davebender
1st Lieutenant
The Ju-88 could dive bomb. The He-111 and Do-17 could not. Do we have historical data to compare bombing accuracy vs point targets like bunkers, bridges and artillery emplacements?
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The Ju-88 could dive bomb. The He-111 and Do-17 could not. Do we have historical data to compare bombing accuracy vs point targets like bunkers, bridges and artillery emplacements?
If true I think this would be a popular delivery method. So what if the airframe is only good for a few dozen missions? The target is destroyed and only a few bomber aircraft were required. Much less expensive in aircraft and aircrew then level bombing using hundreds of aircraft.As a dive bomber, the Ju 88 was capable of pinpoint deliveries of heavy loads
But you are only risking a single dive bomber squadron to take out a factory size target. As opposed to risking 500 or so heavy bombers to accomplish the same mission.left the bomber extremely vulnerable to both AA and fighter attack.
I realize that. But look at the flip side of the coin - a single squadron of heavy dive bombers (i.e. Ju-88s) can destroy an enemy factory or bridge. From a military point of view losing all 12 Ju-88s to destroy such a high value target is much less expensive then sending hundreds of heavy bombers which are likely to miss the target completely.Divebombing as a technique also proved very vulnerable to flak.
I realize that. But look at the flip side of the coin - a single squadron of heavy dive bombers (i.e. Ju-88s) can destroy an enemy factory or bridge. From a military point of view losing all 12 Ju-88s to destroy such a high value target is much less expensive then sending hundreds of heavy bombers which are likely to miss the target completely.
However, if you're going after small, hard-to-hit, high value targets like bridges, the equation is reversed because the bombers will probably miss the target, exposing themselves for no gain. This is where the higher risk of dive bombers pays off- the accuracy allows you to strike small, high value targets.
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Only if you hit it. Otherwise you just make a big splash in the water and kill a lot of fish.load up a few Lancasters with Grand Slam or Tallboy bombs and you wipe that bridge off the face of the earth
Only if you hit it. Otherwise you just make a big splash in the water and kill a lot of fish.
These massive bombs designed by Dr. Barnes Wallis reached the speed of sound during descent being streamlined and equipped with angled fins that produced a rapid spin. Penetrating the ground before exploding they worked by setting off shock waves that would bring down nearby structures. The 5.443 kg (12.000 lb) "Tall Boy" dropped from 6.096m (20.000 feet) made a 24 meter (80 feet) deep crater 30 meter (100 feet) across and could go through 4,88 meter 16 feet of concrete. On 8-9 June, 1944 eight Lancaster bombers of No. 617 Squadron used the deep penetration "Tall Boy" bomb in an attack against the Saumur Rail Tunnel. The new weapon proved its worth, but at the cost of losing 5 of the 8 bombers on this mission. Eventually 854 Tallboy bombs were used, the most note-worthy mission resulting in the destruction of the battleship Tirpitz
The "Grand Slam" (Earthquake) bomb was of the same design as the Tallboy but larger and heavier weighing 9.979 kg (22.000 lb). The Grand Slam was first used on 14 March, 1945 when a force of Lancaster bombers led by Royal Air Force Squadron Leader C.C. Calder attacked the Bielefeld railway viaduct destroying two spans. In another attack against submarine pens, (Bunker Valentin) near Bremen, two Grand Slams pentrated 4,5 meters of reinforced concrete. 41 Grand Slam Bombs were dropped by the end of the war mainly against bridges and viaducts.
In mid-1944 the British had to realize that with traditional weapons (torpedoes, mines and bombs) there was no way to put the Tirpitz out of commission permanently. At this time a new bomb was put into service, the "Tall Boy", a weapon developed under the direction of Professor Dr. Barnes Wallis, under whose leadership the 3.900 kg (8.600 lb) rotary water bombs, used with great success in the spring of 1943 on reservoir dams in Germany, also originated. The RAF Bomb Command thus received orders to attack the Tirpitz with the new "Tall Boy" bombs. With their weight of 5.443 kg (12.000 lb) they were the heaviest bombs ever built up to that time. In fact, the "Tall Boy" was a "Superbomb". It belonged to the category of thick-walled, teardrop-shaped GP bombs (GP "General Purpose", thus a multipleuse bomb) and were 6,35 meters (21 feet) long with a diameter of 0,95 meter (38 inches). Their warhead consisted of 2.358 kg (5.200 lb) of "Torpex", a highly explosive substance with a detonation speed of 7.600 meters (8.350 yards) per second (in comparison: the detonation speed of traditional TNT is "only" 6.900 meters (7.580 yards) per second). The ignition delay could be set to a maximum of eleven seconds. Such bombs could be carried only by the four engined bombers of the "Lancaster Mark I S" type, and then only one per plane, which also had to be rebuilt for this purpose. At the end of the war a total of 854 "Tall Boy" bombs had been dropped, of which 77 were dropped in the three attacks on the Tirpitz in September, October and November of 1944 alone. In the first attack, two direct hits on the bow was achieved, in the second only a near miss. In the decisive third attack there were three direct hits and one near miss. At the third attack, 12. November 1944, Tirpitz capsized and had to be written off as a total loss.
the Ju87B-1 (the model in service in 1939-1940), "was to prove effective in the hands of expert pilots, who, in dives of eighty degrees to within 2,300 feet from the ground, could deliver a bomb with an accuracy of less than thirty yards. Even average pilots could achieve a twenty-five percent success rate in hitting their targets
By comparison, US Army air forces typically designated a radius of 1,000 feet as the "target area" aim point for the "pickle-barrel" bombing conducted in Europe. "While accuracy improved during the war, [US Strategic Bombing] Survey studies show that, in the over-all, only about 20% of the bombs aimed at precision targets fell within this target area.
In 1938, "even well-qualified bomber crews could achieve only a two percent bombing accuracy in high-level, horizontal attacks (up to 13,500 feet), and twelve to twenty-five percent accuracy in low level attacks against targets of between 165 to 330 feet in radius
Eventually the twin-engine Ju88 "wonder bomber" (as the propaganda of the day called it), and even the He177 "heavy bomber" were to fall victim to the momentum of the dive-bomber craze. The original specifications and indeed the early prototypes of the Ju88 were quite good when compared to the fighters actually available during the Battle of Britain. "In March 1939, one of the first prototypes established a new 621 miles closed-circuit record by carrying a 4,409 lb. payload at an average speed of 321.25 m.p.h.."30 (The maximum speed for the Spitfire Mk 1: 355 mph, and that of the Hurricane Mk 1: 328 mph.) But, following extensive (about 25,000) modifications to meet the "dive-bomber" specifications and to provide for additional armament as well as a fourth crew member, the performance of the final production models of the Ju88 were disappointing. As an example, when the production version, Ju88A-1, arrived in September 1939 it had a maximum speed of only 258 mph, and a range of 550 miles with a 2,000-pound bomb load. With a maximum bomb load of 3,800 pounds performance was further reduced to 190 mph with a radius of just 250 miles! However, and this is significant in light of the reasons for the modifications to the original design: a production model, when properly flown under test conditions, could deliver 50 percent of its bomb load within a 50-meter circle