Do-335 ILO the Me-210? A Proposal.

[Juha]

Hello Dave
No I haven't have see that thread before but I have seen few other threads in which Hucks and LWD and Co argued, sometimes one can pick some new info from those but they are usually boring. I rather use my books, I have several on WWII night fighting/nightfighters and few on electronic equipments in use 39-45, one of which specialized on German equipment. Also Aders' and Streetly's books give good info on the electronic equipments of LW.

BTW, SES who wrote one message to that thread has very good site on German electronic equipments and LW night fighting tactics. He is a Danish Colonel (ret.) IIRC.

Merry Christmas to all!
Juha.

 

[Soren]

Here's what the Do335 nightfighter I am proposing will look like, only difference being that I would add one 30mm Mk103 cannon to either wing, like on the A-1, (Cutting the wing LE fuel tanks in two instead of having one long one in order to make room for the cannons ammo), plus have a small Spanner IV or FuG280 IR light detector in each cockpit.

Weapons pack:

3x 30mm Mk103 automatic cannons
2x 20mm MG151/20 automatic cannons
FuG 280 Kiel Passive IR detector
Spanner IV Passive IR detector
R4M AA rockets

Radar
FuG 220 Lichtenstein SN-2: metric radar
FuG 212 Lichtenstein C-1: decimetric radar
FuG351 "Korfu Z" Passive radar homing device with a range of 300km (Improved Naxos)
FuG 227 Flensburg: Metric radar detector


Navigation
Patin PKS 12: Course-steering autopilot
Peil G6: Radio direction finding equipment
Fu Bl 3 E w/AWG 1: Bad Weather Landing Aid w/ blind landing radio equipment
FuG 101: Bad Weather Landing Aid precision altimeter

Communications
FuG 10: Long range communications
FuG 16ZY: Mid range communications
FuG 25a: IFF (Identification Friend or Foe) Range 100km
FuG 120: Comm data link
FuG 24SE w/ZVG 24: Ground/Air Radio w/ homing device

 

[merlin]

Not the same thing. Like the Ju-290, the He-277 was a more or less conventional heavy bomber design with 4 tractor engines.

The Dornier tandem engine designs were unique.

No, the French Centre (Farman) 222 - 223 aircraft had four engines in two nacelles with tractor pusher engines. One of the latter variants made the first Allied attack on Berlin, because of its long range it went via Denmark - Baltic - south to Berlin!

 

[merlin]

Thanks Soren. Yes realised them being ait-cooled when I posted the pics. I had guessed they weren't as air-cooled inlines are not very common in WWII There was also a design of the Fokker using two Merlins, so judging from your info, this would have been a better option.

The DXXIII was powered by two 540 h.p. Walter Sagitta I-SR 12 cyl air-cooled engines. Several alternative power plants were considered, including the Junkers Jumo 210G, the Hispano-Suiza Xcrs and the Rolls Royce Kestrel XV, these alternatives were considered in Dec '38 before the prototypes first flight, but later the Merlin DB 601 were under consideration - max spedd 385 mph expected.
The aircraft was publically displayed at an aircraft exhibition in paris in 1938.

Perhaps, with the spoils of war Dornier should have taken over the project!?

 

[davebender]

Putting such long range cannon on a night fighter isn't necessary. Unless you also plan to use them in the daytime when you might get 1,000 meter kills vs B-17s using the new EZ-42 computing gunsight.

 

[Marcel]

The DXXIII was powered by two 540 h.p. Walter Sagitta I-SR 12 cyl air-cooled engines. Several alternative power plants were considered, including the Junkers Jumo 210G, the Hispano-Suiza Xcrs and the Rolls Royce Kestrel XV, these alternatives were considered in Dec '38 before the prototypes first flight, but later the Merlin DB 601 were under consideration - max spedd 385 mph expected.
The aircraft was publically displayed at an aircraft exhibition in paris in 1938.

Perhaps, with the spoils of war Dornier should have taken over the project!?

Prototype reached 535 km/h in testflight with the Walter Sagitta's. Germans examined the prototype, but were just interested in the nose-wheel configuration.

 

[Soren]

Putting such long range cannon on a night fighter isn't necessary. Unless you also plan to use them in the daytime when you might get 1,000 meter kills vs B-17s using the new EZ-42 computing gunsight.

It will provide quicker kills, and the IR sights will make 1,000+ meter shots at night possible. As for daytime attacks, the EZ42 is unnecessary, it was most useful against fast flying fighters, against bombers a normal sight is more than good enough.

 

[drgondog]

It will provide quicker kills, and the IR sights will make 1,000+ meter shots at night possible. As for daytime attacks, the EZ42 is unnecessary, it was most useful against fast flying fighters, against bombers a normal sight is more than good enough.

I wonder how ANY IR technology short of CCD would enable consistent kills at night at 100 meters, much less 1000 unless the Germans had a very sophisticated capability to slave a radar to the IR signature to enable ranging capability plus the required 'center of image' to enable sighting and hits..

 

[Soren]

I wonder how ANY IR technology short of CCD would enable consistent kills at night at 100 meters, much less 1000 unless the Germans had a very sophisticated capability to slave a radar to the IR signature to enable ranging capability plus the required 'center of image' to enable sighting and hits..

It's a matter of sighting the weapons for 1,000 meter shots with both types of sights before ever taking off. After that it's a matter of trial error until you get it right. But an attacking range of 600m would make abit more sence and improve hit probability. One successful burst and the bomber will be going down.

And ofcourse the tracking and identification of a bomber involved the use of radar, and the range estimation did as-well.

 

[drgondog]

It's a matter of sighting the weapons for 1,000 meter shots with both types of sights before ever taking off. After that it's a matter of trial error until you get it right. But an attacking range of 600m would make abit more sence and improve hit probability. One successful burst and the bomber will be going down.

Soren - as you know, the radar tecnology of the time was registering a 'return' as a spike with amplitude indicating range (and perhaps relative magnitude of the return). IR at the time was a 'blob' with zero definition and/or magnitude.

Sighting in on 'what' to calibrate 'what' for the IR. To me it is the equivalent of sighting in on a football stadium with IR and a relatively defined target in the meter x meter range for the optical sight - and how did they slave the IR to Radar for ranging?

 

[Soren]

As far as I know IR equipment wasn't just showing a blob back then, the Germans using some quite sophisticated imaging equipment. The Allies were no less than stunned when they saw how good the picture quality of German IR was as they tested their sets at the end of the war. The IR sets used on German panzers SPWs provided good quality vision out to 700m, while Allied IR sets of the same period had max range of around 30 meters.

In the Do-335 NF radar would be used to find the bomber, identify the range and the FuG280 or Spanner IV would then be used to fix the target in the sights of the pilot. When the pre-adjusted range for the armament sight combination was achieved the pilot could open fire on the target. And seeing that the IR sights were telescopic the pilot always had one eye clear for observation.