Buchons, Spits, Bearcats, and a real Pilot

[Chingachgook]

X

 

[Kurfürst]

I very much doubt this pilot's opinion can be seriously considered. He seem to carry an odor of bias and spitdweebism. It can be weighted against the comments of Hanna and Southwood, both who are far more balanced in their views, and both consider the Buchon inferior to the G-2/trop, especially handling and speed-wise.

Now as for the Buchon, it's obviously not as clean as the original 109G, that Merlin-cowling really ruins aerodynamic with it's odd bumps and awful spinner design; sticking Hispano in the wings doesn't help the 109 airframe either. The fact that he complained - perhaps somewhat exaggrevatedly, given the bias - about E-bleed seems to underline the aircraft is either overdraggy or underpowered, or both.

The engine itself is AFAIK a Merlin 45 (ie. Spit V!) deriviative, that's not on par with the original DB 605A either, though the single staged Merlins were about a 100 kg lighter. As I recall when during the war in Germany they put a DB 605 in a captured SpitV, it become quite a bit faster, not slower.

I'd rather doubt that the draggier Buchon with and oldie single staged Merlin would be even nearly as fast as the original G-2. That data is probably just not reliable. The cruise speed claimed (318mph) tells a lot, the original 109Gs were rated at around 370 mph max cruise, and the data listed for the 109G in the first page is also dead wrong.

 

[Kurfürst]

Also keep in mind that the brits usually claim peak outputs as engine power, whereas others typically just SL outputs. That arbitrary makes the former engines look more powerful. Ie. a DB 605A would be 1475 PS (at SL) by it's official specs, by British specs it would be an 1550 PS engine (as they would quote it's output at peak, ie. 2100m).

 

[Chingachgook]

X

 

[Soren]

The engine used by the Buchon is the Rolls Royce Merlin 500/45 and is rated at 1,600 HP, NOT 1,400 HP !, and I shouldn't have to point that out more than twice.

And Kurfürst certainly isn't talking in circles Chinny, he's infact the one who knows the most about the 109 on this entire forum so I'd be very careful about entering a discussion with him on this subject if you're not 100% certain of what you're talking about.

PS: The one who's biased here is you Chinny, the comments made by you above and in the past clearly demonstrates this - you like flinging out accusations.

 

[Chingachgook]

X

 

[twoeagles]

With port wine injection, it is 1,610...

(Apologies, just wanted to lighten this up. It's not my thread, so carry on!)

 

[Chingachgook]

X

 

[Kurfürst]

You are talking yourself in circles Kurfurst.

If the Merlin is as gutless as you say, then that would make the Buchon have less drag, not more. The Buchon will do almost 420mph. Hinton backs this up - he said it was significantly faster than the MkVB and MkIX that they were running with it.

Amazing. Put an appearantly weaker engine into an aircraft, add proturbulances onto the cowling, and it go faster. Not only faster, it will go 420 mph at 13000 ft. That's about the speed of the last, largely cleaned up Bf 109K at this altitude using ultimate 2000 HP engine of the DB 605 line .

Amazing isn't it, Messerschmitt and DB put hundreds and thousends of man hours into refinining the airframe and raising engine output, whereas all they would have to do is weld an obsolate version Merlin from fallen oldie MkV Spitfires onto a Gustav airframe and put a crude cowling on it - which is what the Buchon is..

You show your own bias calling Hinton a spitdweeb, you should be so lucky as to fly the planes that has flown and for as long as he has flown them. FYI, Hinton expressed a serious dislike for IX and XIV, but because he likes the VB you discount his remarks?

Well I had only your presentation of what Hinton would actually said, and I agree, given that you're the interpreter, there's a good amount of chance that what he said was 'lost in translation', and maybe it's more safe to ignore it to prevent Mr. Hinton getting an undeserved bad reputation that is probably more fitting for the interpreter.

You make assumptions on the fly and you make them based on your own bias just like Soren.

Like noting that if you reduce engine output and increase drag the plane will go slower, not faster than the original...?

Maybe this is hard for you to follow but I am sure it's fairly logical for the rest of us. Sorry, I just deal in facts. Engine outputs, flight trials with an orginal MkV fitted with a DB 605A+cownling which made it faster than with a Merlin 45+cowling (=Buchon), Mtt reports on cowling development and drag suggest that any claim for 420 mph top speed at 13k ft for the Buchon is a very unreasonable figure.

If adding a DB 605 with a 109cowling onto an Spit V airframe with a Merlin 45 and it's associated cowling made the Spit V faster, then it's fairly simple to reverse engineer what happens if a DB 605 and it's original cowling gets replaced by Merlin and it's associated cowling.

I do more wind tunnel work than anyone you are ever likely to meet. I have to laugh every time someone says something as ignorant as your remark about the Buchon cowl. Anyone that makes aerodynamic assumptions based on how something looks is usually clueless about aerodynamics.

Such big words. So tell us, oh fountain of wisdom, how what are your professional observations about the Buchon cowling? Detail them please. And where do you work ? I am finding it hard to believe even a small percantage of what you claim, given the nonsense you're pushing forward and the generic ignorance showed that even I, a mere enthusiast can see immidiately..

No, I don't work in the aerodynamic field. But I doubt you do. After all, you're throwing out generalized feelings and such, based on pilot stories and specifications from popular booklets.. And appearantly you don't even have any clue about how engines work, how they convert power into thrust, or that their power curve varies greatly with altitude and it's fairly meaningless to throw around maximum power outputs and maximum top speeds because the two quite simply most of the time do not relate to each other directly. '
If the Merlin is as gutless as you say' - I would really expect more from an allegadly professional, trained engineer than just to vaguely refer to 'the Merlin' without understanding that the many Marks of this engine had very different capabilities, and would make specific comments to the specific engines.

 

[mad_max]

Kurfy posted:

that their power curve varies greatly with altitude and it's fairly meaningless to throw around maximum power outputs and maximum top speeds because the two quite simply most of the time do not relate to each other directly.

Good gawd I actually agree with something Kurfy posts.

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

This is a good conversation guys. Just make sure that you all play nice.