About the Fw190 D9

[Tony Kambic]

I've been researching how to manufacture the correct rear spinner for the Do335. Maybe someday. I do notice in one decent photo taken from the rear of the aircraft while on the ground, that the rear spinner has a hole in the center. I believe this may confirm that the hole is a manufacturing artefact, since there would seem to be no other reason for a hole in the rear spinner.

 

[Denniss]

Or they used the same spinner for all DB 603 installations, makes no sense to have specific ones per aircraft.

 

[Tony Kambic]

Or they used the same spinner for all DB 603 installations, makes no sense to have specific ones per aircraft.

The rear DB603 spinner on the Do335 is different from the nose spinner. From what I can tell in most of the images of the surviving '102' Do335, one of the two shipped to the US after the war, it seems to have been missing the rear spinner from the beginning. When it was restored in the 1970s in Germany, a fiberglass rear spinner was fabricated but it is not the proper shape. Look at the displayed 335 at Udvar-Hazy and you can visualize that compared to war time photos of the 335. The second 335 shipped to the US seems to have vanished, most likely scrapped.