 200 should have managed it as well, but bombload was fairly limited (4 or 6 250 kg bombs for the C-2) and the Ju 89 should have had a good deal more potential for expanded internal bomb capacity than the Fw 200. (the initial 16x100 kg bombs isn't very impressive, though)

If the He 111 could be modified to increase internal fuel capacity (or use drop tanks) along with perhaps 1000 kg of bombs and manage the same distance, that would probably be a good deal more cost effective and more useful for adapting between strategic and tactical bombing needs. (the Do 217 might be useful in a similar configuration, but obviously wouldn't be available in numbers by 1941)


In any of those cases you still run into the problem of escorts or limiting attacks to night bombing. (or possibly high altitude day bombing - Jumo 207 powered Ju 89 derivatives might have managed that, but again you're running into more specialized aircraft; 207s on the He 111 would likely leave it a bit underpowered and limit practical take-off weight or require RATO, though the added fuel efficiencies of diesels and high altitude cruise might still allow better long-range loadouts than a Jumo 211 powered He 111 with expanded internal/external fuel)

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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 20, 2015)

Juha said:


> Sorry but the drawing is on the cross-section of the fuselage, so no info on the lenght of the bomb bay, there might be that info in the text but I don't have time to look it. IMHO the easiest way to find out is to look on a good sideway picture of He 177, measure the lenght of the bomb bay and with the knowledge of the lenght of He 177 calculate the lenght of the bomb bay.



Yeah, I originally thought of doing that, but then I still don't have its depth. The reason why I want it in the first place is because I'm trying to compare it to that of the He 277.


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## Koopernic (Jun 20, 2015)

parsifal said:


> Tirpitz was an exceptionally difficult target to hit. She was protected on three sides by steep Fjord walls, had a full regt of flak protecting her, torpedo nets, smoke machines. Attacking aircraft had to either fly high, as was done in the November attacks and only had a short time in which to sight up the target, due to the canyon walls either side, or run the gauntlet up the Fjord itself.
> 
> On the day of the attack, the 617 sqn was lucky. weather was clear, but there were no fighters, cloud cover partially obscured the target, but it was still possible to see her. Blind bombing aids were used to assist in sighting up, but the final bomb releases were done visually. Smoke machines were activated, but the screen was only partial at the time of the bomb releases.
> 
> There was probably no better protected warship in the world at that time. And hitting a warship sized target at 16000 feet is never easy



Steep fjord walls do absolutely nothing to protect from level bombers, they did however block the Tirpitz's own warning radar and FLAK. The Tirpitz was exceptionally poorly protected, the kriegsmarine reports of the time are emphatic that much more shore based FLAK was needed, in fact I can't even see any FLAK on the photo recon. The Luftwaffe was exhausted: extremely thinly spread, short on fuel, hadn't been told that the Tirpitz had been moved to a new Fjord, whose defences hadn't been built up. She was sunk in November 1944 as the Luftwaffe was collapsing and was short of men and machines.

The bomb aiming was not remarkable or exceptional from the height it was conducted considering that several dozen tall boys were dropped. It was well within the capability of any competent bomb aimer from the Luftwaffe, USAAF, RAF using a Lotfe 7, Norden or SABS2. Assuming bombing from 14000ft hitting a ship with a 100ft beam represent an error of of 0.7%. An 800ft length would be impossible to miss.

With nearly three dozen bombs dropped its surprising they didn't get more hits suggesting the heavy FLAK distracted the RAF crews somewhat.

Statistically it's the equal of dropping 36 marbles onto a 1cm wide model battleship from waist high. You are bound to get a hit.

No ones heavy AAA worked well at that altitude. The USN Reckoned that 80% of the aircraft it shot down were defended by 40mm bofors and 20mm oerlikon.


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## Greyman (Jun 21, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> Statistically it's the equal of dropping 36 marbles onto a 1cm wide model battleship from waist high. You are bound to get a hit.



Wow.

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## fastmongrel (Jun 21, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> Statistically it's the equal of dropping 36 marbles onto a 1cm wide model battleship from waist high. You are bound to get a hit.



That has to be the dumbest thing anyone has said on this forum all year. Try dropping the marbles whilst jogging past the 1cm wide model and see how many times you hit it.

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## parsifal (Jun 21, 2015)

It turned out that way I guess, but it should have been so very different, and I firmly believe that no-one else other than the very best, like 617 could have attempted it.

The shore based flak support was not located immediately arounfd the target. It opened fire more than 13km away from the target. It was located mostly on the peaks, giving most of the flak excellent fields of fire.

There were two elements of the active defences that failed to work properly. The defending fighters were present, and were scrambled. If they had managed an interception, the heavily overloaded Lancasters,. stripped down as they were and lacking most of their defensive weaponary, would have been sitting targets. But the fighters were vectored to the wrong fjord.

The smoke pots, which so often had thwarted so many attempts previously had been emplaced, but were not yet functional leaving the target largely unobscured. As it was the target was still partially obscured by cloud cover. 

As far as passive defences are concerned, I can assure you that mountains have a very real and adverse effect on bombing accuracy, when using unguided iron bombs. Mountains produce unstable air turbulence, affecting aircraft stability and the trajectory of the frefall bombs. Mountains affect sighting times for the bombers, meaning they have less time to sight up, account for wind currents and turbulence and identify the target correctly. Aiming up can take a few minutes to achive, especially when you are aiming for a relatively small precision target like a warship. Lastly, whilst the British benefitted from some impressive bombing and navigational aids by this stage of the war, the performance of these aids was somewhat affected by the presence of large landmasses around the target. Similar problems had bedevilled the BC attacks over the Ruhr at that time, which had far more gentle natural obstacles affecting the target. 

A few things worked to assist 617 in this attack. The Tallboys they used were an incredibly heavy, but aerodynamic bomb. Whereas, even bombs of 2000 lbs weight would tend to tumble and get buffetted around by air turbuloence, the Tallboys were very stable and predictable in their descent path. Further, the flak was firing blind without benefit of radar, an unusual handicap, but it meant the flak was relatively innaccurate on this occasion. The air was still and visibility good.

Bombing any shipo from 16000 feet, with iron bombs without any real electronic assistance is dificult at the best of times, I can see youve never watched the progress of bombing runs on the range when you make claims like that. They are difficult even with the technology of the 70s and 80s which I am familiar with, but with the technology of 1944, it was more a matter of luck than good planning.

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## fastmongrel (Jun 21, 2015)

Parsifal dont forget No9 squadron were also on the raid. No9 squadron (unlike 617 who used the SABS) used the standard Bomber Command MkXIV Automatic bomb sight.


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## Koopernic (Jun 21, 2015)

fastmongrel said:


> Parsifal dont forget No9 squadron were also on the raid. No9 squadron (unlike 617 who used the SABS) used the standard Bomber Command MkXIV Automatic bomb sight.



The two sights would potentially work well together, the SABS IIB would calculate the cross and head wind and this could be communicated to the bombardiers flying those with the Mk14 who would enter the data manually.



fastmongrel said:


> That has to be the dumbest thing anyone has said on this forum all year. Try dropping the marbles whilst jogging past the 1cm wide model and see how many times you hit it.



The computing sights didn't take or require any intuitive guesses. They measured the ground speed with complete precision, they had access to the airspeed and air pressure within a fraction of a percent. Bomb tables for weapons such as the tallboy were meticulously measured. There was no guess work a in 'jogging past'. It was well within the range of ability of normal optics and machining. The USN and USAAF were the first with the ability, then the Luftwaffe then the RAF, then the Russian Air force.

Operation Catechism wasn't exceptional bombing by the standards of the bomb sight. Tirpitz was a sitting duck over 800ft long and 118ft at the beam. The crews, Bomber crews presumably being better than average RAF crews, had the discipline to disregard their own safety and use the bomb sight properly as per the instructions and drill. FLAK at that height was seldom effective.

I'm more impressed with the 4 Fw 200's who attacked convoy Faith and hit two *moving* ships with 2 bombs each(4 out of 8 dropped) and straddled and damaged several others while being shot at by a destroyer, sloop corvette and a Catalina.



parsifal said:


> A few things worked to assist 617 in this attack. The Tallboys they used were an incredibly heavy, but aerodynamic bomb. Whereas, even bombs of 2000 lbs weight would tend to tumble and get buffetted around by air turbuloence, the Tallboys were very stable and predictable in their descent path. Further, the flak was firing blind without benefit of radar, an unusual handicap, but it meant the flak was relatively innaccurate on this occasion. The air was still and visibility good.
> 
> Bombing any ship from 16000 feet, with iron bombs without any real electronic assistance is difficult at the best of times, I can see you've never watched the progress of bombing runs on the range when you make claims like that. They are difficult even with the technology of the 70s and 80s which I am familiar with, but with the technology of 1944, it was more a matter of luck than good planning.



I would say that had the Tirpitz been protected by an intercepting Geschwader or 'squadron' of Fw 190's perhaps up to half those Lancaster's, if intercepted, would have been shot down as happened to a similar raid in 1940 when 24 Wellingtons attacking Willehmshaffen lost 12 of their number to a squadron of Me 109E, a much less powerful fighter. 

The absence of intercepting fighters was what made the raid possible and perhaps the wind patterns were stable. Everyone's Armour piercing bombs such as the Tallboy and Grand slam were made with precision so as to help them survive the impact of a hit and then penetrate the target, this would have made the bomb's aerodynamic characteristics consistent with the data accumulated on the bomb range. 

Even from 16000ft the Tirpitz was *not* small; it was 118/16000 = 0.7375% for the beam and 800/16000ft = 5% across the length. So long as everything had been aligned and set properly those bombs were going to all get very close.


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## Juha (Jun 21, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> Steep fjord walls do absolutely nothing to protect from level bombers, they did however block the Tirpitz's own warning radar and FLAK.



Tirpitz wasn't achored in steep walled fjord, the area around was rather flat for Northern Norway next to Tromso town, look photos, maps or Google Earth. In fact that was intentional because Germans had chosen a shallow anchorage for Tirpitz. The far away mountains were limiting the radar but that had no effect on AA because other radars and observation posts gave ample warning and RAF was using same approaching route than 2 weeks previously. So AA was put on preliminary alert almost 1½ hour before the attack and flak alarm was sounded an hour before the attack. Tirpitz went to action stations 36 minutes before its 15" guns open fire when the first bombers were 21 km away shooting markedly too low, so much on the blocking effect of the mountains.



Koopernic said:


> The Tirpitz was exceptionally poorly protected, the kriegsmarine reports of the time are emphatic that much more shore based FLAK was needed, in fact I can't even see any FLAK on the photo recon.



There were 2 flak ships nearby, plus one medium and one large size vessel which also put up AA fire and british photo interpreters found 12 heavy and 20 light AA guns on land near Tirpitz before the first attack on 28 Oct, not very much but better than nothing and Germans might have deploy more during the 2 weeks between the attacks.



Koopernic said:


> The Luftwaffe was exhausted: extremely thinly spread, short on fuel, hadn't been told that the Tirpitz had been moved to a new Fjord, whose defences hadn't been built up. She was sunk in November 1944 as the Luftwaffe was collapsing and was short of men and machines.



Most of the III./JG 5 was at Bardufoss, 70 km south, Tirpitz had been at same place almost a month, had suffered one daytime air attack, ruined by cloudcover, 2 weeks earlier. III./JG 5 had fuel to take off on 12 Nov but because of delays missed the Lancs. So we had a big battleship achored off the nearest town, 70 km away, already a month, which had already suffered one air attack and the fighter boys didn't have a clue?



Koopernic said:


> The bomb aiming was not remarkable or exceptional from the height it was conducted considering that several dozen tall boys were dropped. It was well within the capability of any competent bomb aimer from the Luftwaffe, USAAF, RAF using a Lotfe 7, Norden or SABS2. Assuming bombing from 14000ft hitting a ship with a 100ft beam represent an error of of 0.7%. An 800ft length would be impossible to miss.



LOL, so all the RAF, LW, USAAF, IJAAF and IJNAF bomb aimers who mostly missed their achored targets were incompetent? IIRC during the initial phase of the Pearl Harbor attack, the 49 Kates dropping 800 kg AP bombs almost training conditions and lower level got 7 - 8 hits (4 on Arizona, 2 on Tennessee and 1 or 2 on Maryland, not sure on the size of the second bomb that hit Maryland) and those were pre-war trained IJNAF regulars, probably as good as you ever got during the WWII. But you are right that the bombing of 9 Sqn wasn't satisfactory and so the SASO of the 5 Group wanted 'a thorough investigation' on that.



Koopernic said:


> With nearly three dozen bombs dropped its surprising they didn't get more hits suggesting the heavy FLAK distracted the RAF crews somewhat.



How surprising, look my info on Fritz-X accuracy testing vs real attacks in my message on the Ju 388 thread.



Koopernic said:


> Statistically it's the equal of dropping 36 marbles onto a 1cm wide model battleship from waist high. You are bound to get a hit.



Maybe the real world bombing is a bit more difficult, at it seems to be in the light of history.



Koopernic said:


> No ones heavy AAA worked well at that altitude. The USN Reckoned that 80% of the aircraft it shot down were defended by 40mm bofors and 20mm oerlikon.



The main aim of the heavy AA is to force bombers higher and hinder bombers, or at least it should be.

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## stona (Jun 21, 2015)

There seems to be a lack of understanding of bombing accuracy.

In the period June-August 1944, shortly before the attack on Tirpitz, 617 Squadron was achieving an average radial error from 17,000ft (just above the level of the Tirpitz attack) of 170 yards (510 ft). This in fact makes it statistically remarkable that they could hit a target measuring 824 ft by 118 ft with so few bombs.

Cheers

Steve


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## Shortround6 (Jun 21, 2015)

The land heavy AA was what? 88mm guns? 16000 ft was about as good as it was going to get for them. Short time of flight compared to higher altitudes. Angle for tracking not bad compared to lower altitudes, decent engament time (rounds fired while bombers are in range).

Land based and even ship based AA was not moving so effectiveness should be better than a moving ship in a seaway.

The marble analogy doesn't work well not only because it is chest high, not waist, but it doesn't allow for the time of flight/drop problem. How many seconds from release to impact? A 100 ft error in bombing altitude (0.625%) can throw the impact off. Along with other small errors.


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## GrauGeist (Jun 21, 2015)

Might also point out that standing over a scale model and dropping marbles is a flawed analogy.

As SR suggested, try it from chest high - while walking


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## Koopernic (Jun 21, 2015)

Juha said:


> How surprising, look my info on Fritz-X accuracy testing vs real attacks in my message on the Ju 388 thread.
> 
> .



I have Bollinger's book on my kindle. Unsurprisingly you seem to have found (what page I can't find) the worst passible unit performance with the worst possible performance.

Bollinger also gives the success rate of the Hs 293 at 30% (page 172) which could be raised to 50% if a charitable interpretation that included near misses that caused light damage.

As far as the Fritz-X is concerned it had its greatest success by 1943 and wasn't used much for nearly a year. When it was it was next used it was over allied invasion beaches at night or in the face of stiff fighter opposition and these latter efforts drag down the result.

At this time the He 177 units were suffering a minimum of 20% monthly losses and often as high as 50%. Earlier attacks by KG40 did so with strong opposition from cruisers but generally no air opposition they also used the reliable Do 217.



Juha said:


> Tirpitz wasn't achored in steep walled fjord, the area around was rather flat for Northern Norway next to Tromso town, look photos



The Fjord was high enough to prevent early enough detection or the raiders and allow organisation of interceptors and the smokescreen while RAF planners were able to make use of the difficult terrain to minimise what radar warning time there was.



GrauGeist said:


> Might also point out that standing over a scale model and dropping marbles is a flawed analogy.
> 
> As SR suggested, try it from chest high - while walking



It's entirely apt, the error, in artillery terms is 7.375 mil (parts out of 1000). Good artillery operating over similar ranges would achieve 1 mil.

So long as the bomb sight and its optics is all precision made and aligned to less than 1/1000, the bomb precisely machined so that it conforms to the tables prepared earlier then the bomb will be accurate. A rifle or artillery shell has to be made with similar precision and its propellant charge also 'weighed' with precision. The fall time makes little difference except in the area of direct impingement of cross wind on the bomb. The Bombsight has already compensated for the direct drift of the aircraft before release, the major source of error. A little unexpected side wind or head wind on the way down is not going to move a dense 10,000lb pound steel bomb like a tallboy of target much over a 15-20 second fall.

If you want to fuss its equivalent of dropping a precisely made steel ball bearing of 1mm diameter from chest onto a 8cm by 12mm model Tirpitz high using a computer to open a solenoid release with the computer able to access the exact height and speed.



stona said:


> There seems to be a lack of understanding of bombing accuracy.
> 
> In the period June-August 1944, shortly before the attack on Tirpitz, 617 Squadron was achieving an average radial error from 17,000ft (just above the level of the Tirpitz attack) of 170 yards (510 ft). This in fact makes it statistically remarkable that they could hit a target measuring 824 ft by 118 ft with so few bombs.
> 
> ...



Under what precise circumstances, using armour piercing bombs or GP, in combat, at night and what target? A ships is clearly identifiable as being the target. The GEE-H (which was more or less Oboe) in the guise of its American clone micro-h when measured in use by US the Operations Research had error's measured in miles rather than the 50 meters it was capable of. This is a blind bombing system that should have eliminate all possible visual errors yet they still failed to follow the instructions. Was it bad targeting, unwieldy formations, being distracted by FLAK. Well trained crews following a well rehearsed and double checked plan used the kit properly and attacked the correct target.


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## Juha (Jun 21, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> I have Bollinger's book on my kindle. Unsurprisingly you seem to have found (what page I can't find) the worst passible unit performance with the worst possible performance.



Difficult to see on what you are complaining, III./KG 100 was the Fritz-X unit and I gave the the results of it. That covers both the Do 217 and He 177 periods. And you first put forward the accuracy of Fritz-X on that thread but forgot to mention that that was the accuracy during the tests not that of combat situation. As usual the first ones were considerable better than the latter. The Graph is 12.1 and is it on the page 173 in the printed book. IMHO you should also read the text right after Graph 12.4 that might bring some reality to your appraisal of the effectiveness of the guided weapons of the WWII. They were a step forward but not yet a gigantic leap forward.





Koopernic said:


> The Fjord was high enough to prevent early enough detection or the raiders and allow organisation of interceptors and the smokescreen while RAF planners were able to make use of the difficult terrain to minimise what radar warning time there was.



Nix, see my previous message, the times were from the report of the Tirpitz' senior AA defence officer. The lancs were seen far away from Tirpitz and there were good early warning messages from other observation post. Something went badly wrong on the German side and it wasn't surprise that the military tribunal passed out several prison sentences.


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## Juha (Jun 21, 2015)

Because it seem that some are too lazy to dig out the info on the terrain around Trömsö here is a link to a film filmed during the attack, flak bursts can also be seen.
Daylight Attack On 'tirpitz' - British Pathé

It also shows one reason why 9 Sqn, which bombed after 617, had difficulties in bomb accuracy.


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## pbehn (Jun 21, 2015)

Hitting a ship with a single bomb was a fantastic achievement in accuracy. Bearing in mind bombs dropped from the same height by whole fleets of bombers were known to miss the given target completely by a wide margin I cannot see how a counter argument is put forward. Not only was the Tirpitz hit but various submarine pens bridges and the V3 launch sites were also taken out. It may annoy some that the Lancaster dropping Tall Boys and Grand slams were extremely accurate and destructive but they must live with their annoyance it is a historical fact and it wasnt chance. In three missions against the Tirpitz, operations paravane obviate and catechism Tirpitz was damaged each time. Additionally the Lutzow was crippled by a near miss and settled on the bottom.


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## kool kitty89 (Jun 21, 2015)

stona said:


> In the period June-August 1944, shortly before the attack on Tirpitz, 617 Squadron was achieving an average radial error from 17,000ft (just above the level of the Tirpitz attack) of 170 yards (510 ft). This in fact makes it statistically remarkable that they could hit a target measuring 824 ft by 118 ft with so few bombs.


Is there any information on accuracy specific to tall boy bombing? (or tall boy and grand slam?) Regardless of the other variables in the case of the Tripitz, the ballistics of those bombs should have made for significantly lower errors. (in fact, I wonder if the consistent ballistics of those bombs actually gave them an edge in precision over the guided bombs used during the war)


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## Koopernic (Jun 21, 2015)

Bomb errors given in circular error probable are a gross simplification of what actually happens. Bomb fall patterns, naval shell fall patterns are far more likely to be shaped like an elongated oval shape, *very* elongated by 4:1. They may even be cross shaped. 

The CEP appears only useful for gross statistical assessments of weapons fired from near point blank range. I've often seen Luftwaffe assessments in terms of a 60% confidence or defined as a square or rectangle. IE 50% of bombs fell within this dimension of the x ordinate and 50% within y ordinate, the kind of information you need for planning an attack on irregular shaped targets such as ships, bridges or tanks rather than calculating how much misery has been created in area targets below. In terms of the November 1944 RAF raid that hit Tirpitz with 1-2 tall boys of 29 dropped and 31 carried the run ups were so as to line up the bomb fall pattern with the highly oval shape of the Tirpitz.

Converted into a circle Tirpitz was a target nearly 100m diameter.

A basics junior (lower high school) high school physics course on error budgets should convince anyone of the high basic accuracy of these sights. There are challenges such as making sure the bomb sight levels itself to within better than say 0.1 degrees, that the basic computing mechanism that calculates speed does not degrade this and the the mechanism that automatically releases the bomb is also precise. Even the speed of the bomb release mechanism must be consistent and taken into account.

These sorts of accuracies were achievable, the USAAF based its entire doctrine around the results they had achieved in tests of the Norden, these were not faked or fudged. 

The actual stress of combat introduces new realities and factors that degrade this but experience, good drill, planning, experience and air superiority could clearly restore this.

RAF aircraft dropping tallboys were effectively operating in conditions of air superiority, they were seldom intercepted or were well protected by escorts by the time the tallboys had been developed.

I imagine the tallboys aero ballistic properties were measured full scale in a wind tunnel at a variety of air pressures and velocities and that bomb trail errors were tabulated spreadsheet style by the ladies. I suspect the grandslam shared the exact shape and could use the same data as Reynolds effects would be minimal but would also fit a wind tunnel nicely.

It's worth noting that great care could have been taken with the manufacture of tallboys thus assuring tables conform with the actual bombs produced whereas the finest bomb aiming in the world would be thrown of by a batch of 500lb bombs in which the fins were canted in slightly inconsistent ways and whose weight varied.

A bomb throwing machine seems unlikely.

The better bomb sights took the human factor out, automating bomb release. The USAAF even used radio command to sequence the pattern of the bomb release across a formation from command of a lead bomber.

I have a high regard for what humans can do in "aiming" our species evolved with fire and using ballistic weapons for over 500,000 years. One only needs to see what a genetically talented world class spin bowler can do after 10 years practice. However these advanced sights took the u or elastic level,of trying out as well as reducing eventing to a precise mechanised calculation.

I expect the bombers all did individual runs but they may have use groups of smaller formations to get a pattern.

The probability of a hit reduces with the power of 5 with range a doubling of altitude reduces pk by 32.


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## GrauGeist (Jun 21, 2015)

pbehn said:


> Hitting a ship with a single bomb was a fantastic achievement in accuracy. Bearing in mind bombs dropped from the same height by whole fleets of bombers were known to miss the given target completely by a wide margin I cannot see how a counter argument is put forward. Not only was the Tirpitz hit but various submarine pens bridges and the V3 launch sites were also taken out. It may annoy some that the Lancaster dropping Tall Boys and Grand slams were extremely accurate and destructive but they must live with their annoyance it is a historical fact and it wasnt chance. In three missions against the Tirpitz, operations paravane obviate and catechism Tirpitz was damaged each time. Additionally the Lutzow was crippled by a near miss and settled on the bottom.


Well, if the mission (choose whichever attempt you like) was so successful, why did it take so many attempts to take the Tirpitz out?

The terrain surrounding the Tirpitz added a high degree of difficulty whereas the mission against the dam offered a much different formula and circumstances for success.

And from my vantage point, I can't see anyone belittling the Lancaster missions or their acheivements.


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## parsifal (Jun 22, 2015)

I am surprised that there is so much divergence of opinion on this Tirpitz thing


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## Juha (Jun 22, 2015)

GrauGeist said:


> Well, if the mission (choose whichever attempt you like) was so successful, why did it take so many attempts to take the Tirpitz out?



Simply because of smoke and/or clouds. It is difficult to hit a pinpoint target which one could not see. During 29 Oct 44 raid Lancs were only a few minutes late, seeing Tirpitz during the run in but just before releasing point clouds from the west drifted over Tirpitz spoiling the attack. The problem was that it was late autumn and so the weather was what it tended to be and the Artic Night was fast approaching so RAF wasn't in position to wait a long spell of clear weather.



GrauGeist said:


> The terrain surrounding the Tirpitz added a high degree of difficulty whereas the mission against the dam offered a much different formula and circumstances for success.



That had profounding effect on 1942 raids and maybe also on the Alta raid because there the fjord there was rather short. But not at Tromsö because Lancs attacked along a very long fjord so they saw the target tens of miles away (and were seen). The chosen attack route allowed very early target acquaintance but means that the bombers passed the Bardufoss airbase, where 2 full Staffeln of III./JG 5 were based, by only some 15 - 20 km.


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## stona (Jun 22, 2015)

parsifal said:


> I am surprised that there is so much divergence of opinion on this Tirpitz thing



The difference is really that some seem to think that with the SABS sight hitting a battleship, even stationary, was a simple thing. The SABS sight was not some miraculous instrument, in fact at the same time as 617 Sqn was achieving an average radial error of 170 yards (later improved to 125 yards), 9 Sqn was achieving an error of 195 yards with the Mk XIV sight. The difference was just 25 yards, not as great as some imagine. 

I think that hitting a stationary battleship was a remarkable achievement, even given the better sight, and was the result of much time on the practice range. The Tirpitz attackers may have been operating in an era of allied air superiority but they still flew at an altitude above some of the more deadly forms of flak. The higher you fly the less accurately you bomb. The 8th AF considered this one of the most successful aspects of German flak defences.

Anybody know how many large warships, with the exception of Tirpitz, were hit by level bombers flying at 15,000 ft or above in all theatres during WW2?

Cheers

Steve

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## Juha (Jun 22, 2015)

For starters *RAF*: BBs Scharnhorst (this is arguable, Merrick's By Day By Night says that Halis bombed from 15,000ft but Garzke, William H.; Dulin, Robert O. (1985). Battleships: Axis and Neutral Battleships in World War II says from 10,000 to 12,000 ft misidentifying the bombers as RAF B-17s and B-24s, so info is probably from a German source. But this was an exeptional feat because Halis were under heavy AA fire and numerous fighters were attacking them during the bombing. They got 3 1000lb AP hits, which all went through Sch. without exploding and two 500 lb HE hits with exploded on armoured deck. 15 Halis made the attack, one was probably shot down before bombing, 4 during the return trip. La Pallice on 24 Jul 41), Gneisenau; Pocket BBs Admiral Scheer, Lützow/Deutschland, CAs Prinz Eugen and Admiral Hipper. On 14 December 1940, a British air raid on Naples damaged Pola. Two bombs hit the ship, both amidships on the port side. The hits damaged three of the ship's boilers and caused significant flooding and a significant list to port. Pola was drydocked on 16 December for repair work that lasted until 7 February 1941. Probably by 148 Sqn Wellington ICs which made 3 attacks on Naples in December, but I'm not sure, there is surprisingly little info on this attack even if it and other British air attacks on Southern Italian ports forced the Italian fleet to move its heavy ships to Sardinia, so I have no info on the bombing altitude.

*USAAF*: B-17s hit both Vittorio Veneto and Roma, B-24s Littorio, one hit on the No. 1 turret, turret remained operational but this was a rare hit on a BB under way in the open sea. The bombing altitude was 12,800m according to Garzke and Dulin, but that is clearly an overstatement. IJNAF Mitsubishi Nells also got one bomb hit on both HMS Repulse and HMS Prince of Wales in Dec 41 but they bombed from around 3,000 - 3,500 m. IJN CA Myoko was hit by the B-17Ds from 19th BG bombing from 7,500 m on 4 Jan 42. On 29 July 1945 IJN CA Aoba was hit by at least three 500-lb bombs that struck across the stern abaft No. 3 turret during a high-level attack by B-24s of the 7th AF

*LW*: BBs Warspite, Roma, Italia/Littorio hit by Fritz-Xs dropped by III./KG 100. LW used sometimes dive-bombing Ju 88s alongside level-bombing He 111s when the latter made anti-shipping attacks making it difficult to say who made the hits, e.g. during the attack on Scapa on 16 March 40 CA HMS Norfolk was hit but according to de Zeng IV, Henry L. Stankey, Douglas G. with Creek, Eddie J. (2007). Bomber Units of the Luftwaffe 1933-1945: A Reference Source. Volume 1 Ju 88As from I./KG 30 hit Norfolk and He 111s from I./KG 26 hit a cruiser, but because Norfolk was the only cruiser hit that doesn't clear the situation. Shores, Christopher with Foreman, John, Ehrengardt, Christian-Jacques, Weiss, Heinrich and Olsen, Bjorn (1991). Fledgling Eagles only says that both formations bombed and Norfolk was damaged. From what I remember, most RN cruisers hit by bombs were hit by dive-bombers.

*IJNAF*: On 4 Feb 1942 Mitsubishi G3M Nells from 1st Ku got one hit on the CA USS Houston which disabled
the No. 3 turret of the cruiser. Bombing height was circa 5,000 m.


I'm sure that there were some other cases.


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## Juha (Jun 22, 2015)

SpicyJuan11 said:


> Yeah, I originally thought of doing that, but then I still don't have its depth. The reason why I want it in the first place is because I'm trying to compare it to that of the He 277.



Didn't I give the outer depth (from the level of the fuselage floor to the outer surface of the bottom of the bomb bay doors?


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## SpicyJuan11 (Jun 22, 2015)

Juha said:


> Didn't I give the outer depth (from the level of the fuselage floor to the outer surface of the bottom of the bomb bay doors?



Oh, yes you did, sorry


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## Elmas (Jun 22, 2015)

Incrociatore Trieste sunk by bombs, April 10th 1943.

La Fine del Trieste e Gorizia

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## GrauGeist (Jun 22, 2015)

Here's the HIJMS Hiryu under attack by B-17s during the Battle of Midway:





Also, during the First Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, the HIJMS Hiei came under attack by B-17s with no hits. It was a combination of attacks by torpoedoplanes, divebombers and naval gunfire that sank her.


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## Koopernic (Jun 23, 2015)

stona said:


> The difference is really that some seem to think that with the SABS sight hitting a battleship, even stationary, was a simple thing. The SABS sight was not some miraculous instrument, in fact at the same time as 617 Sqn was achieving an average radial error of 170 yards (later improved to 125 yards), 9 Sqn was achieving an error of 195 yards with the Mk XIV sight. The difference was just 25 yards, not as great as some imagine.
> 
> I think that hitting a stationary battleship was a remarkable achievement, even given the better sight, and was the result of much time on the practice range. The Tirpitz attackers may have been operating in an era of allied air superiority but they still flew at an altitude above some of the more deadly forms of flak. The higher you fly the less accurately you bomb. The 8th AF considered this one of the most successful aspects of German flak defences.
> 
> ...



The distribution of bombs for a typical CEP (circular area probable) is approximately as follows.
A/ within one radius of the CEP 50%
B/ outside of one radius but within two 43% 
C/ outside two radii 7%

Within one radius of the CEP the distribution of bombs in terms of area is approximately even though there is a some clustering towards the centre.

The distribution is Rayleigh (two dimensional Gaussian) ie the normal curve. Form a statistical mathematical point of view it would have been nicer for the CEP to be defined as the radius which contains 63% of hits. I've seen that the Germans at least defined the accuracy of their FLAK radars in this way.

Accuracy degrades as per a cube law though I've heard it claimed that the probability of a hit in naval artillery is according to a power of 5 law. I am not convinced, I can see how a square law applies to ballistic fall of an side ways deviation of a projectile which accelerates and thus integrates according to a square law.

Hence a 10% increase in bombing altitude would increase CEP by 33% or 50% depending on which law you believe is the truth and apply.

The Lancasters that attacked the Tirpitz bombed from between 12500ft and 16000ft. The former is likely what achieved the hits.

If we assume 617 squadron achieved 170yards/150meter CEP at 17000ft they would achieve significantly better at 16000ft and dramatically better at 12000ft.

But take the example of 32 bombs with a CEP of 170yard/150meters, 617's assumed CEP at 17000ft, and noting that each 50% reduction in radius would have 25% of the bombs.
A 16 bombs would be within 150m
B 4 bombs within 75m
C 1 bomb within 37.5m. Suggesting a high probability of a hit, greater than 50%, since the radius with an area equal to Tirpitz was around 45m.

These radii could be reduced about 6.5% for 16000ft as compared to 17000ft.

Using the cube law bombing at 12500ft as opposed to 17000ft should double accuracy but using a conservative linear approximation reduce CEP 12500ft/17000ft x 170yards = 125yards/112meters.

Lets run our calculation again, for 32 bombs dropped from 12500ft with a CEP of 112 meters.
A/ 16 bombs would fall within 112 meters
B/ 4 bombs would fall within 56 meters
C/ 1 bomb would fall within 27 meters, the Tirpitz can be assumed to have an area with a radius of 45 meters on the basis of its area.

If we consider the slight clustering effect and that the improvement between 17000ft and 12500ft was probably due to a cube law then the odds look quite good.

It's worth noting that the raid was a repeat of another 32 bomber raid conducted in October 1944 in the same fjord so in effect about 60 bombs were dropped.

*************

Early bombsights simply were set at an angle according to tables and didn't use optics but use a tongue and V similar to a traditional rifle, the RAF initially preferred this for night use. They contained elementary mechanical elements to help the course to be set in the presence of estimated wind etc. If the aircraft was jostled or its angle of attack varied then the bombsight could go off by a few degrees that could equal hundreds of meters.

The first major improvement in bombsights seems to have been the introduction of gyroscopically stabilised optics. Quite oddly it seems the RAF tried a computing bombsight without a gyroscopically levelled platform in the ABS I and so did the Luftwaffe with the Lotfe 7A, it would seem pointless to carry out accurate calculations from such an unstable datum. Once stabilised, using a pendulum that was averaged out by gyroscopes there was a stable datum.

The difference between the Mk.14 bombsight and the SABS IIB was that the Mk.14 simply told the bomb aimer/pilot where the bombs were going to land, even in a slight dive and while manoeuvring, the sight also helped the bomb aimer set a course to run over the target. The wind drift or estimated target motion had to be estimated and manually entered so it was no good against a moving ship if bomb fall time was a factor or stiff winds. Meteorological aircraft and master bombers probably provided this information.

The SABS IIB was similar to the Norden and Lotfe 7. It added a function in which the ground or targets relative motion could be tracked. Effectively a mechanism (tachograph ?) tracked a fixed spot on the ground on the basis of altitude of the aircraft and target as well as the aircrafts true air speed.

The bombardier then adjusted some variable speed drives and this adjustment is in fact the wind drift (or in the case of a moving ship its velocity vector). The sight now put out actual ground speed and the magnitude of the cross, head wind.

We know the bomb trail, we know how long it will take to hit the 'ground' and it is now possible to come up with an aiming solution.

Navies had been doing it for decades (Dreyer tables, the more advanced Pollen system) and it had been done in FLAK predictors. 

As far as attacking a ship is concerned it would make little difference if it was stationary or moving to a wind correct bombsight. So long as it moved in a straight line as merchant ships did.


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## GregP (Jun 23, 2015)

The power of 5 law comes in when you take into account that the target is maneuvering. I have a good book on artillery accuracy, but am not sure off the top of my head of the 5th power proportionality. It was certainly more than a square law due to the plane)s) changing course, but exactly how much more, on average, is a good question.

It is probably a square law for straight line flight and bombers on a bomb run would do that until bomb release. They were also constrianed by the closeness of adjacent bombers in formation. A B-17 or Lancaster isn't exactly a Red Bull racer. Nobody else would fly straight in flak if they had any sense. Most people who survived had either luck, sense, or both.

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## Juha (Jun 23, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> The distribution of bombs for a typical CEP (circular area probable) is approximately as follows.
> A/ within one radius of the CEP 50%
> B/ outside of one radius but within two 43%
> C/ outside two radii 7%
> ...



It is thought that bombs No 1 and 4 were hits, the first was probably Tait's, dropped from 13,000 ft, the second hit was by Lee's from 14,400 ft, Kell's from 12,800 ft or Anning's from 16,000 ft



Koopernic said:


> If we assume 617 squadron achieved 170yards/150meter CEP at 17000ft they would achieve significantly better at 16000ft and dramatically better at 12000ft.
> 
> But take the example of 32 bombs with a CEP of 170yard/150meters, 617's assumed CEP at 17000ft, and noting that each 50% reduction in radius would have 25% of the bombs.
> A 16 bombs would be within 150m
> ...



One must remember that according to the HQ 5 Group '...only the first 50% of the aircraft to attack will have had a clear run and a reasonable clear AP and that smoke must have made subcequent aiming very difficult.' 9 Sqn Mean Point of Impact was some 300 yards offset from the target. And only one bomb within 200 yds of the M.P.I., 7 of the remaining 9 within 700 yds. 617 got 7 within 200 yds and rest within 700 yds. One case of a photographic malfunction.





Koopernic said:


> It's worth noting that the raid was a repeat of another 32 bomber raid conducted in October 1944 in the same fjord so in effect about 60 bombs were dropped.



29 Oct 44 raid failed because of the clouds shrouded Tirpitz a few minutes before the planes arrived at the dropping point. It's pretty difficult to hit an unseen target with a one shot weapon like a Lanc with a Tallboy.


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## kool kitty89 (Jun 23, 2015)

Koopernic said:


> The first major improvement in bombsights seems to have been the introduction of gyroscopically stabilised optics. Quite oddly it seems the RAF tried a computing bombsight without a gyroscopically levelled platform in the SABS I and so did the Luftwaffe with the Lotfe 7B, it would seem pointless to carry out accurate calculations from such an unstable datum. Once stabilised, using a pendulum that was averaged out by gyroscopes there was a stable datum.
> 
> The difference between the Mk.14 bombsight and the SABS IIB was that the Mk.14 simply told the bomb aimer/pilot where the bombs were going to land, even in a slight dive and while manoeuvring, the sight also helped the bomb aimer set a course to run over the target. The wind drift or estimated target motion had to be estimated and manually entered so it was no good against a moving ship if bomb fall time was a factor or stiff winds. Meteorological aircraft and master bombers probably provided this information.


So the Mk.14 was a more conventional non-computing optical sight with gyroscopic stabilizer? That does seem indeed to be the most sensible step to take between simpler sights and computing sights. Developing more complex computing sights without stabilizers doesn't seem to make much sense at all. (more complex than basic stabilized sights, more difficult to get in service in a timely manner, and ineffective given the lack of stabilization)




> As far as attacking a ship is concerned it would make little difference if it was stationary or moving to a wind correct bombsight. So long as it moved in a straight line as merchant ships did.


Not the case for those photos of bombing over Midway. Those warships were quite obviously taking evasive maneuvers given the sharp turns clearly visible in their wake.


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## stona (Jun 23, 2015)

The Mk XIV was a computing sight, but wind speed and direction had to be input manually, leading to inevitable errors. It was stabilised. The 'computer' was not integral to the sight but in a separate cabinet, usually fixed to the left of the bomb aimer (as in the Halifax and Lancaster). Sperry manufactured the Mk XIV in the US as the T1 sight, producing 23,450 examples for use by British and Commonwealth air forces between November 1942 and June 1945. The Mk XIV required only a 10 second straight and level bomb run.

The SABS (Mk IIa) was a descendant of the older unstabilised tachometric (tachymetric in US English) Automatic Bomb Sight (ABS) and was described as 'tachometric, precision, bomb sight'. It was stabilised. Like the Norden it therefore required a long, straight and level bomb run with no freedom of manoeuvre to take evasive action. For the SABS this was a minimum of about forty seconds, which would have seemed an eternity for the crew when flying through flak.

Cheers

Steve


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## pbehn (Jun 23, 2015)

Oh please! how can attacking a stationary battleship be the same as attacking a moving one? If the ship is able to sail in a straight line then you have a small chance of predicting where it will be, if a battleship is steering in any way at all you need a massive fleet of bombers to cover all the possibilities. If a heavy bomber was spotted attacking a ship in open water the ship only has to turn 90 degrees to make an impossible target to hit.

Attacking a stationary target is different, the Tirpitz was completely crippled by a near miss in the first tall boy attack it had a damaged propellor on the second and was sunk on the third. Each tall boy attack resulted in it being impaired as a threat but to the British only its sinking was satisfactory, a massive amount of resources were deployed against its threat only the Tirpitz being sunk would allow their re deployment.


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## Elmas (Jun 24, 2015)

But, AFAIK, no bomb sight could predict and compute temperature gradient from flight level to ground and much less air density: and just this could induce an error of several tens, if not hundreds, meters.


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## Shortround6 (Jun 24, 2015)

People, both during and after the war (decades after) sure spent a lot of time and money on guided ordnance (and the cost per unit/bomb dropped that entails) if mid/late war bomb sights were so accurate.


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