Best Battle of Britain Aircraft

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

I agree as well, however if I were a bomber guy I would still feel better with the defensive armament that the B-17 and B-24 had compared to other bombers that I will not mention so as not to get into a long and lengthy discussion again. I dont want to have to come to your aid again in that particular thread.

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

I dont want to have to come to your aid again in that particular thread

when did you come to my aid!

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

When syscom was all over you.

Im kidding lanc, calm down.

 

[Twitch]

The defensive armament of the American heavies certainly was not useless. at least fifty calibers could actually take out an enemy fighter unlike .30s and .303s. No German pilot I've talked to ever discounted the danger of wading in to a bomber box with dozens of guns aimed at him. They didn NOT considerit a piece of cake.

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

the fact remains that it didn't stop them being shot down in large numbers..............

 

[loomaluftwaffe]

what about the flak? wasn't it just as useful as the sturmjagers?

 

[Twitch]

While unescorted heavies were shot down they gave it back pretty well too. Zestroyers were lost in noticable amounts on various intercept missions. The Luftwaffe losses weren't excessive but who wants to be a statistic? You simply can't attack from 6 o'clock and wade into several cross-covering box formations and not emerge unscathed while 150+ .50s are trained on you.

While on the Schweinfurt mission 3 Thunderbolts were lost defending the Big Friends. Fifty-nine B-17s went down over the Reich's airspace. Six others were destroyed near of over England from ditching or bailouts. Another seventeen were damaged so badly that they would never fly again. Only fifty planes received no damage of the 257 that made it over Germany's airspace.

The Luftwaffe lost 38 fighters. That's more than 2 squadrons worth of planes! Not unreconcilable but not a pittance either.

 

[loomaluftwaffe]

wow... how close was the campaign to actually being stopped? when a whole fleet doesn't make it back?

 

[carpenoctem1689]

Flak wasnt as useful, because there were means of disabling the radars that ranged the flak, the guns often werent concentrated enough (with many notable exceptions, but you couldnt cover all of germany with guns, but you could with planes moving at 100s of miles per hour). Flak, mainly the 88 was a good weapon and certainly could reach up and strike the formations of heavys, but B-17s and B-24s could take alot of damage, and flak is just small bits of metal moving at high-speeds due to an explosive 88mm in this case shell. It would take a direct hit on the aircraft, the death of pilot and co-pilot, or severe flap or engine damage to bring down a bomber of the size of the heavies. Also, in such a large formation, the odds you will hit the same bomber more than once are slim, making repeated near miss bring downs much less likely, they needed fighters and flak coordinated for maximum effectiveness.

 

[loomaluftwaffe]

what about losses on the German Side?

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

The Luftwaffe lost 38 fighters

out of interest are they american or german figures?

 

[bigZ]

Hi. First post and hopefully not my last.

Voted the Hurricane not because its my favorite but it is the plane that did more than any other to win the BOB, plus us Brits always love an underdog.

The 109 would have made a better showing if the NAZI's had maybe forced the cosmetic industry to cease the production of ladies makeup and made them concentrate on drop tanks as used in the the Spanish Civil War instead. Still even if they had this we could always fall back on strategic depth as shown later in France by the Germans.

Regarding a previous post regarding the use of Flak. Acording to my sources German flak required an average of 16,000 shells to knock down 1 B-17. Also toward the end of the war 1.25 million men were being used to man the guns in the Reich. Can't help thinking all that manpower and materials could have been better used elsewhere. Although visiable flak is a better morale booster than unseen effective nightfighters ask any Lanc pilot.

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

While I agree that it took a lot of FLAK to bring down bombers I dont think it was 16,000 shells for one bomber.

The only way to tell would be to find out how many were fired throughout the whole war, which we will never ever know.

In 1944 FLAK accounted for 3501 USAAF aircraft shot down. On March 24, 1944 72 British Bombers were lost over Berlin, 50 of them were shot down by FLAK.

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

i agree that Flak was vital, even in the BoB............

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

FLAK was more deadly and caused more problems than people think.

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

makes for a great scene in Downfall too "Using das flak as artilery"

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Even thought that is a German movie, I still have not seen it. I really would like to.

 

[bigZ]

My source for the 16000 rounds to 1 bomber down was taken form the 'Rise and Fall of the Luftwaffe' by Eagle editions.

Heres another source confirming the figure.

Pre-Nike (Anti Aircraft Guns)

German author Werner Muller in his book "The Heavy Flak Guns" said,"Based on average monthly ammunition consumption in 1944, it took 16,000 rounds of 88mm gunfire to bring down one four engine bomber."

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

Even thought that is a German movie, I still have not seen it. I really would like to.

it's a phenominal film you'll really enjoy it..........

 

[Ajax]

The Spitfire did alot to keep the spirits up of the brits on the ground, but stats-wise I should really vote for somthing else...

How could I betray the spitfire though? It's like an aussie opting for somthing fried instead of a BBQ...