# Luftwaffe's ideal night fighter: you are in charge



## tomo pauk (Oct 11, 2011)

Okay, since we expect 1000-bomber raids, during the night, any time in 1942 (ie. within 18-24 months after this futile air assault vs. UK) to occur vs. Fatherland, the world's best night fighter must be constructed. What would your ideal LW's NF looked like? Of course, you can 'draw' an ideal NF for 1943-44-45's bits pieces too.


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## Erich (Oct 11, 2011)

the "neu" Me 262B-2a with Berlin 240 radar and enclosed streamlined fuel cells. Good bye Bomber Command


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## michaelmaltby (Oct 11, 2011)

"... the "neu" Me 262B-2a with Berlin 240 radar and enclosed streamlined fuel cells."

I tend to agree -- operating as a night fighter does a lot to reduce the weakness (landings) that the 262 faced during daylight ops. A very compact package with the right punch. How visible were the engine exhaust flames at night ..?

MM


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## woljags (Oct 11, 2011)

personally any of the later nightfighters ie heinkel 219 or dornier 335 given the resources to push them through quicker in bigger numbers would have made a difference


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## tomo pauk (Oct 11, 2011)

All very fine planes, but what should've been built for 1942, for example?


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## Ratsel (Oct 11, 2011)

The Luftwaffe already had the Me262.. so that would be the logical choise. In whatever numbers as the engines allowed. As Erich said.. Goodbye BC.


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## fastmongrel (Oct 11, 2011)

Ju 88 with DB603 engines Schrage Musik and a centimetric radar outfit with a passive tail mounted radar detector. Why waste a 500mph Me 262 on 200mph bombers, what you need is sufficent speed to get to the bomber stream and good endurance to stay in the stream and cause havoc. The 262 is barely going to be able to stay aloft long enough to catch the stream never mind stick with it for up to 2 hours.


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## Erich (Oct 11, 2011)

you didn't read my posting did you ......... ? the 262 NF was going under major re-design changes as I have the tech readout and spec schematics for my book the fuel cells would have given the jet enough endurance to blow Mossie and 4 engines out of the skies. as per 1942 there was no other options at that time to re-equip the Bf 110 and Ju 88 into a viable death machine, radar was in it's infancy. nothing in the present Allied arsenal was going to catch either one at night.

the Ju 88G-6 was already in full swing by January 45 so no need to press further except to play games with BC and the use of updated A-I. the jet was of the future and the LW was looking into this besides updating an armored front Ar 234 for defense as well.


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## Crimea_River (Oct 11, 2011)

woljags said:


> personally any of the later nightfighters ie heinkel 219 or dornier 335 given the resources to push them through quicker in bigger numbers would have made a difference



The 219 never got the DB 613 engines it was designed around. IMO, the ideal NF for this timeframe would have been the 219, mass produced with the promised engines. The 262's closing speed on the slower bombers at night would have been a real handful to master and it wouldn't have been capable of carrying the SM hardware.


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## Ratsel (Oct 11, 2011)

With the cover of night coming from astern I don't think a 350kph-400kph speed is out of the question. Assuming the engines don't grenade from playing with the throttle. The 4xMk108 will take care of the rest.


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## tomo pauk (Oct 11, 2011)

Erich said:


> .... as per 1942 there was no other options at that time to re-equip the Bf 110 and Ju 88 into a viable death machine, radar was in it's infancy. nothing in the present Allied arsenal was going to catch either one at night.
> 
> ...



Perhaps Beaufighter would be able to catch LW NF (either 88 or 110) in 1942, historically?


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## Erich (Oct 11, 2011)

the 262 was to have the MK 108's removed and the SM installed as standard fit so you see gents even by these calculations the craft was able to slow down to perform the LW nf function of hit and run for longer periods of time, we have to get out of the mind mode of early 1945 when the two seater still had not proved itself and the useage of silly twin outboard nose fuel tanks. the He 219 was to be phased out in fact so was the 110G-4 it was going nowhere in 1945 because of the Mossie threat the 219 carrying two crew had to be spotted for a third and where ws he located in the experiments...............mid way down the fuselage by his lonesome. the jet was on the verge . . .


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## Shortround6 (Oct 11, 2011)

Brand new starting from scratch?

Twin DB 601Es with enough allowance for 605s when they show up. Two seats side by side (better crew co-operation and an extra pair of eyes out the front). Space for electronics. A pair of cannon firing up and a pair of cannon in the bottom of the fuselage firing forward where they won't blind the pilot. Fit it with Fowler flaps or something to keep landing speed down. 

They didn't need a super Mosquito killer. They needed a plane with enough performance to get into the bomber stream and shoot up enough British bombers in 1942 to make them think that the night bombing plan was a bad idea. They need numbers of their own and it needs to be serviceable, low maintenance, and easy to fly.


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## Erich (Oct 11, 2011)

reason for the Neu 262 to come into being 4 2cm weapons rectified glimmspur ammo not to blind the pilot, many things were thought of too late to see service thankfully for the Allies 

in any case the Ju 88G-6 already filled the bill enough it should of replaced all Bf 110G-4 junk by 1945 beginnings as the rear warning radar was standard and enough eyes to see everything, updating MW injection to blast forthwith even with a good mid altitude. there is even evidence that a crew of two was flown with extra fuel tank to go from one of the German proper to the other ..........


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## tomo pauk (Oct 11, 2011)

Something lighter/smaller than a Bf-110, SR6?


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## Shortround6 (Oct 11, 2011)

A bit smaller and lighter. Germans too often tried for the best vs "good enough" and the best fell through so they tried to make do with things that weren't quite "good enough" while waiting for the next big break through. 

The increase in weight of about 5000lbs from the 110F to the 110G certainly didn't help things.


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## davebender (Oct 11, 2011)

The Me-110 is fine for 1942.

Next generation night fighter engines.
- Jets are unproven technology during 1942. Cannot count on them.
- DB603 engine program has been hamstrung by RLM. Cannot count on it being available in adequate numbers.
- Jumo213 development was surprisingly slow. Cannot count on it as of 1942.
- V24 engine programs were cancelled for all practical purposes during the fall of 1942. Cannot count on them.
- 1942 versions of the BMW801 engine were hardly world beaters. Furthermore production was small. Cannot count on them.
- Jumo211 and DB605 engines were mature technology and available in huge numbers.
- Daimler-Benz was investing serious effort into making the DB605 engine even more powerful and reliable. 
.....Decision. The next generation night fighter will be powered by DB605 engines. 

Weapons.
WWII era night fighting was a point blank business. A pair of forward firing 3cm Mk108 cannon will kill anything at a range of 100 meters. May be supplemented by a pair of lightweight 2cm MG FF cannon slant firing weapons. 

WWII Germany had plenty of aluminum. No need to piddle around with wood as the RAF and VVS were forced to do.

Now for the next generation airframe.
RLM is providing great support for the Me-210 program and DB605 engine program. It's the obvious choice. However if this option is chosen the Me-210 night fighter will be considerably different from the Me-210 dive bomber. Essentially it will be Me-210 wings and engines with an entirely new fuselage. Might be different enough to receive a new designation (other then Me-210). 
.....No dive brakes.
.....No bomb bay.
.....No structural strengthening required for dive bombing.
.....Fuselage internal area will be arranged to provide space for radar and other specialized equipment. 
.....Aircraft electrical system beefed up to provide power for electronic equipment.

IMO there is another good possibility.
Dornier Do 335 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


> In May 1942, Dornier submitted an updated version with a 1,000 kg (2,200 lb) bombload as the P.231, in response to a requirement for a single seat high-speed bomber/intruder. P.231 was selected as the winner after beating rival designs from Arado, Junkers, and Blohm Voss development contract was awarded as the Do 335. In autumn 1942, Dornier was told that the Do 335 was no longer required, and instead a multi-role fighter based on the same general layout would be accepted



From the late 1930s onward Dornier tried hard to get an aircraft contract that employed his tandem engine technology. Why not a two seat tandem engine night fighter? This would be considerably different from the historical Do-335.
.....DB605 engines.
.....No bomb bay or structural strengthening required to carry bombs.
.....Enough electrical power for all the electronic equipment.
.....Enough internal space for all the electronic equipment.


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## Erich (Oct 11, 2011)

for 1942 and the LW the Ju 88C-6 had already proved itself by 1941 with the Ferenachtjagd over England, too bad the silly Austrian called them off as it would of really set the Allies back in a hole not definitely but the overabundance of nuisance raids were causing major concerns of the times. NJG 2 being pulled back to bolster poor Mussolini in Italy, one of the stupidest moves yet made in the war efforts


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## vikingBerserker (Oct 11, 2011)

If timing was not an issue, I wonder how the Ar 234P would have performed with the 4 engines. Good size with enough room for extra crewmen and plenty of fire power.


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## davebender (Oct 11, 2011)

I agree. But but a night intruder is a different mission then an aircraft required to shoot down enemy bombers over your own territory in cooperation with ground based radar.

IMO the historical Me-210C and Me-410A are probably the best bets for a next generation German night intruder aircraft.


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## jim (Oct 11, 2011)

In very late war Do 335 and Me262 are undoubtly the best
In 1942:
Start with Ju 88 c
1) remove the gondola (+15-20 km/h)
2) Introduce a low drug canopy (Like ju 388j s) no rear defensive gun
3) Use BMW 801D (Realistic scenario) or detuned jumo 222 2000hp (unrealistic scenario)
4)3 men crew
5)Extended wings from ju 188 and tail surfaces similar to Ju 88g
6) possibly powered controls
7) 2 mg 151/20 in swallow belly pacage plus one in the nose firing between the radar antennas ( field modification, i have the photo) plus 1 mg 151 SM
I expect from this configuration a speed of ~560-580km/h , excellent handling, endurance, adequate firepower,space for electronics and development potential. From january 43 use of db603A would lower weight and increase speed specially over 6000m . use of GM1 in special units could even allow to intercept pathfinders mosquito.
Then , in spring 44 , db 603 E for a further small gain in performance and streamlined radar antenas. Finally in autumn 44 use of Mw50 to finally catch the mosquito in performance. Then Do 335 can replace it.
But with the total defaet of germany in electronic warfare no desicive diference would have been achieved.
For wilde sau operations i would propose db 605 equiped FW 187


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## davebender (Oct 11, 2011)

Are you sure that's realistic?

27,783 BMW801 engines were produced.
Over 15,000 Fw-190A/F/G fighter aircraft were produced. Powered by BMW801 engine.
Some other aircraft such as the Do-217E were also powered by BMW801 engines.

It appears to me that historical BMW801 engine production was inadequate to support the historical aircraft programs. What happens when a Fw-190A needs an engine change? There couldn't have been many spare engines sitting around.


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## Crimea_River (Oct 11, 2011)

davebender said:


> IMO the historical Me-210C and Me-410A are probably the best bets for a next generation German night intruder aircraft.



Too slow. Would have been Mossie fodder in no time.


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## pbfoot (Oct 11, 2011)

Don't think you could improve much on Ju88g (whatever Erich chose ) the Jet fighters I don't believe had the legs to play in the bomber stream, the pilots would have zipped by the targets clugging in at 200knots


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## davebender (Oct 11, 2011)

The Me-410A entered service during January 1943. It had a max speed of 385mph. Me-210C max speed was about the same but the aircraft had a smaller payload.

*Mosquito F Mk II.* (I think this was the night fighter version operational during January 1943)
de Havilland Mosquito - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Max Speed. 366mph @21,400 feet.

Night intruder aircraft operated low so performance @ 5,000 feet would probably be more relevant. However I doubt contemporary RAF night fighters had a speed advantage over the Me-410A.


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## stona (Oct 12, 2011)

Statistically the night fighter pilot's worst enemy was ......himself.
The Me262,towards the end of the war was generally flown by expert,experienced,pilots. Put them in the hands of regular front line nightfighter pilots and I suspect they would attrite themselves without any help from Bomber Command. They had enough trouble landing their Ju88s and Bf110s at night.
Cheers
Steve


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## davebender (Oct 12, 2011)

That's probably true. A higher then normal level of aircrew skill was required to operate at night. Mass produced wartime aircrew rarely got enough training before being thrust into combat. Bombers flying at night had the same problem.


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## vikingBerserker (Oct 12, 2011)

Another reason why I think the Ar 234P would be a great candidate. Speed almost the same as the Me 262, crew of 2-3 and heavier armanment (4 x 30mm 1 x 20mm)


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## gjs238 (Oct 12, 2011)

tomo pauk said:


> Okay, since we expect 1000-bomber raids, during the night, any time in 1942 (ie. within 18-24 months after this futile air assault vs. UK) to occur vs. Fatherland, the world's best night fighter must be constructed. What would your ideal LW's NF looked like? Of course, you can 'draw' an ideal NF for 1943-44-45's bits pieces too.



Would this ideal night fighter be fighting the "Ideal night bomber for RAF" or the "Fast bomber for USAAC"?


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## davebender (Oct 12, 2011)

Two point of departure (from historical) makes for unpredictable results. You would need to run a simulation with the two sides reacting to each others decisions as they are made.


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## wuzak (Oct 12, 2011)

What about a Do335? But dump the front engine, replace it with radar and guns in the nose. Add a second seat - would have to be behind the pilot. Use the best DB603 version available.

Anybody got the performance numbers of the Do335 on a single engine?


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## davebender (Oct 12, 2011)

Proposed two seat night fighter version of the Do-335.
http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.c...-255/5681/gallery_11347/photos_1240891589.jpg






No need to delete the front engine. Nor do you need to change the firepower. 1 x 3cm Mk103 cannon and 2 x MG151/20 cannon were standard. An additional Mk103 cannon in each wing was optional.


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## vanir (Oct 12, 2011)

Mk103 is a lot of heft for performance in air-air that can be matched, albeit less accurately over long ranges by the Mk108 with greater ammo loads and huge weight savings, optionally increasing firepower without an aircraft performance drop.

It's like the Soviets with their ShVak and rechambered Beresin, you could put three 2cm cannon where previously you had two for the same carry weight and shell lethality, why it was the best gun of the war was because it let you carry more than anything else in its class without impacting air combat performance. That was the whole point about the Mk108.
In the bomber destroyer scenario, like any air-air scenario the question is efficiency and the Mk108 is simply far more efficient than the Mk103.

I think Mk108/shräge musik equipped traditional night fighters like the Ju-88G and He-219 would've outshone a Mk103 equipped Do335 in the long run, despite the Dornier's ability to attack from greater range. That's really only a benefit in daylight interception, at night it's a bigger drawback that you've less than 2/3 the fire rate and half the ammo of an Mk108 setup, at a cost of three times its weight for a reduction in firepower, the only positive is a greater attack range. The glaring drawback is being a highly unstable aerial combat gun, in an Fw-190A the test pilot couldn't even keep more than two or three shells on target because the guns recoil tossed it into yaw spins.

In ground attack the Mk103 is superb in a large, heavy and stable attack fighter preferrably with widely spaced engines, like an Me-410. I don't believe wing mounted Mk103 would've been successful through the service trials process on the Do335, it was really based on a design for an antitank gun fitted to heavy twin engine fighters in a single central fuselage mount, it's sledgehammer recoil is a little rough to go putting under lightly built aircraft wings, at the very least a gun brake/recoil system should be developed for that and it's already too heavy as it is.

For my part the key here I think was in DB-603 development, which was prematurely cut short. Had the industrial situation in late war Germany been fictionally unlimited and mighty, realistically proposed variants of the DB-603 would've increased the altitude and speed performance of existing He-219 and Ju-88G night fighters which were just the thing, with as many Mk108 you can pack inside without killing performance. I think what was used couldn't be topped, but resources to develop and implement them on a strategic scale was absent. You take the same equipment used in service and put it the numbers of late war American numerical superiority, building it in a comfortable and well supplied industrial complex like the US mainland to a high quality control standard.

When US pilots flew some captured Doras postwar they commented that what impressed them the most was the ability to match Mustang performance with such poor build quality they had to be disassembled and rebuilt before the aerodrome would declare them airworthy enough to test fly! They said they only imagined what German industry could've achieved if the nation was industrially as well off as the US and a similar scale.


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## Siegfried (Oct 13, 2011)

wuzak said:


> What about a Do335? But dump the front engine, replace it with radar and guns in the nose. Add a second seat - would have to be behind the pilot. Use the best DB603 version available.
> 
> Anybody got the performance numbers of the Do335 on a single engine?



Single engine performance of the Do 335A-0 was 348mph, I think this was only with the DB603A engine, the 475 mph DB605E version would have been even faster and the 495mph 
DB603L version faster again.

For microwave radars (9cm and 3cm) Dornier was preparing the Do 335 to take dielectric rod radiator aerial array in the leading edges of the wing by making the leading edges of wood.

http://www.cdvandt.org/CIOS-XXXI-8.pdf

The Berlin series of centrimetric radars tended to use arrays of these rod aerials, they are like tube and produce a narrow beam from the tube, when arranged in an array of anything from 2 to 8 or more the beam becomes tight. Came out of the technology developed for the FuG 350 Naxos radar homers and warning devices. The so called Arado Ar 234 "AWACS" used this in a dish above the aircraft.

The Luftwaffe's night fighter needs to be BIG and probably needs 3 crew to handle all the equipment:

1 Active radar plus a tail warning radar. Active radar was being developed to have pulse doppler clutter rejection as on groaund based radars with windlaus.
2 FuBl 3 automatic blind landing instrument
3 3D autopilot
4 Passive Radar such as Naxos
5 FuG 16ZY to give distance and bearing to a becon
7 Bernhard/Bernhardine jam proof navigation becon which also provides general telemetry of the bomber strams position.
8 Large jam secure radio and telemetry system immune to interferenance.
9 Advanced IFF system eg the FuG 226 Neuling system that was replacing the compromised FuG 25a Erstling system.
10 Tail warning radar
11 backup navigation systems
12 Infrared system like Kiel.
13 system to trigger enemy IFF


Really the Luftwaffe needs two types of night fighter: a small fast unit with basic radar to attack recons and pathfinder mossies as well as enemy night fighters and a big heavily equiped version that is somewhat slower but still fast.

Gebhard Adders book on the German night fighter force notes that the Luftwaffe wanted to use telemetry data injected straight into the 3 axis autopilot to guide the interception and then have automatic firing of the guns or R100 or R100BS missiles via radar. A device called Pauke added to a microwave radar.


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## davebender (Oct 13, 2011)

I agree. 

Which is why I favor a Me-210C / Me-210D variant with the fuselage built specifically for the night fighter role. Interior space should be similiar to the Me-110. Not as spacious as the Ju-88 but it's adequate. Aerial performance with late war DB605 engines producing 1,800 to 2,000 hp should be superior. Fast enough that RAF path finder Mosquitoes cannot assume they are uncatchable. If mass produced an Me-210 should also be less expensive then the larger Ju-88G.


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## Erich (Oct 13, 2011)

are we staying with 1942 or the wave of the future. ?

no a big NF is not the key and Mossie hunting had ended by early 1945 the 4 engine BC bomber was the threat. the 262 as stated was the craft needed with four 2cm weapons, throw out the Mk 108 short range. the Mk 103 had been thouroughly tested in air to air ops by the LW and it was a flop so no need to place in an overzsized craft like the Do 335. All the specs presented by Siegfried were to be established in the NEU 262 as I mentioned in earlier postings. the 210 and 410 series were tested as platforms for radar which failed by NJG 1 and NJG 5 and also tested for intruder ops again the two famous NJG's refused the craft and stayed with the Bf 110G-4 of the times.

the Mk 108 although a standard for LW NF's literally at close range blew Allied craft apart and because of the close range tendencies was to be phased out with a longer range version of the MG 151/20 2cm weapon with corrected flash hiders.


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## tomo pauk (Oct 13, 2011)

Indeed, my fine gentlemen: what should we build for 1942?


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## davebender (Oct 13, 2011)

Were they normal light bombers or did the Luftwaffe investigate building a new Me-210 fuselage specifically for night fighter use?


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## Erich (Oct 13, 2011)

the Me 410A was used, the techs could not fit the SN-2 set and the electronics could not be fitted in the cockpit with the observer/radio operator as the room was not there.


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## davebender (Oct 13, 2011)

That's a standard light bomber which isn't what I am proposing.

By 1942 the Luftwaffe should plan to build at least 100 dedicated night fighter aircraft per month. Numbers great enough to warrant a purpose built aircraft such as the Ta-154 or He-219. I think Messerschmitt should enter their own night fighter design in the contest. It would share some components with the standard Me-210C but it would not be the same thing.

Bf-162 vs Bf-110
Me-155A vs Me-109G.
Me-210C vs Me-??? (purpose built night fighter aircraft)


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## Erich (Oct 13, 2011)

Dave the Me 410A was the standard fighter not bomber variant, it just did not work for the LW NF force and they refused it much like NJG 3 with the He 219 A-5 and A-7's only I./NJG 1 used it to some potential, plus about 4 to portions of NJGr 10.

the Ju 88C-6 variant getting back to your earlier posting indeed used the Lich radar sets in both intruder and NF against BC over the Reich and even in 41 should of replaced the faulting Do 17's and earlier Bf 110 variants. I go back again to my proposal of blasting the English airfields to oblivion that no Allied heavy bomber English or US could take off from, so therefore a 1942 LW NF would not be needed for the future .........


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## davebender (Oct 13, 2011)

How many "standard fighter aircraft" had a bomb bay, dive brakes and a dive bomber site?


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## tomo pauk (Oct 13, 2011)

How would German (night or day?) bombers gotten through - they have had a hard time even in 1940?


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## Erich (Oct 13, 2011)

the A was the standard fighter A/C of the Me 410 with weapons fitting for the ZG's during late 43.

ask the British at the time how in 1941 the NJG 2 the only NJG 2 to come over inland did so well against the BC bombers both hunting them over their A/F's and bombing them to pieces on the ground, even with the NJG's in their smallness of that time frame the impact they could have done. The Austrian always knowing the best for the German war effort moved the Geschwader to no-mans land.

Imagine over 25 Geschwader performing nightly intruder raids to places unknown besides Allied A/F's.


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## stona (Oct 13, 2011)

Erich said:


> I go back again to my proposal of blasting the English airfields to oblivion that no Allied heavy bomber English or US could take off from, so therefore a 1942 LW NF would not be needed for the future .........



And how exactly are you going to do that? With commitments in the Mediterranean and Russia and with the same total number of aircraft with which the Luftwaffe failed to defeat the RAF in 1940,operating on only one front,this is just pie in the sky.
There was a monumental failiure in German planning,someone has already suggested that the war was lost in 1937. In late 1941 Anglo-American production totals exceded Germany's by 400% for single engined fighters,169% for twin engined aircraft and 4,033% for four engined aircraft. German production was barely covering losses and allied air forces were rapidly expanding. I've not even included the Soviet production. 
They couldn't have blasted English airfields in 1941/2 with less forces than they attempted the task in 1940 and faced with far stronger opposition. They might have succeeded in achieving an even higher rate of attrition of Luftwaffe forces than they were already suffereing.
Cheers
Steve


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## riacrato (Oct 13, 2011)

Just for the heck of it: Bf 109Z with 3 MK108, no machine guns. Don't know if it had been possible to fit in all the equipment, though.


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## Erich (Oct 13, 2011)

it was already proven Steve that at night the British forces were un-prepared for a total onslaught I fully understand the victory of BoB during DAYLIGHT hours.

I interviewed both sides back in the early 1970's over this very issue I present but quickly not wishing to get OT it was entirely possible. we can argue of course of this what-if and get nowhere............ my point is thus in 41-42 quite a different story than in late 44-45 where BC had a tried and true in effect defense system, though it's major move was drawing out the LW on their own territory which they did marvelously. remember the operations by LW night fighters over England during spring of 45 with too few A/C at their disposal.


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## tomo pauk (Oct 13, 2011)

While the concept of battling BC bombers over home turf in 1941/2 has merit, how would 25 squadrons of Ju-88s fared when contested by 40 squadrons of Beaufighters?


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## stona (Oct 13, 2011)

I don't buy it. Luftwaffe losses on the Eastern front alone were averaging 268 bombers a month (32.1%) between June and November 1941. In commision rates were rarely above 50%. The percentage of fully operational crews was rarely over 60%. Where were the aircraft and crews. for this onslaught going to come from? The total establishment was roughly the same as 1940. Infact the Luftwaffe in June 1941 had 200 less bombers,now spread over three fronts,than it did in May 1940 for the assault on Britain.
Such an assault on British airfields may have been possible tactically but the Luftwaffe did not have the means to carry it out. It was already on the slippery slope to defeat. The determination and bravery of its pilots and sometimes brilliant leadership at medium and lower levels could not compensate for the lack of long term production and strategic planning. 
Cheers
Steve


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## davebender (Oct 13, 2011)

Roughly 2,500 aircraft. Even with a 50% available rate you are talking about over 1,000 Me-410s. That many night intruders would just get in each others way. 

If Germany had over 1,000 light bombers available for operations against Britain you might as well load the aircraft with cluster munitions to attack all the parked Allied aircraft. Escort them with 100 night fighters to help suppress RAF night fighter defenses.


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## stona (Oct 13, 2011)

The Luftwaffe had 1,511 bombers (excluding Ju87) available in ALL theatres as of June 21 1941. If 60% (optimistic) were operational,and had crews available that gives a total available of well less than 1000 aircraft. The vast majority were already comitted in the East,tied to the armies there,with significant numbers also in the Mediterranean.
At the same time they had a total of 188 twin engined fighters and 263 night fighters,again in all theatres. I suppose they could have flown (and probably crashed) some of their 1,440 single engined fighters!
Whilst these raids might have been tactically possible,it's hard to see how the RAF could have countered them,the thousand aircraft mentioned above simply didn't (and never would) exist.
Cheers
Steve


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## davebender (Oct 13, 2011)

I agree. 

Late 1930s Germany would need a serious shift in production priorities to build a force similiar in size to RAF Bomber Command, even if the attacking aircraft are light bombers such as Ju-88s and Me-410s. You need aircraft, airfields, fuel, aircrew, munitions etc. The entire vast program which allowed Britain to put 1,000 bombers over Europe per night.

Personally I think a single Geschwader of light bombers permanently assigned to the night intruder mission would be plenty to give the RAF a serious headache.


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## Erich (Oct 13, 2011)

you cannot take reality and apply it truthfully to this what-if scenario. you mention eastern front bomber losses - nothing to do with the topic header, 45 squadrons of Beaus to 25 C-6's, c'mon back to it shall we............. 1942 the British did NOT have the night defense capabilites because the NJG 2 was removed then the Allies could then re-invent the wheel for their own.

to the topic

1942 to be honest and factual and not design your own flop the LW had nada, 0 to their holdings, a few tired Bf 110F's and some Do 17's, 217's big and heavy and Ju 88C-6's which were the best of the breed at the time. forget what the Allies had as this has really nothing to do with the topic header- start another one if you would prefer. 

man we get off so easily.............

oh well thread over . . . .


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## davebender (Oct 13, 2011)

From the late 1930s Germany produced a single low cost yet effective day fighter in ever increasing numbers. Half way through the war this was supplemented by a second low cost yet effective day fighter.

From 1939 onward Germany used Me-109s, Fw-190s, Me-110s, Do-215s, Do-217s, Ju-88s, Fw-189s and probably a few other aircraft types for night fighter missions. Pretty much anything that could fly was assigned to the night fighter force at one time or another.

Why can't the German night fighter force adopt the same method as the day fighter force? A single low cost yet effective aircraft type produced in large numbers.


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## michaelmaltby (Oct 13, 2011)

".... Why can't the German night fighter force adopt the same method as the day fighter force? A single low cost yet effective aircraft type produced in large numbers."

They _can_ but for ....

... politics. Nazi Politics.

MM


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## Ratsel (Oct 13, 2011)

Maybe becouse German Flak had sensitive German areas well covered and there was no need to 'Adopt' any day fighters for this single purpose. They modified as nessesary. I think they got more organized night fighter units when BC adopted the policy of firebombing civilians living at non-military areas.

If the fat man just continued on for a few more weeks during the BoB, BC would have been a non-issue.


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## davebender (Oct 13, 2011)

I fail to see your logic. 

"Nazi Politics" produced a single low cost yet effective day fighter. Why can't "Nazi Politics" produce a single low cost yet effective night fighter?


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## Kryten (Oct 13, 2011)

well first off would'nt the Ju88 have been the most cost effective as it was in mass production, and therefore easier to build?
secondly, anything smaller than an 88 and your going to have packaging issues surely? all those radar sets and recievers were quite bulky in ww2 , so would the 88 be more practical in regard to maintenance and build costs when installing all these gizmos?

I am aware the me110 etc ws used as a night fighter but wasn't the 88 the most successfull?


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## Edgar Brooks (Oct 13, 2011)

Ratsel said:


> I think they got more organized night fighter units when BC adopted the policy of firebombing civilians living at non-military areas.


You missed one word out of that statement:- "when BC adopted the NAZI policy of firebombing civilians living at non-military areas."
Edgar


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## Ratsel (Oct 13, 2011)

ahhh NAZI politics. The only parts of the German armed forces that followed NAZI politics to the letter was the Waffen _SS_. The German armed forces as a whole, even during WWII did not follow/endorse any political party despite how hard some want to believe that. The FAT MAN, as stupid as his morphine addicted pea-sized brain was, didn't agree with every aspect of NAZI politics.


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## Edgar Brooks (Oct 13, 2011)

Well, strangely enough, it's very difficult to understand, when your friends and relatives are being blasted to bits, "Oh, that's alright, they're not really Nazis, so they don't really want to kill us." Stop playing semantics; if you fight for an ideology, you support that ideology.


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## johnbr (Oct 13, 2011)

How about the Arado 440 with 4 mk 103 in the fuselage 2 20mm in the wings.


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## vanir (Oct 13, 2011)

davebender said:


> I agree.
> 
> Which is why I favor a Me-210C / Me-210D variant with the fuselage built specifically for the night fighter role. Interior space should be similiar to the Me-110. Not as spacious as the Ju-88 but it's adequate. Aerial performance with late war DB605 engines producing 1,800 to 2,000 hp should be superior. Fast enough that RAF path finder Mosquitoes cannot assume they are uncatchable. If mass produced an Me-210 should also be less expensive then the larger Ju-88G.



Yeah I'm leaning towards this. Me-410 production replaced 210 at the factory but was only an engine change to the 603 which is better for our nightfighter, the airframe stability changes had already been implemented in Me-210 jigs since early 1943, Hungarian 210Ca licensed production for example all used the late stable airframes from the beginning.

An Me-410 with rear gunner turned into a radar operator and a belly pack of 4x Mk103 with muzzlebrakes and flash suppressors (existing fit for the type) now there's a deadly plane.
And I don't see why a nightfighter needs a 3 man crew. Pilot/gunner and RIO/navigator.

In a 410 the Mk103 is just fine, but be nice if those Mk213 revolver guns entered production, what were they, 1200rpm-cyclic per gun in 30mm it seems (according to Karlo Kopp).


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## davebender (Oct 13, 2011)

IMO that was a mistake. The larger DB603 engine increases aircraft payload. However DB603 engines were in short supply right through the end of the war. Consequently only 1,160 Me-410s were manufactured over a two year period before production ended during September 1944. An average of about 50 Me-410s per month. 

The Luftwaffe needs at least 100 purpose built night fighter aircraft per month in addition to the 50 Me-410s. Our night fighter variant must be powered by DB605 or Jumo211 engines as that's all we have available in quantity. IMO that's not so horrible. The Hungarian Me-210C performed just fine powered by 1,475hp DB605A engines and more powerful DB605 engine versions are on the horizon.


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## michaelmaltby (Oct 13, 2011)

".... Nazi Politics" produced a single low cost yet effective day fighter. Why can't "Nazi Politics" produce a single low cost yet effective night fighter?"

Yes - and politics produced the Ju-88 as well. Politics however sometimes avoids  "reality". The Germans needed "a single low cost yet effective night fighter" but didn't focus on that priority *until it was too late*. And then they had too many candidates and not enough production, aircrew or infrastructure. In 1939 Britain had its "infrastructure" in place for airwar - Germany didn't.

MM


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## davebender (Oct 13, 2011)

The 1939 RAF had it's problems too. You don't get the benefit of hindsight in the real world. The RAF and Luftwaffe both muddled through the war as best they could. Both air forces had strengths and weaknesses.


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## DonL (Oct 13, 2011)

> The Luftwaffe needs at least 100 purpose built night fighter aircraft per month in addition to the 50 Me-410s. Our night fighter variant must be powered by DB605 or Jumo211 engines as that's all we have available in quantity. IMO that's not so horrible. The Hungarian Me-210C performed just fine powered by 1,475hp DB605A engines and more powerful DB605 engine versions are on the horizon.



There are only two outstanding designs which can perform with DB 605 or Jumo 211.

1. The FW 187 with DB 605.
The problem is, it's speculative if the radar equipment can be cramped in the small FW 187.

2. The Ta 154 showed very good performance as Ta 154 A-1 with nightfighter equipment and Jumo 211 F/N.

That's the only designs which showed enough performance with this engines and could match with a Mosquito.

The Me 210 was a design failure and wasn't much faster as the Me 110 with the same engines!


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## krieghund (Oct 14, 2011)

If we stick to the topic of meeting the threat in 42-43 then the Arado Ar240A series with DB601E appears to be the most promising..first flown in 1940 and entering LRIP in 1942 it has a max speed of 384 at 19685 ft and a range of 1242 miles @ 345. Imagine the range if flown at less than max continuous power. The dive brakes were already being dispensed with but I would remove the Barbette gun turrets to save weight and space. Also remove the cameras from the engine nacelles. The aircraft has a good turn of speed and endurance persistence and has an already established upgrade path .

The Ar240B series with DB605 was flown late 1942 and had MW50 incorporated. The Ar240C series with DB603A started in mid 1943. The last version Ar440 with DB603 was flown the summer of 1942 with a speed of 467 at 36000ft with GM1.

Of course this aircraft was plagued by the same syndrome other good types had in Germany----RLM seeing the world via their bellybutton!!


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## stona (Oct 14, 2011)

Well said Edgar. If you press a panel or bang in a rivet you are also supporting it. To win a war against Germany you kill Germans.
It doesn't look nice written down because it isn't. We're talking about a war.



Erich said:


> you cannot take reality and apply it truthfully to this what-if scenario.



I like the Me410 as a night fighter. As it's a what if you might as well give them several hundred of these,which they couldn't actually produce,armed with weapons systems that didn't exist at the time to blast Bomber Command from the skys!
Of course I'll give bomber command a new jet engined heavy bomber that the new fighters can't catch.
I'll also give the Luftwaffe a few hundred four engined bombers to blast Bomber Command air fields,but then I'll give Fighter Command RAF five hundred night fighters that can shoot them down.
Even in a 'what if' the reality of the situation has to be taken into account!
Cheers
Steve


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## riacrato (Oct 14, 2011)

Why would anyone want to use a MK103? You can't use the extra range at night you only expose your position and mark yourself a target.

Reactions: Like Like:
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## stona (Oct 14, 2011)

riacrato said:


> Why would anyone want to use a MK103? You can't use the extra range at night you only expose your position and mark yourself a target.



A good point. A weapon is only as good as its sighting system which is why the RAF considered the effective range of its .303 calibre machine guns to be the same as .50 calibre machine guns day and night.
Extra range at night is even more of a problem.







Cheers
Steve


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## DonL (Oct 14, 2011)

> If we stick to the topic of meeting the threat in 42-43 then the Arado Ar240A series with DB601E appears to be the most promising..first flown in 1940 and entering LRIP in 1942 it has a max speed of 384 at 19685 ft and a range of 1242 miles @ 345. Imagine the range if flown at less than max continuous power. The dive brakes were already being dispensed with but I would remove the Barbette gun turrets to save weight and space. Also remove the cameras from the engine nacelles. The aircraft has a good turn of speed and endurance persistence and has an already established upgrade path .



The Ar240 showed very poor handling all her lifetime with three or four different prototypes with 3 different engines and was in a "permanent correction" to get a better handling.
I doubt that the Ar 240 was a promising design, it was too much destroyer and light bomber then heavy fighter or nightfighter.



> The Ar240B series with DB605 was flown late 1942 and had MW50 incorporated.


The MW 50 showed up at 1944 for the DB 605A not in 1942.



> I like the Me410 as a night fighter.


The Me 410 was directly derived from the Me 210 but without the design failures of the Me 210, anyway it was an underperformer and was much much in need of the DB 603 or Jumo 213 to achieve any performance. This design was also too much light bomber and destroyer then heavy fighter. 

For example the Ta 154 as V2 with Jumo 211F/N achieve better performance, full equipped as nightfighter (with Lichtenstein, full ammo and cannons) as the Me 410 A-1 as dayfighter!
Also the He 219 and the Ju 88 G reach better performances with the same engines then the Me 410 even though they were much larger.

The whole Me 210/410 development from 1937 till 1944 was nothing but crap and a massive waste of resources.


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## michaelmaltby (Oct 14, 2011)

"... The RAF and Luftwaffe both muddled through the war as best they could. Both air forces had strengths and weaknesses."

Didn't say otherwise DB - made no claims for superiority or perfection - simply stated a FACT. As a result of the Zeppelin Raids in WW1 Britain had experienced the terror of civilian bombing and had worked to install a fairly thoughtful, competent early warning system and fighter control - to which radar was added. I do not believe the same claim can be made about German air defenses in September 1939. If you know otherwise DB please share .... otherwise .... 

MM


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## DonL (Oct 14, 2011)

Kammhuber Line - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


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## krieghund (Oct 14, 2011)

*DonL

The MW 50 showed up at 1944 for the DB 605A not in 1942.*



According to "Ar240 Luftwaffe Profile Series No. 8" states Ar240 V-7 flew Oct 1942 and Ar240 V-8 flew Dec 1942 both equipped with DB605A with MW-50. All further produced aircraft were equipped with versions of the Db603A.


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## Shortround6 (Oct 14, 2011)

The Luftwaffe didn't need a super Mosquito killer in 1942. It needed more night fighters of practically any type, night fighter crews with more faith in the equipment and a little less faith in the MK I eyeball and a control system that could control more than one fighter at a time in a "BOX". 
The RAF at the start of 1942 only had about 400 first line machines and the first 1000 bomber raid was only possible by using large numbers of Whitleys and Hampdens from training units and using instructors and student pilots as crews. Blenheims were still being used to bomb the night fighter airfields. 
Even the Me 110E/F if available in decent numbers ( and with modifications to crew training and the control system) could have inflected many more casualties on Bomber Command. The 1000 plane raid on Cologne was a PR stunt to get more funding/support for Bomber Command. According to Wiki 1047 planes took part, 868 bombed the main target, dropping just 1,455 tons of bombs and the British lost 43/44 aircraft (3.9%) "The losses were 22 aircraft were lost over or near Cologne, 16 shot down by flak, 4 by night fighters, 2 in a collision and 2 Bristol Blenheim light bombers lost in attacks on night fighter airfields"

A night fighter force that could have shot down 30 planes instead of 4 would have pushed the loss rate to 7% and shifted it into the unsustainable area.


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## riacrato (Oct 14, 2011)

Hence I'd suggest using the Bf 110 for the major part of '42 and gradually replacing it by Ju 88s and Bf 109Zs. The commonality of the 109Z with the daylight versions F through K should be kept as high as possible to ensure sufficient numbers are available.
If the Bf 109Z-based NF turns out to be a turd, you have the Ju 88 as a working backup. No need to invest in projects like Ar 240, Me 210/410, Ta 154, He 219 although if possible I'd go through with one of the more modern (Ta 154 or He 219) as a "just in case" project. Eventhough it failed in the end, I'd probably also choose Ta 154 over the He 219, simply for the fact that it's cheaper.


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## krieghund (Oct 14, 2011)

I thought now would be a good time to put the candidates in perspective;


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## DonL (Oct 14, 2011)

@ Kriegshund

Some fast question about the Ta 154 to your chart, i will study it later for all modells.

Ther Arnament of the Ta 154 A4 (as Nightfighter) was 2 x MG 151/20, 2 x MK 108 (to the front) and 2 x MK 108 as "Schräge Musik"

The top speed of the the A4 eith Jumo 213E was 650 km/h or faster, depends of which radar was used.
With the Jumo 211N the Ta 154 was 625 km/h fast as full equiped night fighter.

Fuel consumption: In your chart the DB 603 has a lower fuel consumption as the Jumo 213!
This is wrong. The Jumo 213 has the lowest specific fuel consumption of all german piston engines.

My inforfamition come from:
http://www.amazon.de/dp/392769746X/?tag=dcglabs-20
Flugmotoren und Strahltriebwerke: Amazon.de: Kyrill von Gersdorff, Helmut Schubert, Kurt Grasmann: Bücher


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## Siegfried (Oct 14, 2011)

Edgar Brooks said:


> You missed one word out of that statement:- "when BC adopted the NAZI policy of firebombing civilians living at non-military areas." Edgar



I think its correct to say Bomber Command, as a result of the "Area Bombardment" policy implemented a policy of unprecedented attacks on civilians (Destrution of 80 of Germany's biggest cities). The euphemisms such as "Dehousing" and "Demoralisation" are indications of the targets were human. Arthur Harris, honest to the core, makes no quibbles about it and often makes the point that no specific target was chosen, such as when Lubeck was fire bombed.

That the Luftwaffe attacked cities and used incendiaries is without doubt, however the cities did have valid targets, which were specifically targeted and were chosen for specific reasons to support immediate tactical or strategic goals. 

RAF raids on German cities (targets in and around Munich) began the day after the Luftwaffe bombed parts of Rotterdam. British propaganda caste the attack as a reprisal for Rotterdam bombing but had in fact been planed for a while. Rotterdam was a besieged city, the German Army needed the bridges and needed to keep moving in order to participate in the Battle of France, these were high stakes as loss against France and Britain was still possible. The Dutch officer in charge of negotiations had delayed and milked a surrender of the city for almost 3 days and a mix up with ulimatum extensions, time zones and the non-availabillity of the valuable and accurate Stukas sealed the cities fate.

Despite general accusations there doesn't appear to have been any terror bombardment of Warsaw, if there were such orders given they were also refused.

Attacks on German cities expanded in scope after a lone Heinkel accidently dropped its bomb load on London, killing no one. Again propaganda used it as an excuse. The Luftwaffe had been avoiding targets around cities as much as possible (ports around naval base cities excepted)

Coventry was the home of Britains machine tool industry and also the home of much of its aero-engine production. It was attacked using x-geraet, a beam riding system as accurate as the legendary Oboe. Large Factories and dwellings shared walls in this citiy. The city was fire bombed but the targets were the specific factories althout the areas around them were clearly subject to something equal to area bombardment, the dwellings and occupents were not the target.

X-Geraete had very precise beams, but the main beam had 14 side lobes that could be accidently used. I'm not sure if intentional but the perimeter of one of the Conventry raids did have incendiaries dropped in a v-formation. This may have been marking to perimeter of the bomb zone or it may have been accidental. 

The "Baedeker raids" on Bristish tourist towns at a latter stage of the war was a reprisal to attacks on cities like Lubeck, a medieval city of world heritage status. The fire bombing of this city which had no major targets, had a profound impact on the Germans. Goebells thought it was a new type of cultural warfare designed to demoralise by attacking markers of cultural heritage. 

The area bombardment policy was driven I believe by frustration at the inabillity of bomber command to attack accuratly and survivably during the day. I think Curchills adviser, Lord Cherwell (Frederick Lindemann, a German born Jew with an American mother) who has been described as having a pathalogical hatred of Germans set Bomber Command deeper down this path than it otherwise would.

There was little waiting for better aircraft or better navigation aids able to carry out different policies. The "over the horizon" version of Oboe, that worked with orbiting aircraft and was working in 43 was never pushed enough because it seems the policy was set in stone. 

When the V2 (and V1) was prematurely rushed into production it was to provide a counter terror with which it might be possible to negotiate an end of bombardment of German cities. It was hideously inaccurate (4.5km CEP by German trials but still more accurate than H2S/H2X) The more accurate guidance systems of the V2 (vollzirkell) or full-circle, used a columated beam riding system with motor cuttoff controlled by doppler and range for an accuracy of 500m. It ran into trouble with ground plane interferance in testing in 1943 and had to be re-engineered for higher frequencies and compensating techniques. The new components were bing built at the end of the war.

The Luftwaffe was used to attack cities and that they fire bombed them is without doubt, but it does seem they were responding to immediate tactical needs such as supporting an Army crossing (Rotterdam) or destroying aero-engine infrastructure (Coventry). I can certainly see how this 'escalated' tit for tat. I don't see that there was a Nazi, Luftwaffe or a German policy of city bombardment that tirggered this.


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## Ratsel (Oct 14, 2011)

Couldn't have said it better myself, I Salute you Sir.


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## krieghund (Oct 14, 2011)

DonL said:


> @ Kriegshund
> 
> Some fast question about the Ta 154 to your chart, i will study it later for all modells.
> 
> ...



Hi Don, the fuel consumption figures are from "Fuel Consumption of the GAF" Mar 1945 Intel report and the table comes from Schiffer's "German Night Fighters in WWII" by Griehl


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## stona (Oct 15, 2011)

The RAF was also attacking factories and production facilities. They did it on a larger scale and often more innacurately than the Luftwaffe's attack on Coventry. The Luftwaffe did a good job damaging many factories in and around Coventry as well as a cathedral and about 5,000 homes. Killing workers and their families is a valid way of attacking production,here they didn't do so well,less than 600 killed.I don't suppose anyone in Germany was crying about that.

Having quite rightly pointed out that the RAF could not fly over the Reich during daylight Hitler himself set the rules of the game in a speech of September 1940.

"They therefore come during the night — and as you know, release their bombs indiscriminately and without any plan on to residential areas, farmhouses and villages. Wherever they see a sign of light, a bomb is dropped on it. For three months past, I have not ordered any answer to be given, thinking that they would stop this nonsensical behaviour. Mr Churchill has taken this to be a sign of our weakness. You will understand that we shall now give a reply, night for night, and with increasing force. 

And if the British Air Force drops two, three or four thousand kilos of bombs, then we will now drop 150,000, 180,000, 230,000, 300,000 or 400,000 kilos, or more, in one night. If they declare that they will attack our cities on a large scale, we will erase theirs! We will put a stop to the game of these night-pirates, as God is our witness. The hour will come when one or the other of us will crumble, and that one will not be National Socialist Germany. I have already carried through such a struggle once in my life, up to the final consequences, and this then led to the collapse of the enemy who is now still sitting there in England on Europes last island."

Of course he got the conclusion wrong. 


Should the US not have fire bombed Tokyo or used nuclear weapons on Japanese cities? Maybe they should have invaded Japan,costing hundreds of thousands of American lives so that we could feel better about it today.
I grew up in the era of 'Mutually Assured Destruction' the consequences of which would have made WWII bombing casualities pale into insignificance.
War is hell.
Steve


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## jim (Oct 15, 2011)

stona said:


> The RAF was also attacking factories and production facilities. They did it on a larger scale and often more innacurately than the Luftwaffe's attack on Coventry. The Luftwaffe did a good job damaging many factories in and around Coventry as well as a cathedral and about 5,000 homes. Killing workers and their families is a valid way of attacking production,here they didn't do so well,less than 600 killed.I don't suppose anyone in Germany was crying about that.
> 
> Having quite rightly pointed out that the RAF could not fly over the Reich during daylight Hitler himself set the rules of the game in a speech of September 1940.
> 
> ...


 
Mr Steve
Fire bombing of Tokyo was not the only alternative to Japan invasion. America could wait till japan starved to death by the use of American submarines ,mining of japanese seas and destruction of industry by daylight accurate air attacks
British targeted specificaly the population .Also they did it long after the war was decided. (Look Dresden with America co operating)
And when alleis got total air domination and thus could fly safely during daylight they continiue attack populations. And ,in 1945 , when all major cities - industrial centers were destroyed they targeted smalller towns very often without any military target, while jabos attacked targets as small as villages and farms . 
I have some doubts about how proper would be the use of Me 262 against Lancasters and Halifaxs due to performance difference. I believe a combination of Me 262/Do335 would be ideal for the night fighting. Also i always looked strange to me why technicians could not make a good night fighter out of Me 410 . Removal of defensive barbettes and the bomb bay should provide enough space for electronics.


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## stona (Oct 15, 2011)

jim said:


> Mr Steve
> Fire bombing of Tokyo was not the only alternative to Japan invasion. America could wait till japan starved to death by the use of American submarines ,mining of japanese seas and destruction of industry by daylight accurate air attacks



Ridiculous,starved, bombed (conventially or otherwise) or burned,dead is dead. You are simply targeting the civilian population in another way.

Absolutely correct that Bomber Command targeted civilians. These were the people who were operating the presses,making the munitions, or growing the food that enabled Germany to prosecute its aggressive war against us and our allies. If we had to make the same decisions again I hope we'd have the nerve and determination to do the same. This was a real war of survival. Churchill said it better than I ever could.

"Hitler knows that he will have to break us in this Island or lose the war. If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands.
But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science."

And

"You ask, what is our policy? I can say: It is to wage war, by sea, land and air, with all our might and with all the strength that God can give us; to wage war against a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalogue of human crime. That is our policy." 

Hindsight is a wonderful thing,but I'm afraid I've no time for the revisionist niceties that it may engender.

Cheers
Steve


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## jim (Oct 15, 2011)

stona said:


> Ridiculous,starved, bombed (conventially or otherwise) or burned,dead is dead. You are simply targeting the civilian population in another way.
> 
> Absolutely correct that Bomber Command targeted civilians. These were the people who were operating the presses,making the munitions, or growing the food that enabled Germany to prosecute its aggressive war against us and our allies. If we had to make the same decisions again I hope we'd have the nerve and determination to do the same. This was a real war of survival. Churchill said it better than I ever could.
> 
> ...



That s an interesting opinion. If we apply the same logic in our days This means that the terrorist attacks in New York, London and Madrid are justifeid since the terrorists attacked the civilians that produce the weapons of NATO forces that fight them? 
Does it means that Nazis executions of population were justifeid because supported the alleid cause in many ways?
Does the cause always justifeis the means? 
I am sorry if i spent your time .It s not nessecary to answer


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## Siegfried (Oct 15, 2011)

stona said:


> The RAF was also attacking factories and production facilities. They did it on a larger scale and often more inaccurately than the Luftwaffe attack on Coventry. The Luftwaffe did a good job damaging many factories in and around Coventry as well as a cathedral and about 5,000 homes. Killing workers and their families is a valid way of attacking production,here they didn't do so well,less than 600 killed.I don't suppose anyone in Germany was crying about that.
> 
> Having quite rightly pointed out that the RAF could not fly over the Reich during daylight Hitler himself set the rules of the game in a speech of September 1940.
> 
> ...



I think bomber command had been flying around Germany, bombing all sorts of targets and clearly hitting the the wrong target, everything from hospitals to residences which of course is likely to be provocative. I believe the RAF rules were quite strict in that bombs that could not be of loaded on to legitimate targets were to be returned however the navigation problem and Bomber Commands initial over estimation of its skill (and human) skill meant they just bombed the wrong thing; the Butt report showed how bad things really were in that 2/3rds of bombs were more than 5 miles from target although BC seems to have worked out the problem well before then. The early months of the war Between Britain and Germany marked a period of ordered restraint by Hitler in the hopes that Britain could be dissuaded from the war and Hitlers discomfort in attacking fellow Aryans (which he expressed to Galland). The Coventry raid did up the stakes considerably and possibly were the straw that ensured that the Area Bombardment directive was issues, it represented another phase, however I do not think that workers were the target or their housing, the factories were the target. I do believe that the incendiaries were used to burn up the large areas around the factories, including housing, as part of a strategy to destroy those factories, however I do not believe that had housing been 1km from the factories that the housing would have been targeted (as the towns around Penemunde was to get at the researchers and workers of the V weapons program)

Exactly what the aim points in and around Coventry were would be interesting to know, there has been little research in this area. x-geraet was accurate but it was only used by pathfinders.

Of course Germany ended up the looser in this gamble but this is a dangerous thing that could have gone the other way for Britain should Germany should after the area bombardment campaign somehow have taken the upper hand and perhaps this is why restraint needs to be shown.

It's easy to see what happened; raids against Germany were conducted to tie up German resources during the battle of France, these (despite often targeting self illuminated blast furnaces) became unintentionally indiscriminate due to the navigation issue but was either seen as deliberately indiscriminate or irresponsibly bumbling. This created an embarrassment to Hitler who spoke of retaliation perhaps to shore up his reputation amongst Germans, perhaps to warn of the British, perhaps to legitimate a wider bombing campaign. The issue escalated in a series of steps from there.

Notable about the escalation of British bombing was that there appear not only to have been strong disagreement over the Area Bombardment program in terms of strategy within Britain and over its effectiveness but there was some moral disagreement. 

The war was an unprecedented tragedy for Europe and perhaps this is why we still obsess about it. One effect of the war has been a new world order that has created migration patterns likely to eventually assimilate the traditional ethnic groups of Europe: including the British and Germans.


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## stona (Oct 15, 2011)

jim said:


> That s an interesting opinion. If we apply the same logic in our days This means that the terrorist attacks in New York, London and Madrid are justifeid since the terrorists attacked the civilians that produce the weapons of NATO forces that fight them?
> Does it means that Nazis executions of population were justifeid because supported the alleid cause in many ways?
> Does the cause always justifeis the means?
> I am sorry if i spent your time .It s not nessecary to answer



No,terrorism and an aggressive war waged by a state are not the same thing.

No,the execution or massacre of innocent civilians in territories occupied by you is not justified or sensible. You are destroying a potential economic resource. The German regime was engaged in genocide,a word now devalued by over use. Genocide is the extermination of an entire race,not a massacre like at Srebrenica,however terrible that was.
As for a population supporting the allied cause,the execution of 'civilians' actively engaged in resistance,sabotage or partisan activities is a very grey area. Any occupying force is likely to see it as justified. As a Briton I would be very wary of the pot calling the kettle black on this point.

In a war of survival the end justifies the means, as long as you are on the winning side. If you lose you end up at Nuremberg.Why else would Japan have suffered two nuclear attacks? It took her out of the war and fired a shot accross the bows of the U.S.S.R. Two birds with one stone,a classic example of the end justifying the means.

Sorry for the diversion,this is a long way from night fighters,but some of the posts above deserved a riposte. 

Cheers
Steve


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

Sep 1939. Me-210 prototype first flight with DB601 engine.

14 March 1942. Modified Me-210A. Longer and deeper rear fuselage.
July 1942. Leading edge slots added to Me-210 wings.
.....Taken together these changes fixed Me-210 handling issues. The resulting Me-210C was ready for mass production during the fall of 1942 after 3 years of development. 

As for speed....
Messerschmitt Me 210 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


> The Me 210 was a straightforward cleanup of the 110, and used many of the same parts. The main differences were a modified nose area that was much shorter and located over the center of gravity, and an all-new wing designed for higher cruise speeds. On paper, the Me 210's performance was impressive. It could reach 620 km/h (390 mph) on two 1,350 PS (1,330 hp, 990 kW) Daimler-Benz DB 601F engines, making it about 80 km/h (50 mph) faster than the Bf 110



Everything I have read suggests the Me-210C had a max speed of about 385mph when powered by two 1,475hp DB605A engines. Pretty close to the original specifications and quite a bit faster then a Me-110G powered by the same engines.


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## Siegfried (Oct 15, 2011)

michaelmaltby said:


> "... The RAF and Luftwaffe both muddled through the war as best they could. Both air forces had strengths and weaknesses."
> 
> Didn't say otherwise DB - made no claims for superiority or perfection - simply stated a FACT. As a result of the Zeppelin Raids in WW1 Britain had experienced the terror of civilian bombing and had worked to install a fairly thoughtful, competent early warning system and fighter control - to which radar was added. I do not believe the same claim can be made about German air defenses in September 1939. If you know otherwise DB please share .... otherwise ....
> 
> MM



Germany had France to worry about, without even the protection of the channel, and had also experience raids in WW1 by the RAF and by Sikorsky Ilya's. Austria had experienced raids from Italy.

In terms of the invention of radar: it occurred in Germany, Britain and the US at around the same time 1934; I think Watson Watts primacy is in doubt. There is an argument I think that the Germans, at GEMA, were first to measure range. Radar work in Germany originated at the Signals Branch (the NVA later NVK) of the German Navy: it was the idea of the Physicist Rudolf Kunhold who head that Branch and came out of sonar ideas.

He wanted to extend the ideas of active sonar by using microwaves (to get the tight beams and small antenna). Though successful they microwave generators were too weak to be useful and by 1934/35 they were successful using triodes and split anode magnetron in the 50cm and 60cm range. This was to the great disappointment of Kunhold who still kept pushing microwaves.

The first Freya radars (then called DeTe I) were used by the coastal branch of German Naval artillery in 1938. By the time of the Sudetenland crisis the Luftwaffe was using them. However by the time the war broke out I think 16 had been produced for the Luftwaffe, perhaps not all in service. Seetakts started being installed on ships in 1937 and were becoming standard from 1938.

Clearly Britain's deployment of radar, the CH system, was in advance of this. I believe one reason for this is that the Germans had to use their radar over land and so the option of a radar with 15m wavelengths was not attractive and they simply wanted compact systems suitable for a small ship. The Luftwaffe wasn't originally going to order Freya and only use its own Wurzburg system (Freya was a Navy developed system, but General Martini recognize its value and range).

The Freya's were simply integrated into the existing air reporting service; this was a functioning system but was found to have operational issue due to the way it was split up into geographical sectors amongst different branches.

Wurzburg and its more accurate spin off Mainz were probably the best Anti aircraft radar in the world till late 1942 since it exhibited an accuracy of 0.3 degree in elevation and azimuth and 25m in range, in late 1942 the SCR-584 entered service along with a series of allied microwave radars and it lost its place. Wurzburg had been built as an early warning radar but turned into a FLAK directing radar by mid 1941 when Wurzburg-D added conical scanning, 25m range accuracy and syncho outputs direct to the range input of the FLAK predictor. The Wurzburg-C had the conical scan but lacked the selsyns and accuracy. The Wurzburg A lacked the conical scan (this outmoded one had been captured by British Commandos at Bruneval). The giant Wurzburg Riesse was simply an over sized Wurzbug-D entering service at the same time in mid 41, was supposed to be for true FLAK direction due to its accuracy but was "misused" to guide fighters.

***********

German radar was pretty good, in some cases better till late 1942 when allied microwave developments came into mass use. The British use of microwave radars on ships in 1941 added nothing that Seetakt couldn't do already. Seektakt contray to most histories could do effective blind fire.

By the time that the Germans had captured their first H2S they had magnetron able to produce 18kW at 18cm and 4km at 3.7cm (the latter tunable) which compares with the 10kW or so of the very first British 9cm microwave radars.

They simply never bothered to develop these into radars, their existing sets worked well enough, and they hadn't the resource and it remained an academic issue, they were also obsessed with making them tunable since the Bruneval raid. You can get proof from

Microwave tube development in Germany from 1920-1945
H. Doring International Journal of Electronics, 1362-3060, Volume 70, Issue 5, 1991, Pages 955 - 978


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## DonL (Oct 15, 2011)

> Sep 1939. Me-210 prototype first flight with DB601 engine.
> 
> 14 March 1942. Modified Me-210A. Longer and deeper rear fuselage.
> July 1942. Leading edge slots added to Me-210 wings.
> .....Taken together these changes fixed Me-210 handling issues. The resulting Me-210C was ready for mass production during the fall of 1942 after 3 years of development.



The development started at 1937 but that's not my problem! Three years from the first flight of a prototype to get a warplane ready for production *in* war, is a huge mistake and a waste of resources.

Please imagine how fast the FW 187 would be with DB 601F and DB 605A and this bird was production ready 1939!
Nobody can convince me that the Me 210/410 was a good design, only average, and there are other designs which were a lot better with much more potential!
I'm also not convinced that a Me 210 with full nightfighter equipment could achieve more then 600 km/h. 

The Me 410 is nearly the same as the Me 210C and was in need of the DB 603 to get any performance.

The FW designs as heavy fighters (two engine designs) were much better and faster then the Messerschmitt designs and much more capable as fighters.


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

German firms had magnetron patents during the 1930s. Were captured British magnetrons different then what they already had?


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

> FW designs as heavy fighters (two engine designs) were much better and faster then the Messerschmitt designs and much more capable as fighters.


The Fw-187 was a superior long range day fighter. Possibly the best designed by anyone before late war aircraft such as the P-51D appeared. 

However I don't think the Fw-187 has much potential as a night fighter. The airframe was just too small.

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## DonL (Oct 15, 2011)

> However I don't think the Fw-187 has much potential as a night fighter. The airframe was just too small.



I agree and disagree because it is very speculative, but FW had send plans of a heavy nightfighter FW 187 to the RLM at 1942!
I also don't know what you can achieve with a thickened up fuselage!

I hope thickened up is the correct translation for the issue I want to describe.
As example the difference between Do 17 and Do 215.

Anyway the Ta 154 had much more potential then the Me 210/410 series.
The Ta 154 V1 achieved 1943 in comparation at Rechlin 700 km/h without nightfighter equipment and Jumo 211N!


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## Tante Ju (Oct 15, 2011)

Edgar Brooks said:


> You missed one word out of that statement:- "when BC adopted the NAZI policy of firebombing civilians living at non-military areas."
> Edgar



There was no nazi about it. But it was put into action much earlier, by other "democractic" states (who may be democratic at home, but not in other place). Examples are many, well known. Imperial Germany used Zeppelin raids in WW1, Italian theorist Douhet developed the theory of unrestricted air war etc. The British (Harris was there as officer and was very fond of idea, go figure) used to bomb Iraq arab rebels into submission with gas and air attacks on civillians in the 1920s, the French did same in Syria and bombed downtown of Damaskus into rubble.. Italians did same in Ethiopia.. I think over Madrid too, but I am not sure how much is true of it, and how much is republican war propaganda. It was not "adopted" from the Nazis because the Nazi did not even get to power yet. Hitler was sitting in jail with his buddies at the time. I doubt he influence anyone.

"Bomber Baron" circle was much stronger in these air forces (particular in Britain) than in Luftwaffe, and I think this is incorrect to say German air force had belief of strategy of "firebombing" civillians. Of course much war-time and post-war propaganda is saying this. On occasion, they did this, but it does not seem to be a policy at any time. Policy of Luftwaffe was close coordinated operations with army as main rule.

Firebombing civillians is clear connected to Bomber Command/Arthur Harris more than to anybody else. I doubt anybody else can be named who would make this _a policy_ (meaning: not tactic used in some cases, often as retribution to other action). USAAF policy in Far east comes close only imho.


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## Tante Ju (Oct 15, 2011)

davebender said:


> German firms had magnetron patents during the 1930s. Were captured British magnetrons different then what they already had?



I wondered lot. Often said that magnetron was some "super weapon", but I keep wonder why. I know it can generate greater power for very short wave radar devices, but I do ask, why is very short wave devices give advantage? Becuase AFAIK most search device operate at fairly long waves, so I guess things are more complicated, probably because why short wave is good for one purpose, long wave for another purpose. 

Say how does it bend with earth curve? How does it effected by jam? How accurate resolution there is? How sensitive to weather? What is detection range, ranging accuracy with same power source? Weight etc?


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

Only if 2,000+ hp engines are available in quantity. Which wasn't the case historically during 1942 to 1945.

The British Mosquito night fighter performed just fine when powered by RR Merlin engines. Why can't a similiar size German night fighter achieve similiar performance with DB605 engines?


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## stona (Oct 15, 2011)

davebender said:


> German firms had magnetron patents during the 1930s. Were captured British magnetrons different then what they already had?



This would be Hollmann's magnetron,patented in 1935. It was rejected by the German military for technical reasons (mainly unstable frequency) leading to the development of a radar system based on vacuum tube technology,the Klystron.This system could never match the power output of later magnetrons. It was what turned out to be a wrong turn.
In 1940 Randall and Boot,working just up the road from me at Birmingham University, developed an improved version of Hollmann's magnetron and overcame it's inherent problems with some nifty electronics. It wasn't having a magnetron but making it work in a practicle radar system that was the problem. With a trans-Atlantic development programme the Western allies developed a significant lead in radar technology.
The first centimetric radar installed in a Luftwaffe night fighter was (from memory) the FuG 240 which was derived from captured H2S technology.Only a handful were fitted to some Ju88G-6s before the end of the war.
Cheers
Steve


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## DonL (Oct 15, 2011)

> Only if 2,000+ hp engines are available in quantity. Which wasn't the case historically during 1942 to 1945.



That's wrong Dave.

The Ta 154 V3 --> Ta 154 A1 equipped with full nightfighter equipment and Jumo *211N* achieved 625 km/h.
NJG 3 pilot Gottfried Schneider was on 44 enemy missions with a Ta 154 A1 and shot down several Bombers.

Edit:

Several Ta 154 were on enemy mission at NJG 3 and NJG 10.
They had mixed setup, some Ta 154 with Jumo 211N, some with Jumo 213A and some with Jumo 213E.
At the book of Dietmar Herrman most NJG pilots that flew the Ta 154 and He 219 stated that the Ta 154 was better then the He 219.


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## stona (Oct 15, 2011)

Tante Ju said:


> why is very short wave devices give advantage? Becuase AFAIK most search device operate at fairly long waves, so I guess things are more complicated, probably because why short wave is good for one purpose, long wave for another purpose.



A shorter wave length increases resolution,i.e. you can detect smaller targets. The cavity magnetron is a small device which could be fitted into an aircraft. The antenna for centimetric radar is also smaller and would be familiar to most of us.
Here is the antenna for the FuG 240 fitted on a Ju88. It can be covered with an aerodynamic nose cone,reducing the huge drag of earlier 'antler' type arrays.







Cheers
Steve


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

6,627 kg. Me-410 empty weight. 2 x 1,750 hp engines.
6,600 kg. Ta-154 empty weight. 2 x 1,500 hp engines.



> Ta 154 A1 equipped with full nightfighter equipment and Jumo 211N achieved 625 km/h


That would be fine if it were true but I doubt it is. The similiar size Me-410A had 500 more hp and didn't have radar aerials yet could achieve only 388mph.


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

Do you have a number for this "huge drag"? I have read it amounts to about 7 knots for a Ju-88 but German radar equipment was lighter in weight and electrical power requirements were lower.


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## Erich (Oct 15, 2011)

Dave

are you talking performance figures on 410 and 154 with souped up engines as your lists do not correlate with actual operating conditions.

back to the 262 one must ask if the jet could not slow down sufficiently to undertake a BC 4 engine then why the tech use of SM installation behind the canopy. The B-2 was to have an extended fuselage for reasons I gave earlier and it would have been the ultimate NF machine for the LW. but back to 1942 ............ numbers indicate as much as 10-15 mph slower with aerials off the nose but because of all the homing devices/aerials off the wings this is added into the figure given.


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## Edgar Brooks (Oct 15, 2011)

Tante Ju said:


> The British (Harris was there as officer and was very fond of idea, go figure) used to bomb Iraq arab rebels into submission with gas and air attacks on civillians in the 1920s. Firebombing civillians is clear connected to Bomber Command/Arthur Harris more than to anybody else. I doubt anybody else can be named who would make this _a policy_ (meaning: not tactic used in some cases, often as retribution to other action). USAAF policy in Far east comes close only imho.


Still peddling lies, Tante Ju? The RAF never used gas to attack anyone, since the stocks remained in the U.K. Have you ever tried firebombing in the desert, by the way? There's not a lot to burn out there, and if a tribesman takes a potshot, at you, with a rifle, he ceases to be a civilian. More Russian "truths," perhaps?
Check the 1940 photos, and you'll find London ablaze, thanks to German incendiaries. At the start of the war, the RAF was banned from dropping bombs on Germany, because it was seen as private property, so please let's have none of this nonsense that the RAF started it, and the poor misunderstood Germans were only retaliating.
My heart sank, today, when I saw, yet again, in a debate on bombers v nightfighters, Dresden being dragged out, as though it was some defining moment; the German generals might have known, by 13-2-45, that the war was as good as over, but, having been on the receiving end of the Bulge and Bodenplatte, the Allies never knew any such thing. As always, hindsight is 20:20.
It's funny, in a way, how few people know what really led the way, for the Allies, in the night skies, and the secret was so well kept that the Germans (and even the pilots) never found out. Infra-red was put to use, as an air-to-air recognition tool, and, for more than 30 years, no-one ever knew.
Edgar


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## stona (Oct 15, 2011)

Maybe 'huge' was not a good choice of word! Significant drag compared with a radar dish contained within a nose cone. I've stood under the Bf110G-4 at Hendon and the FuG 220 array is big! That aircraft doesn't carry the additional FuG 202.
Cheers
Steve


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## DonL (Oct 15, 2011)

> 6,627 kg. Me-410 empty weight. 2 x 1,750 hp engines.
> 6,600 kg. Ta-154 empty weight. 2 x 1,500 hp engines.





> hat would be fine if it were true but I doubt it is. The similiar size Me-410A had 500 more hp and didn't have radar aerials yet could achieve only 388mph.



It is true!!

The Ta 154 V1 achieved 700km/h with Jumo 211N at Rechlin without nightfighter equipment and ammo!
The top speed troped with full ammo and nightfighter equipment to 625 km/h

There were several tests with the V1, V3 and a A1 all with Jumo 211N engines!

Besides this, what has weight to do with top speed?
Weight has a minimal effect to top speed, aerodynamic is much more important. It's 90% aerodynamic and 10% weight.
Weight has effect on acceleration but not on top speed!


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## tomo pauk (Oct 15, 2011)

Hopefully it would be okay to start a new thread that would cover the politics high-brass doctrine? Or perhaps people should just refrain posting about those in this thread? 

Thankyou.


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

Let's do a comparison. 

How much speed did a 1943 British Mosquito night fighter lose due to weight of the radar equipment and additional electrical power requirements?


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## stona (Oct 15, 2011)

Edgar Brooks said:


> Check the 1940 photos, and you'll find London ablaze, thanks to German incendiaries.
> 
> Infra-red was put to use, as an air-to-air recognition tool, and, for more than 30 years, no-one ever knew.
> Edgar



Google St Paul's and you'll find the ultimate blitz photograph. 29/12/40,a U.S. reporter cabled his office 'the second great fire of London has begun'.
The Luftwaffe was indeed 'sowing the wind'.

There was a clever system by which an infra-red beam from an RAF night fighter would be received by a friendly bomber and prevent it's guns (at least the rear turret) from firing. I don't know if this ever became operational,nor can I remember where I read about it.

Steve


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

> It is true!!
> 
> The Ta 154 V1 achieved 700km/h with Jumo 211N at Rechlin without nightfighter equipment and ammo!
> The top speed troped with full ammo and nightfighter equipment to 625 km/h


If true the Ta-154 was faster then a British Mosquito. It's also faster then Spitfire V day fighters which formed the backbone of RAF Fighter Command right into 1944.

Pardon my skepticism but this sounds too good to be true. Can you produce historical RLM documentation to verify these claims?

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## Edgar Brooks (Oct 15, 2011)

stona said:


> There was a clever system by which an infra-red beam from an RAF night fighter would be received by a friendly bomber and prevent it's guns (at least the rear turret) from firing. I don't know if this ever became operational,nor can I remember where I read about it.


I haven't found any evidence of that, and I suspect it might be overegging the pudding a little. If you look at the bomb-aimer's cupola, on "S for Sugar," at Hendon, you'll see two black circles. These were set to signal the letter of the day, using infra-red, and the gunner had an infra-red sight attached to his guns; if a shape appeared behind him, flashing a particular letter, he didn't fire. Aircraft also had lights attached to their wings' trailing edges, and Mosquito nightfighters had a similar receiver in the cockpit; as one pilot put it,"If the wings were lit up, like a Christmas tree, by that sight, we left it alone."
One of my encyclopedias confirms the Ta 154 as having a maximum speed of 404mph (650kph.) It says that the whole thing was abandoned when an alternative adhesive (the original factory was bombed, and destroyed) reacted badly with the plywood, and two production aircraft had structural failure.
Edgar


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

*Ta-154A0.*
Fitted with FuG202 radar equipment and short radar antenna.
Powered by two 1,500hp Jumo211R engines.
385mph max speed.
This sounds believable. Speed similiar to Me-210C which was similiar in weight and engine power.

Nothing wrong with this performance. I would endorse the Ta-154 project provided two changes are made.
- Make the aircraft from aluminum which Germany has plenty of. We don't need problems associated with wood construction. 
- Power the aircraft with DB605 engines as the Daimler-Benz engine has additional HP increases on the horizon. The Jumo211 was a dead end by 1942.

I suspect an aluminum Ta-154 powered by DB605 engines would look a lot like a night fighter variant of the Me-210C. So the two prototypes would likely compete against each other for the contract. 

The considerably larger He-219 won't work as it requires more powerful DB603 or Jumo213 engines to achieve comparable performance. Those engines won't be available due to RLM decisions made during October 1935.


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## DonL (Oct 15, 2011)

Dave,

but you youre comparing apple with beans!

The Tank 154 A0 flew 385 mph as full equiped nightfighter (4x MK108 and 2x151/20) and FuG202.

The Me 210C flew 385mph as day fighter! No Me 210C will reach 385mph with full night fighter equipment!
Perhaps 580 km/h!

Edit:
And again: Weight don't effect top speed!

Why on earth could a Ju88 G6 achieve 625km/h as full equipped nightfighter?


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## Erich (Oct 15, 2011)

the log buchs of some I./NJG 3 pilots confirm the Ta 154 in use but the high rate of speed is not what you all have quoted not even close.......... again this tried and true NJG were not due to several factors impressed with the future bomber killer just like they were not for the He 219A.

Steve infra-red system was used in 1945 on Ju 88G-6's by the LW.

as to the speed of a Ju 88, yes with MW boost system


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

An Me-210C with a different fuselage designed specifically for the night fighter role would not be an Me-210C. It would be an entirely new aircraft model which shares wings and engines with the Me-210C. Subtract 7 knots for the radar antenna. But how much speed gets added back when we delete the bomb bay, dive brakes, strengthening required for dive bombing, rear firing 13mm MG barbettes etc?


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## DonL (Oct 15, 2011)

Erich,

to my informations the Ta 154 was in service at III/NJG 3 not I.


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## Ratsel (Oct 15, 2011)

Ju 88S was a high-speed bomber series based on Ju 88 A-4 but with ventral Bola gondola omitted, smoothly glazed nose and _GM-1 nitrous-oxide boost_, fastest of all variants. Now delete everything associated with bombing, and there yah go.. mosquito killer all day long.


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## davebender (Oct 15, 2011)

> delete everything associated with bombing, and there yah go.. mosquito killer all day long.


It's not quite that simple. You need radar equipment and weapons if you want to find and kill enemy aircraft at night. You also need to build at least 100 of these aircraft per month if you want to seriously hurt RAF Bomber Command.


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## michaelmaltby (Oct 15, 2011)

Seigfried - thanks for the analysis of radar. Interesting stuff. I don't claim that Britain invented radar - nor is *radar* the principle component of Britain's air defense planning -- back to the Zeppelins of WW1. I was thinking of much more - national mind set - as exemplified by this (for example): Listening for the Enemy: Giant Ears on the British Coast - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International

Is it easier to defend an island than a "patch" of territory not surrounded by a large "moat"? Well yes, I guess it is. That's why moats were invented isn't it.


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## Ratsel (Oct 15, 2011)

davebender said:


> It's not quite that simple. You need radar equipment and weapons if you want to find and kill enemy aircraft at night. You also need to build at least 100 of these aircraft per month if you want to seriously hurt RAF Bomber Command.


The Ju-88 already had the radar. Also, I would think it would be used in combination with other A/C.. every seen the Bf 109 with Neptune Radar?


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## Siegfried (Oct 15, 2011)

DonL said:


> The Ar240 showed very poor handling all her lifetime with three or four different prototypes with 3 different engines and was in a "permanent correction" to get a better handling. I doubt that the Ar 240 was a promising design, it was too much destroyer and light bomber then heavy fighter or night fighter.



Rudiger Kosin, who designed the Ar 240 and the Ar 440 as well as the Jet bomber the Ar 234 talks of some of the issues that confronted the Ar 240 in an essential book he wrote called "The German Fighter".

Basically a Fuhrer order when the battle of Poland and latter France started froze the resources to the project and directed them to productivity weapons for the immediate war effort.

Due to this the Ar 240 was starved of funds and the following requirements could not be met:

1 The contra-rotating engines, which had been planed from the start to ensure stabillity around the vertical and roll axis.
They were not supplied due to the restrictions
2 It had been designed to use flow through spinners for radiator cooling, this was not supplied so the aircraft ended up with propellers spinning in the same direction instead of opposite in large extension shafts (due to the wrong gearbox) which put the spinning propellers in the wrong spot. (latter fixed when Db603 and 605 engines fitted)

3 Basically the wing profile was poorly designed.

The Ar 440 seemed to fix all of these issues, the cabin was moved forward, the tail extended, wing span increased, new wing profile used larger DB603A engines used.

Notable with the A3 440 was its speed of 660kmh (410mph) with bomb racks and 670kmh (416mph) without. This was exceptional speed, much faster than the Me 410 though unlike the Me 410 it seems to lack a bomb bay so its penetration speed with bombs 'may' have been lower (it was 360mph for the Me 410)

The speed as a night fighter would have been useful though its high wing loading would require good runways and runway length, takeoff run became a huge issue for the Luftwaffe. It may also have suffered from lack of space issues as well.

It's hard to get passed the Junkers Ju 88. The Ju 88C was the first of the fighter series, the Ju 88R added BMW 801 and the G series improved the aerodynamics (tail size).

Getting a high power engine onto the Ju 88 as quickly as possible would seem the most sensible course. The Ju 88, like most German night fighters was slowed down by the use of external gun packs. These were important in that they kept gun shock away from the avionics and more importantly protected the pilots night vision from gun flash but perhaps it might have been possible to develop a cleaner installation.


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## Siegfried (Oct 15, 2011)

davebender said:


> German firms had magnetron patents during the 1930s. Were captured British magnetrons different then what they already had?



There are several types of Magnetron. The magnetron is a "diode" it only has two functional terminal (ignoring the heater). The basic type is the split anode magnetron invented by Habann of Jena IN 1924 based on a primitive magnetron developed by Hull of GE in 1922. The type Randall and Boot developed is the multicavity magnetron however this was known to the Germans, Russians and Japanese.

A basic vacuum tube diode has a heated cathode at the centre to boil of electrons and has a cylindrical positively charged anode surrounding the cathode to attract them. In a split anode magnetron the concentric anode cylinder is split and a magnetic field run down the axis. The electrons traveling out from the cathod to the anode are curled around by the magnetic field and interact with the anode segments to form a resonant effect. 

Another type is the mulitcavity magnetron, known as a 'rad' or 'wheel' magnetron to the Germans and Mandarin to the Japanese. In this the anode is metal and looks like say 8 or so cavities in the shape of say gear teeth or mandarin segments. French were using these to develop radar at the outset of WW2.

Randall and Boots magnetron had a very efficient cavity, it was a hole with narrow slots rather than relatively open mandarin are square gear tooth like segments.

The story goes that Randall frequented a second had book shops on Saturday afternoon, found a book on Hertz's experiments and a formula which gave the resonance of a loop of wire as 7.94 times its diameter. He wondered whether he could make the loop of wire 3 dimensional along with Boot and they came up with the idea of boring a hole and having narrow slots.

The British magnetron was actually based on a 6 shot revolver cylinder which had the correct dimensions for 9cm radiation (with minor adjustments) and was made on the same tooling. (9cm produced 15 degree beam width with a 75cm dish aerial, this is why 9cm was chosen as the beam was narrow enough to avoid sweeping the ground and till fit in a Mosquito or Beaufighter)

So it was the efficiency of this arrangement that was stunning.

The Japanese at systematically studied their 'mandarin' and 'chrysanthemum' multitcavity magnetrons and came up with exactly the same arrangement actually ahead of Randall and Boot about 1 year earlier. Their M3 magnetron of 10cm 10kW water cooled (glass envelop) magnetron was productionised as the M312 and used in the Type 22 radar in 1942 on the cruisers Ise and Hyugu in mid 1942. In 1943 it was in mass production and about 300 produced. Some were given extra side antennas for fire control. These radars only stayed in the Japanese Navy.

The Japanese moved much much slower than the British despite their primacy, some researchers were even arrested for buying the magnet materials on the black market! They never introduced PPI.

So the British innovations were:
1 efficient cavity configuration
2 later developed 'strapping' which quadrupled power (the Japanese also developed)
3 British immediately recognized the technical and tactical value of their invention and had the researchers to develop the receivers. This was unique.

They had taken 80 physicists before the war and introduced them to Chain Home so that they could be used if war broke out.

The Germans were fairly successful with their 50cm radars and were really left wanting for little till 1943 when Wurzburg was jammed by windows.

The Germans became obsessed with developing tunable magnetrons, also started to run out of resources to engineer new radars.

As I pointed out a 18kW 18cm magnetron is respectable and could have made a radar as is a 3.7cm tunable 4kW unit. In 1940 the Sanitas company had a 100W continuous wave 18cm magnetron that probably could have done about 4 kW in pulse mode. (power goes up with either number of cavities or magnet power) but they didn't recognized its potential.

There was one other factor. The Germans developed standard triodes to the max to the point they could produce microwaves at considerable power.

What prevents normal triodes (with a control grid between cathode and anode) from working at ultra high freqencies is
1 The transit time of the electrons between anode and cathod exceeds the period of the wavelength.
2 the leads become highly inductive and capacitive and block and short out high frequency signals.

To overcome 1 they developed techniques to get electrode gaps down to a few thousands of an inch.
To overcome 2 they made the whole tube in coaxial technology using anular electrode entering through ceramic seals.

These tubes could produce about 12kW, perhaps 18kw in a gas atmosphere) at 9cm, greater powers at higher wavelenghts.

The idea was to go to radars operating at about 25cm and 110kW. These radars were about 80% complete when they were suspended due to resource issues in 1942 though the 3m dish track locking Mannheim K radar did eventually get built for the German navy as a 1.5m dish version known as FuMO 231 Euklid FLAK radar (for German destroyers).

These disk triode tubes such as the LD6 are STILL in production and formed the backbone of soviet radar till 1970.

See here.

http://www.cdvandt.org/BIOS-30.pdf

If you can read German:

http://www.jogis-roehrenbude.de/Buecher/Hist_Leseprobe.pdf

See page 13 at the end of the page.

"So entstand bereits im Jahre 1940 ein Impulsmagnetron einer Leistung
von 18 kW bei 18...20 cm. Und bis 1942 schaffte man ohne Kenntnis des
späteren Beutegutes, des Rotterdam-Tastmagnetrons CV64, eine Eigenentwicklung für
4,5 cm/3 kW zu bauen, brach dann jedoch eine konsequente
Weiterentwicklung ab."


"The result was as early as 1940, a Impulse magnetron of power of 18
kW at 18 ... 20 cm. In 1942 they managed without the knowledge of the
later captured Rotterdam-magnetron CV64, developed a 4.5 cm / 3 kW but then
terminated from a logical development. "

From You can check Review article: Microwave tube development in Germany
from 1920-1945 by H. Döring. (Pay document unfortunately)


"The most important tube, the multi-cavity magnetron, was already in
existence in Germany in 1937. For example, Telefunken built an eight-cavity
magnetron operating at 1.5cm and capable of delivering 50mW ouput CW. At Sanitas
a water-cooled magnetron was developed to deliver I00W CW at 25cm. At
this time, such tubes were called 'Radmagnetron' ('Rad' meaning 'wheel' in
German). A tube developed in 1'938 at Lorenz A G by F. Herriger for a wavelength
of 8cm is shown in Fig. 18. However the advantages of this particular design
for pulse operation were not fully appreciated in Germany at the time."

A 100W CW can probably be produce to about 4kW impulse (1 microsecond or so) and greater if more powerful magnets or more cavities used.

Note: Lovell pointed out that the British almost canceled their magnetron work due to resource issues at the height of the battle of Britain.
http://rsnr.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/58/3/283.full.pdf

video of Bernard Lovell (H2S developer) talks about how the British magnetron was almost canceled !)
Bernard Lovell - A secret report by Hackenberg on the Cavity Magnetron - Web of Stories (Lovell talks about magnetron development and German knowledge of it)
Bernard Lovell - Differing attitudes towards science between Germany and the Allies - Web of Stories


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## Siegfried (Oct 15, 2011)

michaelmaltby said:


> Seigfried - thanks for the analysis of radar. Interesting stuff. I don't claim that Britain invented radar - nor is *radar* the principle component of Britain's air defense planning -- back to the Zeppelins of WW1. I was thinking of much more - national mind set - as exemplified by this (for example): Listening for the Enemy: Giant Ears on the British Coast - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International
> 
> Is it easier to defend an island than a "patch" of territory not surrounded by a large "moat"? Well yes, I guess it is. That's why moats were invented isn't it.



Yes, I realize you never made that claim.

The British of course were highly organized and Wattson Watt promoted a long wavelength technology that could be quickly introduced into service; this is what ensured Britain won the battle of Britain since a half implemented solution of better technology would have lost the battle for them. (the 1.5m stuff developed by the British Army for Coastal Artillery eventually became Chain Home Low and almost could have matched CH into service). It seems the German Navy was on the ball ahead of the Luftwaffe.

The introduction of 80 Physicists to Chain Home radar prior to the war to ensure an adequate R+D potential was of course also critical to British success.


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## michaelmaltby (Oct 16, 2011)

"...The introduction of 80 Physicists to Chain Home radar prior to the war to ensure an adequate R+D potential was of course also critical to British success."



MM


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## davebender (Oct 16, 2011)

The He-219 night fighter was effective and well liked. Historically the program was hamstrung as this relatively large aircraft required relatively powerful DB603 engines that were in short supply. Consequently historical production numbers were tiny.

11 He-219 produced during 1943.
195 He-219 produced during 1944.

But what if RLM were convinced to produce the Me-210C light bomber (DB605 engines) ILO the Me-410A (DB603 engines)? This would free up additional DB603 engines for the He-219 program.

291 Me-410A produced during 1943.
722 Me-410A produced during 1944.

*Possible He-219 production.*
302 during 1943. ILO the historical 11.
917 during 1944. ILO the historical 195.

1,000 additional He-219 night fighter aircraft produced during 1943 to 1944 won’t completely solve the problem but I think their presence would be felt by RAF Bomber Command.

As for the Me-410A, most were used as bomber interceptors rather then their design role of light bomber. I doubt anyone would notice if they were replaced with Me-210Cs.


BTW, great information on the magnetron. Makes my head spin but I'm glad we have techno geeks who understand this stuff.


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## tomo pauk (Oct 16, 2011)

Many thanks indeed


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## Erich (Oct 16, 2011)

The He 219 was well liked by I./NJG 1 only. NJG 3 were not impressed and nor was NJGr 10 even into 1945 with the Stab.

Having built more Uhu's would not of effected anything, most likely building existing Ju 88G-6's would have as it could carry more electronics and had the additional rear arms and tail warning radar as standard which the Uhu did not.


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## davebender (Oct 16, 2011)

11,200 kg. He-219A7 empty weight.
13,109 kg. Ju-88G7 empty weight

I think the purpose built and lighter in weight He-219 night fighter would be inheritly superior to the Ju-88G light bomber if both aircraft have the same engines and electronic equipment. But perhaps not superior enough to justify placing a new aircraft type into production.

In any case there will not be enough DB603 and Jumo213 engines for the entire night fighter force before 1945. So we still need a DB605 powered night fighter to bulk out operational numbers.

What about upgrades to the existing Me-110G? Perhaps new wings and a new nose similiar to the Me-210C would increase speed a bit. GM-1 might be useful for catching high flying RAF Bomber Command pathfinder aircraft.


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## The Basket (Oct 16, 2011)

If given 18 months or even 2 years there isnt much that can be done. Cant develop a new machine so would build up numbers of Bf 110s or Ju 88s and train crews.

One idea is to build a light nimber single engined 2 seater that can be used on Wilde Sau missions. Enough performance to take on the bombers which would be no big deal and enough endurance to stay aloft. A German Defiant with the rear gunner as a navigator. Or maybe a two seat version of the 109 Emil.


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## tomo pauk (Oct 16, 2011)

Like the German Defiant idea


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## The Basket (Oct 16, 2011)

The He 118 would have been a great starting point. 

The Yokosuka D4Y had great performance for a large machine and the 118 was very similar.


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## davebender (Oct 16, 2011)

Doesn't 1942 Germany have enough problems already? 8)


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## johnbr (Oct 16, 2011)

Remember the He 219 was designed for the Ju-222 engine.


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## The Basket (Oct 16, 2011)

davebender said:


> Doesn't 1942 Germany have enough problems already? 8)



The Defiant was the most successful night fighter of the 40-41 period in RAF service. That may have been worth copying if I was looking for ideas.


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## davebender (Oct 16, 2011)

920 kg. DB603A engine. 1,750 hp. 1,900 hp for version using C3 fuel.
1,088 kg. Jumo222A engine. 2,465 hp.

Perhaps a bit of airframe weight can be trimmed if the He-219 is designed for the smaller and less powerful DB603 engine. Power to weight ratio is still as good or better then the highly regarded Ju-88G.


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## pbfoot (Oct 16, 2011)

The Basket said:


> The Defiant was the most successful night fighter of the 40-41 period in RAF service. That may have been worth copying if I was looking for ideas.


Thats not saying much ,IIRc and I may be very wrong but they had next nothing in kills , a single digit number I believe


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## vanir (Oct 17, 2011)

The RAF had little in the way of night fighters because right up to that point the universal doctrine was fast day bombers in europe. The British-German air war got literally chased into the night skies by attrition, not by choice, the Luftwaffe simply didn't have the aircrews let alone the industry to waste on continuing a daylight campaign.

So nightfighters were a novelty that suddenly turned deadly serious overnight. For the RAF in 1940-41 they were smack in the middle of a panic and were still ramping up and refining Hurri and Spit production, most of these didn't have self sealing tanks and only just got bullet proof windshields, a good number were still using watts props including all the overseas hurricane squadrons, whilst reserve units were things like Gloster Gladiators.

The Air Ministry had just made some recent, massive errors in judgement which included series production using limited resources of superfluous aircraft types. It had stockpiles of Fairey Battles, Boulton Paul Defiants and scores of other models produced in limited, but significant numbers that were victims of the changing technological battlefield. These aircraft no longer had the mission survivability for daylight operations in enemy territory, the Luftwaffe had gone and put Messers in every damn fighter squadron in record time. These aircraft were designed for a world where this would've taken ten years to do.

So the RAF just had a lot of useless obsolete models laying around by the squadron, too obsolete to use and too expensive to scrap given replacing them took time. So I wouldn't call the Defiant a successful nightfighter so much as an available one. By early 1942 there were enough surplus day fighter production that Hurri II's could be used and they were welcomed, but night fliers were all holding their breath until things like the Beaufighter came onto the scene, when was that, 1943 before the RAF had any dedicated night fighters? It would make sense that would be the same year it was really picking up pace in Germany.

Hey in 1941 everybody went paranoid over 30 bombers, 300 were "as far as the eye can see" whilst fast forward to 1945 and Brandenburg saw something 5000 sorties in one afternoon from one soviet air army. There were three in the vicinity.

The scope of warfare changes so much through the war that it's like lots of different wars inside one big war.


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## The Basket (Oct 17, 2011)

The Bf 110 was not a good nightfighger either. It was available. And you can wait for the Me 262 to appear or build something now.

If your prey is big and slow then you dont need a jet...just a 20mm cannon and docile handling and you're going to get kills.


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## The Basket (Oct 17, 2011)

About obsolete and bad ideas then everything from the 1930s would be obsolete. The Spitfire would have been hopeless if the prototype had been the main fighter in 1942. The Bf 109B would have been not much either.

109B bad idea 109F good idea and yet same concept same name. Had the B-29 flown against jets in ww2 then it would also have been shown as obsolete in short order. One can argue had the Defiant been developed in the same way then it would have been a better machine rather than the dead end it became.


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## stona (Oct 17, 2011)

The Basket said:


> The Defiant was the most successful night fighter of the 40-41 period in RAF service. That may have been worth copying if I was looking for ideas.



That's not saying much. It was the complete inability of the RAF to make night time interceptions that cost Dowding his job.
Cheers
Steve


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## The Basket (Oct 17, 2011)

stona said:


> That's not saying much. It was the complete inability of the RAF to make night time interceptions that cost Dowding his job.
> Cheers
> Steve


 Not quite.


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## riacrato (Oct 17, 2011)

The Basket said:


> About obsolete and bad ideas then everything from the 1930s would be obsolete. The Spitfire would have been hopeless if the prototype had been the main fighter in 1942. The Bf 109B would have been not much either.
> 
> 109B bad idea 109F good idea and yet same concept same name. Had the B-29 flown against jets in ww2 then it would also have been shown as obsolete in short order. One can argue had the Defiant been developed in the same way then it would have been a better machine rather than the dead end it became.


 
I don't understand your logic, the Spitfire prototype was very good compared to its contemporaries as was the Bf 109B. The Defiant was a modern incarnation of a WW1 concept that was outclassed by its contemporaries in its original role.

The Bf 110 was eventually unsucessful in its original role, though not as severly as the Defiant. It became a very decent nightfighter (by chance) that above all had the room for a three men crew, heavy forward armament and radio equipment all the while remaining faster than the bomber it needed to intercept and retaining a decent range. This changed over the course of the war as armament and equipment had to me made deadlier and heavier and enemy bombers faster. The defiant, being single engined and much smaller, probably bumped against limitations much earlier, though I'm not an expert.


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## Edgar Brooks (Oct 17, 2011)

stona said:


> It was the complete inability of the RAF to make night time interceptions that cost Dowding his job.


That's a bit of an over-simplification; it was the wild over-claiming of 12 Group's "Big Wing," plus the connivance of Sholto-Douglas with Leigh-Mallory, coupled with Dowding having worked way past his retirement, leaving him utterly exhausted.


> but night fliers were all holding their breath until things like the Beaufighter came onto the scene, when was that, 1943 before the RAF had any dedicated night fighters?


No, the first NF Mosquitoes went into action 27-4-42, and Blenheim fighters were trialling A.I. equipment in late 1940. The Beaufighter entered service in 1940, with Bob Braham getting his first night kill (a Dornier,) in one, 13-3-41. 
The night sky is a big, black empty space, and, without decent equipment, it's impossible to get close enough to any aircraft, and carry out an adquate recognition, then shoot it down, without the other pilot seeing you, and disappearing off in a corkscrew dive.


> Hey in 1941 everybody went paranoid over 30 bombers,


So would you, if you were on the receiving end of 30 bomb loads.
Edgar


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## stona (Oct 17, 2011)

Edgar Brooks said:


> That's a bit of an over-simplification; it was the wild over-claiming of 12 Group's "Big Wing," plus the connivance of Sholto-Douglas with Leigh-Mallory, coupled with Dowding having worked way past his retirement, leaving him utterly exhausted.
> Edgar



I'm aware of that and of course his successor did no better,how could he with the technology available? The night sky is indeed very big and very black.
The inability of the RAF to afford any effective protection from the Luftwaffe at night was the single biggest piece of ammunition that the Douglas/Mallory/et alter clique had to help them remove Dowding. There were many at the Air Ministry who had,politely,a minimal grasp of the complexities of air fighting,particularly at night. They could be easily convinced that Dowding was falling down on the job.

Cheers
Steve


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## Siegfried (Oct 17, 2011)

The Basket said:


> The Bf 110 was not a good nightfighger either. It was available. And you can wait for the Me 262 to appear or build something now.
> 
> If your prey is big and slow then you dont need a jet...just a 20mm cannon and docile handling and you're going to get kills.



The Bf 110 was actually fulfilling its original specification.  The Bf 110 had good handling, one thing important for night takeoff and landings.

The "Zerstorer" concept was for the following roles
1 heavy fighter bomber to straff up and bomb aerodromes before defensive fighters could be launched prior to level bombers destroying the aerodrome.
2 heavy fighter to shoot down enemy bombers over own territory using heavy fire power.
3 bad weather fighter (which covers night fighter)

When the Bf 110 was used as an escort fighter it was operating outside of its role, which is why it got creamed unless dealing with slower aircraft. Kurt Tank developed the FW 187 as a lighter twin engined fighter able to mix it with single engined aircraft in terms of maneuverability, climb and acceleration but possibly likely faster and longer ranged, sort of like the Whirlind. The Luftwaffe didn't get the concept: it was prone to economizing by specifying aircraft into multi-role combat aircraft.

Once radar was fitted and a 3rd crew member, (who couldn't escape if the rear gunner was stuck in his seat) the Me 110 started to become barely adequate, poor as you say.

A Wurzburg Giant could measure range to 25-40m accuracy and 0.15 degrees so could guide a radar less fighter to within about 50m. Accuracy was a little less in the elevation plane if the beam was close to the ground.


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## Siegfried (Oct 17, 2011)

davebender said:


> The He-219 night fighter was effective and well liked. Historically the program was hamstrung as this relatively large aircraft required relatively powerful DB603 engines that were in short supply. Consequently historical production numbers were tiny.
> 
> As for the Me-410A, most were used as bomber interceptors rather then their design role of light bomber. I doubt anyone would notice if they were replaced with Me-210Cs.
> 
> ...



The He 219 with DB603A engine seems to have been regarded as somewhat underpowered though it was apparently the only Luftwaffe night fighter that could climb out after a single engine failure, presumably it had a higher wing loading than the Ju 88G6.

Your analysis basically says the Luftwaffe is stuffed without more high power engines. The Ju 88C and Ju 88R soldiered on with Jumo 211 engine although both were supposed to receive the BMW 801. The Ju 88G only appeared in 1943 yet the Ju 188E (BMW 801) and Ju 188A (Jumo 213A) both appeared in the first half of 1942, this introduced the bigger wings, ailerons and rudder to better handle the extra power that was used in the Ju 88S and Ju 88G.

The Jumo 211 didn't end up to bad, the versions with a pressurized coolant circuit, cropper supercharger and inter-cooler outperformed the DB605, at least at low altitude.

The only solution I see it engineer a highly streamlined aircraft.

I have been studying the German radar situation for years and have quite a library. Had the Germans decided to produce a microwave radar operating down to around 11cm and likely 9cm they could have done so by about the middle of 1943. The fact however is that both Telefunken and Lorentz (a great company never properly supported) put their work on the back burner when they were close to fielding 25cm devices. The technology could have been extended to around 10cm. It would be achieve to effectively downscale a 54cm wavelength Wurzburg with a 3m dish down to a 13.5cm. It would be in service around the time of SN-2, about 5 months after the Germans would have discovered the allied magnetron (a more powerfull device)
wavelength radar with a 75cm dish to produce a passable radar in a dome. 


Here is some info on the DB603:


In german but you can used google translate:
Do335 Flugleistungen
chart of DB603 engines vs altitude:
Db-603 Engines Comment for Myspace, Twitter, Facebook

Here are figures for the earlier engines:

DB 603A. Length: 2610mm, Height: 1167mm, Width: 830mm. (B4 fuel)
At sea level.
T/off and emergency (3'): 1750PS, 2700rpm, 1.4ata, 570l/h
Climb and combat (30'): 1580PS, 2500rpm, 1.3ata, 460l/h
At critical altitude of 5.7km
Emergency (3'): 1620PS, 2700rpm, 1.4ata, 530l/h
Climb and combat (30'): 1510PS, 2500rpm, 1.3ata, 460l/h
Emergency power at 10km: 950PS, 2700rpm, .85ata

DB 603AA. Length: 2610mm, Height: 1167mm, Width: 830mm (B4 fuel)
At sea level.

T/off and emergency: 1670PS, 2700rpm, 1.4ata, 550l/h
Climb and combat: 1580PS, 2500rpm, 1.3ata, 460l/h
At critical altitude of 7.3km (emergency), and 7.2km (climb and
combat)
Emergency: 1450PS, 2700rpm, 1.4ata, 480l/h
Climb and combat: 1370PS, 2500rpm, 1.3ata, 440l/h
Emergency power at 10km: 1020PS, 2700rpm.

DB 603E. Length: 2706mm, Height: 1167mm, Width: 830mm (B4 fuel)
At sea level.
T/off and emergency: 1800PS, 2700rpm, 1.48ata, 580l/h
Climb and combat: 1575PS, 2500rpm, 1.35ata, 490l/h
At critical altitude of 7.0km (emergency), and 7.1km (climb and
combat)
Emergency: 1550PS, 2700rpm, 1.48ata, 510l/h
Climb and combat: 1430PS, 2500rpm, 1.35ata, 460l/h
Emergency power at 10km: 1060PS, 2700rpm.

I don't believe the DB603 ever operated with MW-50 or C3.

At one point the Ta 152C was supposed to operate with the DB603EM with C3 and MW50 with a power of 2260hp, fuel worried forced a change to the DB603LA with two speed supercharger but operating of B4. The DB603L was C3 optimized I think.

The DB603G was apparently never produced.


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## davebender (Oct 17, 2011)

With the possible exception of the Ju-88, I suspect Me-110s have shot down more enemy aircraft at night then any other aircraft type. Just think what it could have accomplished if it was a "good nightfighter".


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## jim (Oct 17, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> The He 219 with DB603A engine seems to have been regarded as somewhat underpowered though it was apparently the only Luftwaffe night fighter that could climb out after a single engine failure, presumably it had a higher wing loading than the Ju 88G6.
> 
> Your analysis basically says the Luftwaffe is stuffed without more high power engines. The Ju 88C and Ju 88R soldiered on with Jumo 211 engine although both were supposed to receive the BMW 801. The Ju 88G only appeared in 1943 yet the Ju 188E (BMW 801) and Ju 188A (Jumo 213A) both appeared in the first half of 1942, this introduced the bigger wings, ailerons and rudder to better handle the extra power that was used in the Ju 88S and Ju 88G.
> 
> ...


 
Mr Siegfried
I had located the links that you provided 2-3 years ago. It provides performance figures for the Db 603 that i have never met anywhere else, in any book. For example Hermann s Ta 152 gives Db 603LA as 2100 with Mw50 . Yet only with such figures the heavy Ta 152C airframes would have adequate performance. So it makes sence. I think Ta 152C V6 flew with Db603 EB reaching 617 km/h. So theres some confusion about the Db603.
I agree about Mw50, I have never read about Db 603 using Mw 50 in service and that gives Jumo 213 an edge for late 44. And its bizarre because 605 used it from early spring 44. Without ADI all german engines in 44 are simplyy not competitive in west.
It s trully beyond logic the desicions of Luftwaffe. Could have Fw 190 +Db 603 + C3 in service from early 43, could have Ju 88s airframe from 1939 + BMW 801 since 42, could have an unstopable for the eastern front standards attack aircraft (ME410) from early 43, a powrfull night ju 88 from 43 , not to mention Fw 187 still available in 42. It seems that early in war could not even understand the benefits of streamlining! Could anyone explain why Ju 88 A nose had such a druggy shape? Or the psihosis with the gondolas! Or all the development work for the Ju 188 that resulted in mediocre improvement in performance over standart JU88 bombers ( which were kept in paralel production!)


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## Erich (Oct 17, 2011)

interesting thought process Jim and not surprising, why the Ju 88 had such a non streamlined nose and so blunt, though that was to be rectified with the AI within a wooden nose cone short and long, and very smooth the same would of applied to the Me 262 with advance d form of AI a long snoot the 262 would change to be a long profiled fighter jet had it been available in 45-46. the Ta 152 under documentation which I have copies of would indeed been used as a possible S/E Nachtjäger. the altitude and performance of speed indicated so, whether it would of been searchlight or radio-ground control single radar equipped is of question........one can wonder with newer stealth products being developed had the Ta 152 seen service in radar-less paint coating's ?

and yes Dave the Bf 110G-4 scored more night kills than any LW fighter primarily with the famous NJG 1. but as pilots switched from the outdated unit to the upgraded Ju 88G-6, NJG 1 stuck with the Bf 110G except for He 219 I. gruppe. a mix of 110's and Ju's in NJG 6 at wars end and a few left overs in NJG 4.


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## The Basket (Oct 17, 2011)

The Bf 110 ticked the boxes for a nightfighter but it became marginal at the higher weights and had no single engine performance. 

It was available when it was needed and filled a gap. To my knowledge night combat was never a design configuration for the 110 and only the Black Widow was designed as a njghtfighter.

Dowding was removed because he didn't play the game. Being good is no substitute to being popular.


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## davebender (Oct 17, 2011)

Isn't that what counts most? 

For example the P-51H was technically excellent but entered service too late for WWII and was obsolete by the Korean War. 

The German Type XXI submarine was technically excellent and produced in large numbers but it entered service too late to matter. 

The British Comet Tank was a fine 33 ton medium tank but entered service too late to participate in any major WWII battles. By the Korean War it had already been eclipsed by the larger Centurian Tank. 

The German Me-262 jet fighter didn't enter service in Jagdgeschwader strength until mid March 1945. Too late to matter.

What if the above weapons had been in service a couple years earlier when they were badly needed?


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## vanir (Oct 17, 2011)

DB-603G was definitely produced in limited numbers for testing, most of the Ta152 series 1943 and 44 testing used them. The EC was added later in the year and the LA was finally ready in early 45, the 617km/h V6 did that at tree top height over the airfield with an EC motor (C3/MW50 1.95ata). The Ta152C was never going to be fitted with the E in service, just the L but the requirement was for B4 so they modded it to the LA. It's the same difference between the 213E and F, you'd use the L in a lighter Dora airframe as a hotrod.

Lots of things changed between Nov44-Feb45 about the Ta152C production series trim proposal (C-1 and C-3 variants were ratified and tooling delivered Apr45, there is no question about their mass production had the war continued, where most other proposals were pipe dreams). One thing which remained though was it was since late 1943 always going to use either the Jumo 213E or the 603L. The Dora-14/15 was a late call revision of the D-11/12/13 since the RLM now wanted to use the Daimler motor for them, hence the redesignation. They hadn't decided which 603 they were going to use in those.


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## davebender (Oct 17, 2011)

Give Germany another year and the massive Ostmark engine plant becomes a factor. When fully complete it was designed to produce 1,000 aircraft engines per month. Originally tooled for the Jumo222 V-24, the plant was re-tooled for the DB603 V-12 during 1943. 

With production numbers that large I expect Dr. Tank would finally get the DB603 engines he has wanted for the Fw-190 program since 1937. Not that it makes much difference as the Me-262 would be operational in Jagdgeschwader strength by April 1945.


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## tyrodtom (Oct 17, 2011)

Where would Germany be getting it's fuel a year later? Did they have any possibility of holding on to the Romanian oil , or could they ramp up synthectic production enough?

If they had been able to hold out another 6 months, that would have probably just made them the receivers of our first atomic bombs.


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## krieghund (Oct 17, 2011)

davebender said:


> Isn't that what counts most?
> 
> For example the P-51H was technically excellent but entered service too late for WWII and was obsolete by the Korean War.
> 
> ...



Exactly and what about the F8F-1


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## davebender (Oct 17, 2011)

If Germany is holding out into 1946 I've got to assume the Allies have done worse then historical. The synthetic fuel plants are probably still operational and the Soviet offensive has probably stalled out east of Poland and Romania. This has allowed Germany to shift enough forces west to establish a solid defense in eastern France. Perhaps along the Meuse River, taking advantage of all the WWI era fortifications.

Of course this is all speculation.


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## michaelmaltby (Oct 18, 2011)

"... If they had been able to hold out another 6 months, that would have probably just made them the receivers of our first atomic bombs"

I am sceptical. Do you have any source for use of Atomic weapons in Europe in 1945?


MM


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## stona (Oct 18, 2011)

The Basket said:


> Dowding was removed because he didn't play the game. Being good is no substitute to being popular.



He could play the game alright,you don't rise to his rank if you can't. He made enemies in high places Freeman,Salmond,Sinclair,Douglas,even Trenchard (whom he had rubbed up the wrong way years previously). Often it was his own fault. Even the Vice-Chief of the Naval Staff,Admiral Tom Phillips,had a stab at Dowding over the RAF's inability to counter night attacks!
When the head of Middle East Air Command (Longmore) was sacked in May 1941 Churchill proposed Dowding for the job. The Air Ministry quite rightly rejected him and promoted Longmore's deputy Tedder who turned out to be an outstanding commander. Dowding,for the reasons alluded to in Edgar's earlier post,was done by now.Churchill took the Ministries advice,though he always remained personally loyal to Dowding.
I have always been one of Dowding's biggest fans,but I am also a realist.
Cheers
Steve


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## davebender (Oct 18, 2011)

How could there be? The war in Europe ended before President Truman knew the atomic bomb existed.

From the American perspective atomic bombs were just one more weapons system to be used. If central Europe remains free of Soviet occupation during August 1945 then using atomic bombs against Germany becomes possible. It is not by any means certain. Perhaps we will be deterred by German threats of reprisal with their weapon of mass destruction - nerve gas delivered by V2 rockets or jet bombers. If deterrence doesn't work then Europe, including Britain, will become a very nasty place to live during the fall of 1945.


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## michaelmaltby (Oct 18, 2011)

".... If deterrence doesn't work then Europe, including Britain, will become a very nasty place to live during the fall of 1945."

Which is why I am skeptical about the use of the bomb in any circumstances in 1945.

"deterrence" is not really an active war policy in WW2. The closest example is nerve gas and both sides had experience with that already and didn't want to repeat historical mis-steps. "deterrence" becomes a real option when both the Soviets and America have enough bombs to kill each other several times over - and is best described as MAD.

The bomb was a surprise to Japan in August 1945. It would have been a surprise to the Germans in January - August 1945. 
The Allies were demanding unconditional surrender from both Germany and Japan. The Germans were defeated after the Ardennes Offensive, December 1944. Troops were across the Rhine shortly afterwards. In the Pacific, Japan was anything but defeated and as Okinawa proved, the people were prepared to die en masse rather than yield to defeat.

MM


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## Erich (Oct 18, 2011)

Gentlemen

shall we get back on topic..........please


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## davebender (Oct 18, 2011)

Requires an earlier start date (say 1939) but I agree the He-118 had potential as an inexpensive German night fighter. The bomb bay would become an equipment bay for radar gear. Nicely streamlined and relatively light in weight. Could probably achieve 350 mph with a DB601 or Jumo211 engine producing at least 1,350 hp. Fuel capacity might be the achilles heel. I have no idea how much it carried internally.


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## Edgar Brooks (Oct 18, 2011)

vanir said:


> For the RAF in 1940-41 they were smack in the middle of a panic and were still ramping up and refining Hurri and Spit production, most of these didn't have self sealing tanks and only just got bullet proof windshields, a good number were still using watts props including all the overseas hurricane squadrons, whilst reserve units were things like Gloster Gladiators.


Only the Hurricane's fuselage tanks weren't self-sealing, which is why they burnt so many of their pilots; Spitfire tanks were always self-sealing.
Hurricanes got bullet-proof windshields while still in France; Spitfires got them during the Dunkirk evacuation.
Hurricanes could not have armour plate fitted behind the pilot, unless the two-blade prop was ditched, and the armour was fitted while they were in France. No Spitfires, with two-blade props (none of which were Watts type, Supermarine made their own) were in service in 1940, and de Havilland converted all airframes to take their constant-speed 3-blade prop just before the Battle of Britain started.
There were no reserve units, all Squadrons had a part to play, with exhausted Squadrons sent north, to rest and rebuild, before coming south again to swap with others. There was only one Gladiator Squadron, during the Battle, 247, which was based at St. Eval, in Cornwall, out of the reach of the 109s.


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## davebender (Oct 18, 2011)

Should be a favorite of British forum members at it looks so much like their Mosquito. 8)

*Hs-127 Prototype.*
Henschel Hs 127 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
5,000 kg empty weight. Relatively light. Of course this will increase some with weapons and other such equipment.
353 mph max speed. Achieved with 2 x 850 hp DB600 engines. Very fast for so little engine power.



> In May 1938, the contract for Hs 127 development was cancelled by the RLM and the third prototype was not finished.


*Point of departure.*
May 1938. 
RLM offers Henschel a contract to complete the third Hs-127 prototype as a purpose built night fighter. This is in response to the growth of RAF Bomber Command.

Any possibilities for the Hs-127 as a purpose built night fighter?


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## pbfoot (Oct 18, 2011)

Edgar Brooks said:


> Only the Hurricane's fuselage tanks weren't self-sealing, which is why they burnt so many of their pilots; Spitfire tanks were always self-sealing.
> .


I believe the tank in the fuselage aft of the engine was not self sealing in the Spit.


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## The Basket (Oct 19, 2011)

In reality the Bf 110 is the only game in town. So kinda sorts that one.

Have to use an existing machine in full production and make the best of it. Otherwise it takes too long and the battle is finished even before you started. Load it up and hope it still has a little left in reserve. The 110 was on its last legs anyway so it fitted the bill nicely.

Even with the best detective work and knowledge...still would end up with an overloaded 110 as you play the cards your dealt.


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## stona (Oct 19, 2011)

pbfoot said:


> I believe the tank in the fuselage aft of the engine was not self sealing in the Spit.



Two tanks actually. Lower one with an exterior self-sealing coating,upper one protected by light aluminium armour and coated internally with fire retardant 'Linatex' which was a sort of rubberised self sealant. Linatex is still used today as target backing curtains on many shooting ranges.
I think the cockpit bulkhead was fire proofed too. Edgar will know more.
Cheers
Steve


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## Edgar Brooks (Oct 19, 2011)

stona said:


> I think the cockpit bulkhead was fire proofed too. Edgar will know more.


You flatter me, slightly; the fireproof bulkhead was not introduced until August, 1941 (which comes from the Vickers Spitfire modifications ledger.)
Edgar


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## pbfoot (Oct 19, 2011)

stona said:


> Two tanks actually. Lower one with an exterior self-sealing coating,upper one protected by light aluminium armour and coated internally with fire retardant 'Linatex' which was a sort of rubberised self sealant. Linatex is still used today as target backing curtains on many shooting ranges.
> I think the cockpit bulkhead was fire proofed too. Edgar will know more.
> Cheers
> Steve


Yep I'm aware of the 2 tanks but in a quest to answer a question posed to me about the Spit I was involved with , the upper was never self sealed the main reason being IIRC it would have required altering or expanding fuselage hence the firewall was designed to prevent fuel from entering cockpit if tank was punctured


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## stona (Oct 19, 2011)

I'm no expert,I'm just repeating what I've read. Maybe the fit issue was why it was an internal application of the Linatex on the upper tank.
Cheers
Steve


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## davebender (Oct 19, 2011)

The Me-210C will be production ready by August 1942. And the production line was all tooled up. 

Germany made a two seat pilot trainer version of the Fw-190A in limited numbers. The student cockpit position could be converted into a radar operator position. You cannot carry as much electronic equipment as a larger aircraft but the Fw-190 costs only about half as much as the Me-110. 

The proposed Me-109Z could be produced as a night fighter. Personally I have my doubts as the Me-109 cockpit was so small. You could probably carry as much radar equipment in the two seat Fw-190.

What about the Fw-189 airframe? It has plenty of space for radar equipment. Max speed was 217 mph when powered by two 465 hp engines. Can it be modified to use more powerful engines such a the 700hp Gnome-Rhône 14M or 950hp BMW132?

What about the Potez 630 which remained in Vichy French production under German control? Replace the 700 hp engines with something more powerful and you might have a 350mph aircraft. As icing on the cake you take advantage of production in France.


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## stona (Oct 19, 2011)

davebender said:


> Germany made a two seat pilot trainer version of the Fw-190A in limited numbers. The student cockpit position could be converted into a radar operator position. You cannot carry as much electronic equipment as a larger aircraft but the Fw-190 costs only about half as much as the Me-110.



The student actually sat in the front and the instructor in the extra,aft,cockpit at a second set of controls in the Fw190S. There's not much room in the back!






They did try the Fw190A-6 with the FuG 217 as a single seat nightfighter. The radar scope went in place of the ammunition counters on the instrument panel but nothing came of it.
I think the Me210 was probably most promising but of course in reality there was a huge,38,000,000 Reich Mark, **** up with the early production versions.
Cheers
Steve


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## Erich (Oct 19, 2011)

you do not need radar for a LW S/E that was already proven NJG 11 used nothing in late 44-45 on the Bf 109G-14/AS and G-10 of their unit.

Earlier applications look to JG 300 and 301 use of the 109G-6. there was enough down to the ground light from fires to illuminate BC nightly.


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## Edgar Brooks (Oct 19, 2011)

> Yep I'm aware of the 2 tanks but in a quest to answer a question posed to me about the Spit I was involved with , the upper was never self sealed the main reason being IIRC it would have required altering or expanding fuselage hence the firewall was designed to prevent fuel from entering cockpit if tank was punctured


I don't know the significance (I'm no engineer,) but modification 450 was "To delete (A)stack pipe from top fuel tank (B) feed pipe from top tank to bottom tank (C) top **** assembly," and 511 was "To make provision for G type negative carburettor." When rear tanks, plus droptanks, were envisaged on the Mk.IX (and that looks like a Merlin 60-series header tank on the left edge of the photo,) it was sometimes practice to pressurise the whole system, to stop airlocks during changeover(s,) and I see that there's mention of a de-aerator, which was used on some of the Merlin 66 (maybe the 70) engines, with Bendix Stromberg carburettors.
Edgar
Apparently the site's inbuilt censor has decided that the "top **** assembly," being a four-letter word c--k, is too strong for your delicate eyes.


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## tomo pauk (Oct 19, 2011)

davebender said:


> The Me-210C will be production ready by August 1942. And the production line was all tooled up.
> 
> Germany made a two seat pilot trainer version of the Fw-190A in limited numbers. The student cockpit position could be converted into a radar operator position. You cannot carry as much electronic equipment as a larger aircraft but the Fw-190 costs only about half as much as the Me-110.
> 
> ...



The Potez 630 with (I presume) DB-60x seems like a fast plane. A fresh proposal, I admit.


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## davebender (Oct 19, 2011)

IMO this is the right idea but it's installed on the wrong aerial platform. A Fw-190 requires a full time pilot, especially when flying at night. WWII era AI radar and night navigation equipment requires a full time operator. 

Install this system on a two seat Fw-190A and it will be a lot more effective. It's also probably the least expensive German night fighter option. Why not establish a Gruppe of two seat Fw-190A night fighters and see if the concept works? If it doesn't work the experiment has cost Germany very little. But if it does work the Fw-190A night fighter aircraft can be placed into mass production with little effort.


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## Edgar Brooks (Oct 19, 2011)

The Air Ministry tried a radar set-up/nightfighter in a Typhoon, but it didn't work with the one man having far too much to do, so they stayed with the two-handed Beaufighter and Mosquito.


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## davebender (Oct 19, 2011)

Amiot 354 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


> With the fall of Paris in June 1940, Amiot and 3000 of his workers headed south, to the unoccupied zone, where he established a new factory at Marseilles. During the war, Amiot co-operated with the German occupiers to protect his interests, and those of the exiled Wertheimers, then working in the United States. Amiot became a subcontractor for the Junkers company, building 370 aircraft.



The Amiot 354 factory was located in Paris. How much damage was done to production tooling by the retreating French Army? Probably no worse then bomb damage done to German aircraft factories. And Germany was getting pretty good at repairing such damage by 1942. 

The 3,000 Amiot workers in Marseilles are probably getting homesick for Paris. Offer them a 50% pay raise if they will help get the bomber plant back into production. That's a higher priorty then building components for Ju-52 transport aircraft.

Replace the 1,060 hp Gnome-Rhone engines with 1,475 hp DB605 engines. I suspect that would give the Amiot 354 acceptable aerial performance.


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## Erich (Oct 19, 2011)

JG 301 flew Fw 190A-4's with underwing fuel tanks, it still was not enough to get them all over Reich airspace when engaging BC and that was the real issue for a S/E they were of course needed for day ops the T/E could hold their own but never enough equipment.


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## davebender (Oct 19, 2011)

> JG 301 flew Fw 190A-4's with underwing fuel tanks, it still was not enough to get them all over Reich airspace when engaging BC and that was the real issue for a S/E they were of course needed for day ops the T/E could hold their own but never enough equipment.


That situation must be avoided as military aircraft require considerable maintenance. Night fighter units operating two seat Fw-190s must have their own equipment.

As for low endurance, that's the trade off for operating such an inexpensive aircraft. Fw-190 night fighters should be employed as point defense for heavily bombed areas such as the Ruhr, Hamburg and Berlin. Perhaps assign a dedicated Fw-190 night fighter staffel to each such high priority area. Unlike longer legged Me-110s and Ju-88s they would remain within about 75 km of their home airfield.


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## pbfoot (Oct 19, 2011)

flying a Single engine fighter , obeying the fighter controllers instructions and vectots getting you into position to intercept the stream and then fiddling aroind with gains on your radar and trying to get a target on your radar all the while controlling your aircraft in the turbulence of the stream and worrying about fuel ....its a dead end proposiion. Is there any wonder wht all the early jet interceptors were 2 seaters


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## davebender (Oct 19, 2011)

The twin engine P-38 would perform just as poorly at night as a Me-109 or Spitfire. The problem is a single aircrew. Not a single engine.


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## The Basket (Oct 19, 2011)

The Me 210 was a dog and had a bad reputation so that was a non starter. A French plane made by French workers is just asking for sabotage.

The Bf 110 is there...it is working and can be easily modifed and a low risk programme. It aint no rocketship but it aint the worst thing either.


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## davebender (Oct 19, 2011)

You keep repeating this but have yet to present evidence there was anything wrong with the Me-210C. If you have reasons for your opinion then please state them.


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## The Basket (Oct 19, 2011)

I keep repeating? I have said it once!

The thread is about choosing a night fighter from Autumn 1940 so to be prepared for the onslaught of bomber command in 1942. What part of the Me 210 even remotely fills that space? If it starts production in 42 then what is actually flying as a night fighter in 1942? What are the crews training in?

The faults of the Me 210 in the period of 1940-41 are well documented. One could argue the the Me 210c and the Me 410 would have been good night fighters but for what timeframe? certainly not 1942.


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## davebender (Oct 19, 2011)

So are faults of P-47s during 1940 to 1941. What does that have to do with production versions from September 1942 onward?


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## Maximowitz (Oct 19, 2011)

If memory serves I./NJG 1 took on a few 410's for night trials but they were deemed unsuitable. II./KG 51 used them for night intruder missions in spring '44 over the UK with some interesting results - but for a night fighter in 1942, excluding jets, you'd be looking at a Ju88 variant - ever popular with the pilots of the Nachtjager.


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## Siegfried (Oct 20, 2011)

Maximowitz said:


> If memory serves I./NJG 1 took on a few 410's for night trials but they were deemed unsuitable. II./KG 51 used them for night intruder missions in spring '44 over the UK with some interesting results - but for a night fighter in 1942, excluding jets, you'd be looking at a Ju88 variant - ever popular with the pilots of the Nachtjager.



Some Me 410 were apparently fitted with Lorentz Hohtenweil radars for anti-shipping missions. The Me 410 had a bomb bay and I am surprised it couldn’t be used to fit the radar gear for a Lichtenstein, SN-2 or Neptune radar. Sometimes it just gets down to the shape of the electronics packaging or interference from gun vibration?


Pic here







Lorentz wasn't treated to well, the German navy which originated radar in Germany ignored it initially because of its foreign ownership even though the workforce was almost entirely German. The Luftwaffe (General Martini) had no concerns over the ownership issue but for whatever reason, presumably one of avoiding duplication, didn't support its Kurmark FLAK 53cm wavelength radars with more than a dozen purchases giving all the work to Telefunkens Wurzburg.

The Lorentz work was adapted into niches like radar for Maritime reconnaissance aircraft and also provided usable PPI radar with only a 1.8m square antenna for u-boats as well as a 2.4m antenna for destroyers and for surface search on battleships and cruisers that had been brought to the R+D point it could also provide blind fire via subsidiary lobe switching. They made small mobile PPI radars mounted in trailers for filling in the gaps between bigger radars called Jagdhutte (hunting hut)

It's anode modulated radars had a 50kW pulse, some seven times greater than the 8kW seen on Seetakt and Wurzburg and comparable to the UK's Type 284P which opperated at 125kW.

By 1942 Lorentz were 80% complete on a 27cm wavelength semi microwave radar for FLAK laying that would have greatly improved Germany’s position during the coming onslaught of Windows and Carpet Jamming however the firm couldn't see any orders comming and abandoned the field.


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## The Basket (Oct 20, 2011)

Again I will state that the Me 210 is not going to be available in number and fully operational in 1942.

The P47 has the luxury of time.The Luftwaffe do not.


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## stona (Oct 20, 2011)

davebender said:


> Fw-190 night fighters should be employed as point defense for heavily bombed areas such as the Ruhr, Hamburg and Berlin. Perhaps assign a dedicated Fw-190 night fighter staffel to each such high priority area. Unlike longer legged Me-110s and Ju-88s they would remain within about 75 km of their home airfield.



Which is a solution proposed by many at the Air Ministry and rejected by Dowding in 1940/41.Dowding knew his eggs when organising an air defence system.

I've just had an unscientific Trawl through Luftwaffe night fighter claims and I am struggling to decipher the relative success rates of S/E and T/E types. It obviously relates to how many were deployed. Anybody have some easily digestible statistics? Much as I'd love to work through my figures I have to go and earn a living!
Cheers
Steve


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## Shortround6 (Oct 20, 2011)

davebender said:


> So are faults of P-47s during 1940 to 1941. What does that have to do with production versions from September 1942 onward?



What faults of the P-47 in 1940 to 1941?? First prototype doesn't fly until May of 1941 and the first production plane doesn't roll out until 2 weeks after Pearl Harbor. A little tough documenting faults for a plane that doesn't really exist. Spring of 1942 might be a different story.


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## davebender (Oct 20, 2011)

Are you referring to daytime air defenses or night air defenses?

Britain had no effective night air defenses during 1940 to 1941. German night bomber losses averaged less then 1% per mission during that time period.


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## Siegfried (Oct 20, 2011)

The Basket said:


> Again I will state that the Me 210 is not going to be available in number and fully operational in 1942.
> 
> The P47 has the luxury of time.The Luftwaffe do not.



The Me 210 was slated for truly massive production starting in early 1941. In reality it only entered service as a debugged aircraft as the Me 210C in late 1942, effectively Jan 43 for the Me 410. 

The disruption was not so much that the Me 210 was late but that whole aircraft plants had been shut down and retooled to produce the Me 210 then had to retool to produce substitutes like the Ju 88. Eg Heinkels facility near Rostok stopped producing He 111 and to produce Me 210 but then had to make Ju 88 instead.

It's said, anecdotally by Rudiger Kosin (Ar 234 designer) that Willy Messerschmitt personally intervened in the design process to remove the slats and shorten the tail. When the test pilot stepped out of the aircraft he was ashen faced from stressed and immediately stated it needed slats and another meter of tail. However Messerschmitt and the Reich Luft Minsterium were fast tracking the project and had already made RM 5 million of jigs and they would all need to be thrown away. Much time was wasted though slats and extended tail were tested it took a while for them to be tested together unconsciously finding a work around. Broth parties were guilty and weren't calling each other on the problems.

The Me 410 was really only a Me 210 with the bigger DB603 engines and deeper fuselage to handle more radio and other equipment. In theory Me 210 could have been ready by middle 1941 in practice it was late 1942.
********
Messerschmitt learned from the mistakes and started to do more professional risk management with for instance test beds aircraft running ahead of the main project to evaluate risky aspects of the design and incorporation of "plan B" design modifications (eg provision for larger slats) to cope for contingencies.

********

As far as the ideal Luftwaffe night fighter it is the original Ju 88 schellbomber or fast bomber before that aircraft role was ruined by the dive bombing requirements which greatly increased the weight of the structure.

Below are the Ju 88 V1, V4 and V5 respectively. The V5 set a 1000km record at 517kmh/320mph and 2000km record at 501kmh/311mph both with a 2000kg load.

Its likely if they had of persisted with the fast bomber concept, perhaps in parrallel with the dive bomber concept they not only would have had an aircraft too fast to be intercepted by the Hurricane but also an ideal nightfighter. It was also an aircraft that started out as a DB600 aircraft and moved to the Jumo.


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## davebender (Oct 20, 2011)

> The Me 210 was slated for truly massive production starting in early 1941. In reality it only entered service as a debugged aircraft as the Me 210C in late 1942, effectively Jan 43 for the Me 410.
> 
> The disruption was not so much that the Me 210 was late but that whole aircraft plants had been shut down and retooled to produce the Me 210 then had to retool to produce substitutes like the Ju 88. Eg Heinkels facility near Rostok stopped producing He 111 and to produce Me 210 but then had to make Ju 88 instead.
> 
> It's said, anecdotally by Rudiger Kosin (Ar 234 designer) that Willy Messerschmitt personally intervened in the design process to remove the slats and shorten the tail. When the test pilot stepped out of the aircraft he was ashen faced from stressed and immediately stated it needed slats and another meter of tail. However Messerschmitt and the Reich Luft Minsterium were fast tracking the project and had already made RM 5 million of jigs and they would all need to be thrown away. Much time was wasted though slats and extended tail were tested it took a while for them to be tested together unconsciously finding a work around. Broth parties were guilty and weren't calling each other on the problems.


That's pretty much my understanding also. Bad program management was the only thing which prevented the Me-210C from entering mass production during the fall of 1942. RLM derailed the Me-210 program during April 1942 by over reacting to problems with the 100 or so early production Me-210As.

*Point of departure.*
April 1942. RLM does not over react. 
The Me-210 fuselage fix was implemented on a prototype 14 March 1942. So it's already known. Me-210 production is halted for a month or two while rear fuselage jigs are modified. Then production restarts.

July 1942. 
Leading edge slots successfully tested on an Me-210 prototype.

This improvement will also be incorporated to the Me-210 production line. Existing Me-210s will receive the wing modification when aircraft return to depot for major repairs.

Now it's full speed ahead for the Me-210C program. There is no Me-110G as that aircraft type has been superceded. 

Without the Me-110G Germany has no choice but to design a Me-210C night fighter variant. Over the long run that's a good thing.


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## stona (Oct 20, 2011)

davebender said:


> Are you referring to daytime air defenses or night air defenses?
> 
> Britain had no effective night air defenses during 1940 to 1941. German night bomber losses averaged less then 1% per mission during that time period.



Night defences. The RAF's inability to intercept the Luftwaffe by night led to everybody (even senior naval officers) suggesting just how Dowding should go about his job. The idea you have mooted was presented several times but good old Hugh was having none of it.

The Me210 debacle was used as an excuse by the RLM to displace Messerschmitt and take over control of the firm. It is also often forgotten that the twice over switch of production at Regensburg had an effect on production of other types. Peter Schmoll estimates that a minimum of 200 Bf109Gs were lost. There were about 100 Me210s at Obertraubling,rejected by the Luftwaffe which were initially going to be broken up. A few were actually scrapped before a fix was proposed. This fix (fuselage extension,slats etc),carried out on all the Me210 airframes already in production or produced took 3,400 man hours per aircraft,not an easy undertaking. 
Cheers
Steve


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## davebender (Oct 20, 2011)

> fix (fuselage extension,slats etc),carried out on all the Me210 airframes already in production or produced took 3,400 man hours per aircraft,not an easy undertaking.


Then use the 300 Me-210As for parts. 

The important thing is to get on with mass production of the Me-210C at the rate of about 300 aircraft per month, at least half of which would go to the night fighter force.


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## stona (Oct 20, 2011)

davebender said:


> Then use the 300 Me-210As for parts.



Initially,when Milch effectively took over,they were going to break up the Me210s already produced. Remember the RLM had cancelled the project. When Messerschmitt proposed the fix,and agreed to bear the cost, (incidentally promising a completely unrealistic schedule,Messerschmitt must have known it was not possible) the existing airframes were adapted to the new standard. They weren't used for parts,they were used as the basis for the revised standard. That's what took 3,400 man hours per aircraft.

I agree that if they could have sorted out the chaos sooner the Me 210/410 would have been a good platform to develop as a nightfighter.

Cheers
Steve


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## davebender (Oct 20, 2011)

Engineers had the most important Me-210 program fix ready during March 1942. The only chaos was at RLM during April 1942. 

The Me-210 program was too important for the German war effort to allow it to be derailed by RLM politics. If necessary Goering should have stepped in and and put the program back on track for mass production during the fall of 1942. He should also have replaced Milch for fumbling management of such an important program.


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## michaelmaltby (Oct 20, 2011)

"... The Me-210 program was too important for the German war effort to allow it to be derailed by RLM politics. If necessary Goering should have stepped in and and put the program back on track for mass production during the fall of 1942. "

How is it that the Hungarians were able to use the 210 effectively - all-be-it as a heavy fighter bomber-killer, not a Night Fighter?

MM


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## davebender (Oct 20, 2011)

Germany used them effectively also. 89 Me-210Cs were produced in Germany during 1943 and another 74 during 1944. Plus about another 150 Me-210Cs that Hungary delivered to Germany.


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## stona (Oct 20, 2011)

The problems between Messerschmitt and the RLM pre-date the Me210 debacle and can certainly be traced back to the inefficiency of the Augsburg plant,a long time bone of contention between the two. Messerschmitt AG in 1942 was the only major aircraft manufacturer outside the direct influence of the RLM. The removal of Prof. Messerschmitt and everything else done at Messerschmitt to clear up the chaos after the cancellation of the Me210 by the RLM was done,principally by Milch and Lucht,with the full knowledge and approval of Goering.
It wasn't until March 1941 that a Hungarian delegation visited the Messerschmitt-Werke at Regensburg and Augsburg and obtained manufacturing licences for the Bf109G and Me210. According to the licence half of the aircraft built were to be delivered to the Luftwaffe. The Hungarians didn't even start production until the end of 1942,a bit late for our nightfighter. In the period 1942-44 only 302 Me 210s were built by Dunai Repulogepgyar RT. Don't forget that the Hungarians removed most of the armour and reduced the forward firing armament to two MG 151/20s.
It was not a dog. The Luftbeobachtungsstaffeln (Air Observation Squadrons) flew them with GM-1 and 300 litre auxiliary tanks under the wings,at high altitude, tracking and reporting USAAF bomber formations well into 1944. They only suffered one combat loss on 11/2/44.
Cheers
Steve


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## Siegfried (Oct 20, 2011)

michaelmaltby said:


> "... How is it that the Hungarians were able to use the 210 effectively - all-be-it as a heavy fighter bomber-killer, not a Night Fighter?
> 
> MM



The Hungarian Me 210 had the fixes, the extended tail and slats. Why did the Hungarians end up specifying these and the Germans not?

Possibly the Hungarian procurment types had greater technical competance; Hungary punches above is weight in inventiveness. I suspect however Messerschmitt engineers had long solved the technical problem and dare not speak openly of the cost of the fix which would be embarrasing to Managment, the RLM(Reichs Luftahrts Ministerium) and people in high political places who had an agenda. The Hungarians clearly weren't caught up in the nonsense, embarrasment and recriminations. Hence they were able to make clear headed decisions and probably able to obtain the aircraft at Bargain Basement prices, demonstrating its usefullness.

Milch seems to have been of a mindset that mass production of existing types was the only way forward rather than the introduction of risky new types. He did support some new types. He believed that the war was lost if the Me 262 couldn't be in service by 1943 and championed the Ta 154 in part this was his motivation for attacking the He 219 programm which had been placed in production behined his back by Josef Kammhubber.


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## michaelmaltby (Oct 20, 2011)

"... Hungary punches above is weight in inventiveness."



MM


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## davebender (Oct 20, 2011)

> Milch seems to have been of a mindset that mass production of existing types was the only way forward rather than the introduction of risky new types.


The historical result is practically the worst that could have happened for the German war effort. A considerable portion of airframe and machine tool industries were tied up while producing only a few hundred Me-210C aircraft. Then more machine tools were used converting the Me-210 production line into the DB603 powered Me-410. Never mind that previous RLM actions insured there would not be enough DB603 engines to support mass production of the Me-410.

It's almost as if RLM intentionally sabotaged the German war effort.


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## wuzak (Oct 20, 2011)

davebender said:


> It's almost as if RLM intentionally sabotaged the German war effort.



A while ago I was corresponding with a guy at the RRHT aboutthe Vulture, and I mentioned the DB604 and its cancellation to which he said:

"Don’t know much about the DB604 but one of our best allies during the War was the RLM!"


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## davebender (Oct 20, 2011)

20 January 1942. Wannsee Conference.
German Government officially approves extermination of the Jewish race.

FM Erhard Milch was of Jewish ancestry. Goering protected Milch by having him officially declared to be of German ancestry but Milch knew his linage.

April to August 1942.
RLM headed by FM Milch wrecks the promising Me-210C program.

Coincidence?


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## Erich (Oct 20, 2011)

the Hungarians also fitted their Me 210's with the single 3.7cm weapon forward. poor guys were shredded by the US 15th AF.


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## Siegfried (Oct 20, 2011)

davebender said:


> 20 January 1942. Wannsee Conference.
> German Government officially approves extermination of the Jewish race.
> 
> FM Erhard Milch was of Jewish ancestry. Goering protected Milch by having him officially declared to be of German ancestry but Milch knew his linage.
> ...



I would read David Irvings biography of Milch, available for free on Mr Irvings site. Page 168 covers the Me 210.

It's possible to see what Milch was trying to do. It wasn't Milch that created the Me 210 mess though he may have reduced its production run. 

"During an angry discussion between Milch, Vorwald and Messerschmitt at the ministry Milch gave the
professor one last chance: the Me 210 was to revert to Voigt’s original design.
Ten samples were to be produced immediately, the first six being delivered by April."

Göring later proposed an eventual epitaph for himself: ‘He would
have lived longer but for the Me 210.’ The aircraft had originally been designed
by the company’s leading designer, Waldemar Voigt, but the professor had
adapted Voigt’s blueprints to lessen the aircraft’s weight and wind resistance.
Although this produced a radically different aircraft, the ministry (in Udet’s
time) had ordered one thousand straight away, without waiting for the prototype
to fly. Test models went into a flat spin, side-slipped or suffered undercarriage
collapses on landing (the professor had substituted a weaker undercarriage
than Voigt’s to save weight). (one week their were 17 fatalities)


A major dictum revoked by Milch was the heresy that this was to be only a short
war. ‘We have to accept that this is a Thirty Years’ War,’ he warned his own
staff. ‘Not that this means it will last thirty years, but we must act as though it
could. I forbid under penalty of extreme punishment any such expression as
that things still under research or development will be too late to be of purpose
in this war.


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## stona (Oct 21, 2011)

Milch's reluctance to develop new types might be conditioned by the continual failiure of the German aircraft industry to produce viable ones. The Me210 is probably the biggest **** up but it is one of many. 

I don't think Milch's supposed ancestry has anything to do with this. The German aircraft industry and RLM displayed some surprising incompetence throughout the war. Too much power with the companies (initially) and too many egos at work combined with disorganised and fragmented development programmes.
The RLM's complete inability to match airframes with the requisite engines is a good illustration of the left hand not knowing what the right hand was doing.

Cheers
Steve


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## riacrato (Oct 21, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> The Hungarian Me 210 had the fixes, the extended tail and slats. Why did the Hungarians end up specifying these and the Germans not?
> 
> Possibly the Hungarian procurment types had greater technical competance; Hungary punches above is weight in inventiveness. I suspect however Messerschmitt engineers had long solved the technical problem and dare not speak openly of the cost of the fix which would be embarrasing to Managment, the RLM(Reichs Luftahrts Ministerium) and people in high political places who had an agenda. The Hungarians clearly weren't caught up in the nonsense, embarrasment and recriminations. Hence they were able to make clear headed decisions and probably able to obtain the aircraft at Bargain Basement prices, demonstrating its usefullness.
> 
> Milch seems to have been of a mindset that mass production of existing types was the only way forward rather than the introduction of risky new types. He did support some new types. He believed that the war was lost if the Me 262 couldn't be in service by 1943 and championed the Ta 154 in part this was his motivation for attacking the He 219 programm which had been placed in production behined his back by Josef Kammhubber.


IIRC the 210 was originally conceived with a longer tail in the early drawings but Willy Messerschmidt thought the 210 was too large and heavy for a fighter, had it shortened and must take most of the blame for screwing up the original 210 design. One must also remember the Hungarians were flying some very outdated designs, so even a 2nd class fighter was better than what they had to offer.

Milch gets a lot of blame from everywhere. He was a man who had to make unpopular decisions with limited information and he didn't have the luxury of hindsight that we do:

- Trying to cancel the He 219 was absolutely understandeable: It was a very modern but expensive plane, but only somewhat better than the existing Ju 88s which were in already in full-scale production.
- Supporting the Ta 154: A cheap alternative with performance about on part with the He 219 (albeit not popular) using lots of non-strategic resources.
- preparing for the big step with the Me 262 and ignoring the small step of the He 280: Debatable, but he tried to have the industry focus on specific tasks instead of every company tring to do engines and airframes. He poorly executed this though.
- the Me 210: see above by Siegfried


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## Siegfried (Oct 21, 2011)

stona said:


> Night defences. The RAF's inability to intercept the Luftwaffe by night led to everybody (even senior naval officers) suggesting just how Dowding should go about his job. The idea you have mooted was presented several times but good old Hugh was having none of it.
> Steve



That is quite harsh as the technology wasn't really there; albeit a fast twin engine two or three crew fighter able to navigate at night and have several sets of eyes out would have helped.


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## davebender (Oct 21, 2011)

Whose idea was it to convert the perfected Me-210C into the Me-410A even though DB603 engines were scarce?


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## davebender (Oct 21, 2011)

Albert Speer assumed control of German weapons production during February 1942. He must have been involved in Me-210 aircraft production decisions made between April and September 1942. However he doesn't discuss the Me-210 program in his book.

What was his role in the Me-210C / Me-410A fiasco?


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## Maximowitz (Oct 21, 2011)

davebender said:


> Albert Speer assumed control of German weapons production during February 1942. He must have been involved in Me-210 aircraft production decisions made between April and September 1942. However he doesn't discuss the Me-210 program in his book.
> 
> What was his role in the Me-210C / Me-410A fiasco?



None whatsoever.


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## Siegfried (Oct 22, 2011)

davebender said:


> Whose idea was it to convert the perfected Me-210C into the Me-410A even though DB603 engines were scarce?



I don't know where that came from but the reason is obvious: the Me 410 needed the extra speed to fulfill its day time role. I am not sure as to whether the Me 210C had the deepened fuselage that was introduced to provide the volume for all of the extra equipment needed (avionics) and probably rescue equipment etc. I think it did. A speed of 388 mph for the Me 410 was impressive as was a penetration speed of 360mph at a time the two stage Spitfire and Mosquito had only just entered service. I suspect this speed, which is maybe 15mph less than the Spitfire/Mosquito FB was however equal to those British aircraft at altitudes of around 15,000ft where their superior two stage superchargers were of no relative advantage.
Full pressure altitude of the DB603A was 5.7km ( 19000ft).

However a night fighter Me 210C powered by DB605 offers only slight advantages over the Me 110G2 powered by DB605, there is no speed advantage at all. The Me 210C has more range, an internal bomb-bay (irrelevant for a night fighter) and better rear armament. The Me 110 has good handling, can fit the radar and a3rd crew member.

The Me 410 can push itself into enemy airspace at 360mph reaching peaks of 388 mph with an internal bomb load unaffected by drag of its weapon, dive bomb using its Stuvi 5B computing bombsight and dive brakes; all things the Me 110 can't do. 

So the Luftwaffe made the logical choice: Me 410 for daylight use or night strikes, for which it absolutely required the performance of the DB603 provided while Me 110G for night fighrer use with the more obtainable DB605.

It's fairly obvious that the Luftwaffe either needs to dedicate its best engines to the night fighter force in aircraft such as the Ju 88 or come up with outstanding airframes.

It's possible to see what the Ta 154 was about: using non strategic materials and readily available engines such as the Jumo 211 to achieve high performance but that concept was too late, it achieved maturity too late and the the Goldshmitt TEGO film factory for laminating the plywood with a special glue was destroyed just after the first dozen had been produced and thereby permanently crippled the program.

The opportunity to have a super fast night fighter, one that could carry a second crew member and at least some equipment (eg a radar or other electronic seekers but perhaps not both and navigation equipment) was lost when the FW 187 was not put into production before the war started.


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## wuzak (Oct 22, 2011)

FB Mosquitoes never had two stage Merlins. 

The Me410 top speed was slightly above that of the single stage Mosquitoes, but less than two stage Mossies. Two stage NFs were introduce later also.


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## wuzak (Oct 22, 2011)

Also, how much equipment could an Fw187 realistically carry? After all, some of the engine instruments were on the engine nacelles....


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## Siegfried (Oct 22, 2011)

The instruments on the engine nacelle either reflects cockpit space issue for fully instrumenting 2 engines or the placement of secondary instruments out of the cockpit.

The aircraft could carry 2 crew (one facing forward the rear) which the singles could only do for training aircraft stripped of fuel capacity. Even if a radar was not fitted the second man can provide vital help in navigation and operating radio and other navigation equipment (eg triangulating to beacons) that allows the pilot to concentrate on instrument flying and fighting in this case the aircraft would be guided by ground radars (eg two Wurzburgs) to visual contact with the enemy aircraft. I agree its not the ideal aircraft from the space point of view but its much better than a single: the FW 187 I only see as a machine designated to intercept Mosquito pathfinders. A He 219 or Ju 88 couldn't intercept a Mosquito, only specialized single seat night fighters could do that.

The Luftwaffe managed to fit FuG 217 Neptune radars to both FW 190 and Me 109. The Lichtenstein radar would have been an easy fit to a FW-187 since the antenna was merely and array attached to a single pole. Neptune was also relatively easy to fit. A 10cm radar would not fit and nor would SN-2 I suspect however a 3cm radar would fit.


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## Siegfried (Oct 22, 2011)

wuzak said:


> FB Mosquitoes never had two stage Merlins.
> 
> The Me410 top speed was slightly above that of the single stage Mosquitoes, but less than two stage Mossies. Two stage NFs were introduce later also.



It's worth considering that the Night fighter Mosquito would have had difficulty intercepting the faster Pathfinder Mosquito and the PRU Mosquito.

Also what altitude needs to be considered. A faster Me 410 that was only faster at high altitude would profit an aircraft that was performing low level attacks very little.


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## Siegfried (Oct 22, 2011)

stona said:


> Milch's reluctance to develop new types might be conditioned by the continual failiure of the German aircraft industry to produce viable ones. The Me210 is probably the biggest **** up but it is one of many.
> 
> I don't think Milch's supposed ancestry has anything to do with this. The German aircraft industry and RLM displayed some surprising incompetence throughout the war. Too much power with the companies (initially) and too many egos at work combined with disorganised and fragmented development programmes.
> The RLM's complete inability to match airframes with the requisite engines is a good illustration of the left hand not knowing what the right hand was doing.
> ...




I think the failures of German procurement have several causes, for some of which there are excuses.

Of course if a type fails to meet expectation an alternative solution should be ready and in this there were managerial failures.

Consider the most damaging
1 Ju 288
2 He 177
3 Me 210
4 Engine performance deficit, especially at high altitudes between late 1942 to early 1944 (a deficit of 1.5 years) during which turbo supercharged P-47, P-38 and duel stage supercharged Merlin spitfires attrition the Luftwaffe.

in regards to the Ju 288 had the Germans succeeded to introduce into service a 400mph (some sources say 416mph) aircraft with 4 crew and an operational radius of over 2000km (1200) miles with 2 tons of bombs powered by a pair of 2500hp engines running of 87 octane fuel on schedule in 1941 or even 1944 they would have pulled of an incredible accomplishment. The aircraft had 4 remotely sighted heavy guns and a pressurized ejectable crew escape capsule.

The engine of course was too ambitious though it seems to have finally been ready in 1944 and in derated form in 1941. Plan B was the DB606 (two paired DB601 engines) whose travails in the He 177 are well known. The DB610 (two paired DB605) was apparently quite reliable in the Ju 288 but the engine produced disappointing performance in range.

It appears that the problems stemmed from two areas:

1 Big weight growth from radical re-engineering from lessons learned from BoB that widened the fuselage, demanded better superchargers, added a 4th crew member and extra armament this made 2500hp instead of 2000hp.

2 The Jumo 222 production was canceled and the engine was put on low priority in December 1941 even though it achieved a successful 100 hour test run in April 41, this killed the Ju 288 since this engine was essential for the Ju 288. It was Milch that killed of the engine in December 1941, thereby also killing the aircraft. He handed over the massive factory built for the Jumo 222 to Daimler Benz to build the DB610 to power the bomber instead but as Daimler Benz was overloaded with work the factory remained empty till the end of the war. This meant no Jumo 222 and no increase in DB610 production so the bomber had no engine.

Development of the engine continued at low priority and it was ready to produce 2500hp as the Jumo 222A3/B3 and the 2700hp Jumo 222E/F at the end of the war. It was expected to achieve 4500hp eventually.

It appears the engine was ready to produce 2000hp in April 1941 having passed 100 hour endurance tests but was not ready for 2500hp even though it could produce 3000hp in short test. 

Info from Auto Union und Junkers von Peter Kohl,Peter Bessel

This if you use translation tools is also interesting:
FlugzeugLorenz: Junkers Ju 288

The Jumo 222A/B engine, was in theory capable of propelling the Ju 388 at 410 mph and the Jumo 222E/F at 444 mph so had it been developed at full pace it would still have provided an outstanding bomber anyway. The Ju 188A probably would have had a speed of 345 mph with 2000hp.



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


The He 177 started development about 1 year before the B-29. Hence if the B-29 performed its first unreliable missions in June 1944 the He 177 should have been doing so in June 1943, which is more or less what happened. The He 177A5 with new DB 610 engines arrived in November 1943 and cured the fire problems (though a3 was still in production).

Of course the RLM gambled the farm with the He 177 and should have had a 4 seperate engine version developing in the background as a backup or another manufacturer.

Had they allowed for seperate engines, which would have meant dive bombing was impossible, they probably would have had a stunning aircraft entering reliable service sometime in 1942 that was free of the He 177A1 and he 177A3 problems and able to use either Jumo 211J or DB605 engines.

Such and aircraft would easily have upgraded with better engines and by mid 1944 would have been operating with DB605AS, DB603 or Jumo 213

As it was the He 177A5 only solved the problems in early 1944.

In reality the Luftwaffe missed its opportunity when if failed to develop the Ju 89.

The Spanish civil had taught the Luftwaffe that level bombing was completely ineffective and that only dive bombing was of much value. The solution of course was better bomb sights not dive bombing but Goering only rescinded the requirement in late 1942.

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

The Me 210 fiasco seems to have been caused by Professor Herr Direktor Willi Messerschmitt over rulling his chief designer and shortening the tail of the Me 210 by 1m and removing the slats (according to Rudiger Kosin). The other problem was that it had been ordered of the plans with Jigs and tooling made before the first test flight and no one was ready to take responsibility for the faulty design and the money spent on producing an unstable aircraft.

In modern terms this is called 'fast tracking' ie design and construct in parrallel. It is seldom cheaper but it can be faster.

What should have happened is 
1 Risk analysis
2 Plan B and Plan C backup running in parrallel. This means building long tail versions and slated versions even if they are not going to be needed and even if it means that the jigging and tooling for the short tailed versions is wasted. 

***********]

The engine issue is more difficult to understand, part of it gets down to shortages of C3 fuel i think but it looks like high altitude development was confined to research into ultra high altitude interception (50,000ft) rather than just raising ceiling from 37000ft to say 44,000ft.

The fact that MW50 and the bigger superchargers did not come into service till March 1944 for the Me meant inexperienced German pilots were at a disadvantage at a critical time.


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## davebender (Oct 22, 2011)

I disagree. 

Most Luftwaffe engine problems date back to October 1935 when RLM chose to blacklist Daimler-Benz, favoring Junkers and BMW instead. Consequently the DB601 engine program didn't receive priority until 1940 and the DB603 engine program didn't receive priority until 1942. Otherwise there could have been plenty of DB601 engines by 1940 and plenty of DB603 engines by 1942. And WWII Germany would have no engine problems worth mentioning.


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## jim (Oct 22, 2011)

davebender said:


> I disagree.
> 
> Most Luftwaffe engine problems date back to October 1935 when RLM chose to blacklist Daimler-Benz, favoring Junkers and BMW instead. Consequently the DB601 engine program didn't receive priority until 1940 and the DB603 engine program didn't receive priority until 1942. Otherwise there could have been plenty of DB601 engines by 1940 and plenty of DB603 engines by 1942. And WWII Germany would have no engine problems worth mentioning.


 
yet it was Daimler who failed to clear Db605 for 142 ata before autumn 43 and to produce 1 year sooner Db605AM&ASM

Mr Siegfried ,as always, excellent post! At the moment, after the losses of Mr Soren, Mr Crupp and Mr Kurfust , you appear to be the leading Lw experte on this forum!


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## davebender (Oct 22, 2011)

Perhaps things would have been different if funding for the DB601 engine program hadn't been cut over 50% during October 1935.


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## mhuxt (Oct 22, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> It's worth considering that the Night fighter Mosquito would have had difficulty intercepting the faster Pathfinder Mosquito and the PRU Mosquito.


 
The NF.30 had two-stage superchargers, while many of the 8 Group aircraft, as well as 5 Group's 627 Squadron markers, had single-stage Merlins (less of an issue for 627 as they operated at low level).

The Oboe-equipped aircraft of 109 and 105 Squadrons tended to have two-stage engines, as the improved high-altitude performance increased Oboe's effective range.


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## woljags (Oct 22, 2011)

with a more powerful engine fitted how would the me108 faired in the nightfighter role,if they could get the equipment into a 109,the 108 body with cannons fitted might work


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## Shortround6 (Oct 22, 2011)

The Me 108 was sort of a 1930s Beechcraft Bonanza. It is going to take quite an upgrade for it to play night fighter.


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## woljags (Oct 22, 2011)

just a thought,it had 109 wings and tail with the cabin body so might have been useful if developed for other uses


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## Shortround6 (Oct 22, 2011)

woljags said:


> just a thought,it had 109 wings and tail with the cabin body so might have been useful if developed for other uses



No, it didn't. 

They may have been similar in size and shape but nobody is sticking fighter wings on a 240hp passenger plane or vice versa. The 108 weighed 806KG empty. I doubt it was stressed for fighter maneuvers even at it's light weight and the idea that it's wings would stand up to 500kph flight compared to the 305kph it did do is beyond belief. Using wings for a fighter on a low powered 4 seat transport plane plane means the wings are too heavy for the intended use and seriously affect the payload. Too many authors have "claimed" that Messerschmidt "simply" widened the fuselage of the of 108 to make the 109. He may have used the same configuration but I seriously doubt the actual structure was the same, even if we discount the different leading slat arrangement and the different flap arrangement.


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## Siegfried (Oct 23, 2011)

Tante Ju said:


> I wondered lot. Often said that magnetron was some "super weapon", but I keep wonder why. I know it can generate greater power for very short wave radar devices, but I do ask, why is very short wave devices give advantage? Becuase AFAIK most search device operate at fairly long waves, so I guess things are more complicated, probably because why short wave is good for one purpose, long wave for another purpose.
> 
> Say how does it bend with earth curve? How does it effected by jam? How accurate resolution there is? How sensitive to weather? What is detection range, ranging accuracy with same power source? Weight etc?



The width of a radar beam is related to the antena size and the wavelength. If you want a tight beam you need either a small antena with a small wavelength or if you can not generate short wavelenghts you must either accept a bigger antena or accept a broader beam that will blur targets.

The tighter beam gives the advange of more resolution: the abillity to distinguish seperate objects eg two ships or aircraft close together, a ground map.

More importantly the broader beam means it is less likely to intercept jamming from the side or reflections from 'windows' and even if it does the opperator can often seperate a cloud of 'chaff' from another cloud od chaff or a real target because of the tighter beam. 

You can fit a small tight team into the nose of a fighter or make a ppi distplay that fits into the belly of a bomber for ground mappiing or sub hunting aircraft.

Rudolf Kunhold of the NVKn (German Naval signals), the physicist who litterally invented radar in Germany and pushed GEMA to develope radar also pushed microwaves from 1932. However by 1936 the Germans had great success with generating sufficient power at wavelenghts down to 50cm and this was good enough at a time that radar in Britain was still opperating at 15m or 7.5m that they were less concerned at producing 10cm wavelenths.

Hence early success produced quite adaquete radars, Wurzburg was the most accurate FLAK radar till 1942 when the US SCR-584 took over that claim.

The next generation of german radars was to go from 50cm or so down to 25cm ("Mannheim K") and demonstration models were made by 1942 though they could have gone to 9cm at reduced power however the investment wasn't made due to resource issues.

The 9cm work caught them of guard. Also another let down was the failure to move from low powered radars of 8kW pulse to ones producing 160kW or so for greater range and jam resistance. They did produce such radars but too little too late (Wurzburg-Riesse-Gigant could pulse out 160kW to help overcome jamming)



The Wurzburg 53cm radar with a


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## woljags (Oct 23, 2011)

i simply said if developed,if you are saying that the 108 structure was too weak that maybe the case but the design was still there,they could have taken the design/drawings and developed a usable aircraft from the design to comply with what they needed,having been around 108 and 109[spanish built] during my ground crew days in the late 80's they are very similar


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## Siegfried (Oct 23, 2011)

davebender said:


> Perhaps things would have been different if funding for the DB601 engine program hadn't been cut over 50% during October 1935.



For the Luftwaffe's pilots to have any chance the whole Me 109G program and its engines needs to be brought forward 6-9 months, I'm inclined to think 9 months.

The 1.42 ata rating needs to be securely released by January 1943 rather than the repeated equivocation till October 43.

The introduction of the Me 109G5AS, Me 109G6AM and Me 109G6ASM with their 1.7 ata ratings and high altitude superchargers needs to brought forward from March/April 1944 to about June 1943 so that there is some parity against the latest P-47 and P-38 above 20,000ft.

The Me 109K4 and Me 109G10 need to be coming into service in December 43/Jan 1944 instead of 
October/November 1944 at latest since the P-51B are coming into service in numbers.

An ordinary Me 109G6 should never have to see a P-51B if the Luftwaffe wants to save its pilots.

The FW 190 series also needs improvements.

I'm not sure what the hold up was on the 1.42 ata rating
1 Spark plugs
2 Lubrication deaerator?
3 Lack of C3 fuel
4 Piston strength?

It cost the Me 109 10 vital MPH along with almost as much from lack of fairing over the gun bulges and retracting the tail wheel.

As far as release of the MW-50 I don't understand what prevented an earlier deployment of the technology.

It is possible to imagine that the outsize superchargers variants were held back from mass production in order to keep production rates up of stadard DB605A so a lack of capacity due to decisions in the 1930s may be relevant there. The lack of DB603 production could have impacted decisions to not produce Me 309, Me 209-II and limited He 219 and Do 217M and most importantly delayed a decision to exploit it via a FW 190D9-DB603 variant. Lack of DB605 production meant the He 177A5 engine fix in the form of the DB610 didn't show up in production till December 1943 and the lack of this engine also finally killed the Ju 288. A bigger factory also supports a smoother well resourced R+D program.


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## Ratsel (Oct 23, 2011)

Yes they used GM-1 in the Bf 109E so why not continue its used with the Me 109G-10/K-4? I know they used both the MW-50 GM-1 in the TA 152, but too little too late. Anyways, I read sparkplugs were the big problem.


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## davebender (Oct 23, 2011)

> lack of DB603 production could have impacted decisions to not produce Me 309, Me 209-II, He 219 and most importantly delayed a decision to exploit it via a FW 190D9-DB603 variant


If RLM had not pulled the plug on DB603 funding during 1937 the engine would probably have entered mass production during 1941. That changes a bunch of things. 

Dr. Tank would have his preferred engine for the Fw-190 right from the beginning. If the DB603 powered Fw-190C enters mass production during 1941 the Me-209 becomes pointless.


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## tomo pauk (Oct 24, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> ...
> 
> The 1.42 ata rating needs to be securely released by January 1943 rather than the repeated equivocation till October 43.
> 
> ...



Many thanks for that info. 
Do you know, by any chance, when the BMW 801D was cleared for 1,42 ata (IIRC it was cleared for 1,35 ata from March 1942)?


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## Siegfried (Oct 26, 2011)

tomo pauk said:


> Many thanks for that info.
> Do you know, by any chance, when the BMW 801D was cleared for 1,42 ata (IIRC it was cleared for 1,35 ata from March 1942)?



I have seen that information in great detail but I can't recollect where: I believe it came in with the FW 190A3 and the BMW801D engine in the spring of 1942 (March?).
The BMW802D2 used C3 fuel with that variant then soon moving up.

If you have a look at the Allied Fuel intelligence files at fischertropsch.org you will note C3 is initially only rated (by allied tests) around 93/115 or so. By the end of the war it was around 96/130 or more. At least some of the advances in 801 power levels are associated with improvements in C3. The big improvement comes in 1943 or so.


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## Siegfried (Oct 26, 2011)

davebender said:


> If RLM had not pulled the plug on DB603 funding during 1937 the engine would probably have entered mass production during 1941. That changes a bunch of things.
> 
> Dr. Tank would have his preferred engine for the Fw-190 right from the beginning. If the DB603 powered Fw-190C enters mass production during 1941 the Me-209 becomes pointless.



The engine definetly changes things. Had the engine been available sooner aircraft would have been developed to use it.

The ideal night fighter may have been the Hs 127: a Ju 88 rival with 3 crew it reputedly manged 348mph on a pair of DB600 engines of 850hp. Even with enormous weight growth with DB601E or DB605A in the 1300hp range a speed of at least 370mph (same as Me 110G2) should be possible at 1.3 ata. Of course the luftwaffe would need to elect to keep this as a pure schnellbomber not a multi-role dive bomber so its structure stayed lean.

Moreover it had 3 crew from the start and the width to accomodate a variety of equipment.


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## davebender (Oct 26, 2011)

The light bomber role was already covered by Ju-87 and Ju-88 dive bombers. 

I would develop the Hs127 as a purpose built bomber interceptor and long range recon aircraft. That way the Hs127 remains light, fast and maneuverable. Four nose mounted 20mm cannon to provide firepower for this mission. Recon versions would replace two of the cannon with cameras. Since the Hs-127 has the long range recon mission Ju-88 and Me-110 variants would not be built for that role.


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## tomo pauk (Oct 26, 2011)

Siegfried said:


> I have seen that information in great detail but I can't recollect where: I believe it came in with the FW 190A3 and the BMW801D engine in the spring of 1942 (March?).
> The BMW802D2 used C3 fuel with that variant then soon moving up.



Here is a table from the BMW 801 manual, stating the engine can't be pushed more than the values in the brackets allow, applying from March 1942. All due to the danger of overheating the engine.


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