Germany's ideal late war fighter

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davparlr said:
I would think that this would significantly degrade the performance of the fighters, especially since the pre-late 1944 German fighters were marginal in the first place.
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It's a trade off of performance for increased armament and armour. Cannon gondolas and hundreds of kilograms of armour (191.6 Kg extra over the standard fighters 145.7 Kg on a Fw 190 A-8/R2) didn't do much for performance either.

Steve
 
Only until they are fired which should happen at the beginning of the engagement. Then you've got a lightweight Me-109G with hub cannon and two cowl MGs for self defense against bomber escorts.
 
I doubt those racks add much drag or weight.

In any case wooden wing racks were just a temporary solution. Proper rocket pods which attached to wing hard points were in the pipeline. The pods could be dropped if necessary, just like anything else attach to hardpoints. That's necessary for safety as WWII era FF rockets sometimes got stuck or miss fired.
 
For me it is obvious that the IDEAL late-war fighter would have been the Volksjager...
I am not talking about the He 162 as such, but a principle Volksjager, one which would arrive in 1944. The advantages are this: easy to build, faster than any allied escort fighter, strong cannon armament and requiring low-grade fuel.
Ideally, the Volksjager would also be easy to maintain and easy to fly. My personal favourite would be the Lippisch P.20 or the Blohm und Voss P.212.

davebender said:
Cheap, effective and reliable enough for the final year of WWII. However you need to start design work during 1943. Any aircraft program which begins 10 September 1944 is going to be too little too late.
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Totally.
 
easy to build, faster than any allied escort fighter, strong cannon armament and requiring low-grade fuel.
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He-162 easily meets those specifications. I doubt any other emergency fighter program proposal would be superior. In any case the program must begin before 10 September 1944 to have any chance for success.

Why not have Speer kick the program off within a few months of becoming Armaments Minister? Start development during the summer of 1942 with a mass production date of January 1944. 18 months to develop the aircraft and build production facilities. Aviation gasoline was in short supply by 1942 so the aircraft must be powered by something else.
 
Johnbr, the Lippisch P.15 was never accepted for production. It remained a paper project. In fact, I think I have found out that it is actually a Lippisch redesigned Heinkel He 162. As such it's a mixture of the Me 163 and He 162.

Well, the B&V P.211 was the first winner of the competition but in the end the He 162 was accepted because Heinkel had tricked the RLM into believing they had actually advanced further in the design. Their P.1073 design was however very different: it was a twin-engined fighter jet.
Be that as it may, I do agree that the He 162 design would have been sufficient for the Volksjager project. The resulting fighter of course suffered from too many defects, rushed as it was. In this fictitious/alternative Volksjaeger program more time would have been made available, maybe a year from design plans to first operations.
I wouldn't go so far as to have it start as 1942. It is a nice idea but too fantastic. Let's keep things realistic: your plans would make no sense as, one, there were no devestating American bomber offensives in 1942. And two, jet engines were still far away from active service. For sure you can imagine a priority shift to metallurgics for jet engines designs, but this would lead us too far. Let's keep it realistic: a simple single-engined jet fighter (He 178 style) designed in 1943. There were several jet fighter designs in 1943 by Messerschmitt, Focke Wulf, ...

Kris
 
Then stick with the Me-262. I think the airframe was more or less production ready during 1943. Messerschmitt was just waiting for RLM to place the Jumo 004 jet engine into mass production.

The Jumo 004A engine passed several 100 hour endurance tests during 1943. Some western front Jagdgeschwader could be equipped with Me-262s prior to the February 1944 "Big Week" bombing campaign. It all depends on engine production choices made by RLM.
 
Yeah, I like that idea. The Jumo 004A was rejected because it used too many rare alloys. But a limited production run might have been a good choice. (Though I did read once there were also technical problems with the Jumo 004A that were resolved with the 004B).

But the idea is to have an easily produced easily maintained fighter jet. The Me 262 is clearly a heavy fighter.

Also choosing the HeS 030 would be the perfect engine for such a small fighter!
Kris
 
There were technical problems with many wartime produced aircraft engines. Fw-190, P-38 and B-29 bomber come to mind. Wartime needs trump normal safety standards.
 
I read that the P-15 was given the go in a old usa report it even said were it was to be made.The perfect engine would have been the He-30.The He-30 was desiged to put out 2650lb's.Specifications

General characteristics
Type: Turbojet
Length: 2.72m
Diameter: 0.62m ()
Dry weight: 390kg (860lb)

Components
Compressor: Axial 5-stages
Combustors: 10 Cannular chambers
Turbine: Axial 1 stage
Fuel type: Gasoline
Oil system: pressure scavenge return

Performance
Maximum thrust: 860kp (1,896lb)the production was to put 2650lb's
Overall pressure ratio: 3:1 Pressure ratio
Power-to-weight ratio:
 
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HeS 030, talk about a wonder weapon, there is one!

If you take a look at the Lippisch P.15, and you compare it with the Me 163C and the He 162, it becomes clear that it was Lippisch proposal to improve the Heinkel He 162 with design features of the Me 163. We know it as the Lippisch P.15 which means that there was never an official RLM designation. As such it is very unlikely it was approved for production. Unlike the FW Ta 183, another paper project, for instance.

Kris
 
I'm under the impression the Me-262 and its jet engines were dirt cheap to mass produce.

Producing the Me-262 with Jumo 004A engines would increase production cost but it will be operational about 18 months sooner. It's up to the Luftwaffe commander to decide if that trade off is worthwhile.
 
Lippisch P-11 Delta was given the go and I have never is a official RLM designation.The P11 V1 was made the usa found the fuselage but not wings the V2 was lost in a raid.
 
It makes little difference which fighter jet Germany decides to produce. Most of them were vastly superior to existing prop driven aircraft.

Jet engines were the key component which determines when Germany can place a jet fighter aircraft into mass production. So IMO we should be discussing engines rather then airframes.
 
Germany's ideal late war fighter? Easy!

1) Built from propaganda speeches and building rubble.
2) Fueled by blind obedience.
3) Flown by minimally trained Weiner-Pups. (Which Germany had a curious excess of at this stage in the war.)
 
davebender said:
It makes little difference which fighter jet Germany decides to produce. Most of them were vastly superior to existing prop driven aircraft.
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This is something I just can't accept.
Even the Me 262 (along with the Arado Ar 234 the only German jet to see anything even close to a proper flight test program) was not so superior that it guaranteed invulnerability a huge kill margin every time.

Germany had some interesting research ideas going on of that there is no doubt but that is still years off of fielding properly tested designs which have been through a proper test schedule (and I'm talking structurals, weapons, fueling and all the rest as well as simply having an interesting outline shape).
Not to mention a proper evaluation of appropriate tactics, maintenance operational procedures.
All of which take years to implement properly.

The fact is by the end of 1944 Germany was so badly damaged (in terms of infrastructures) that German industry could have wheeled out a squadron of F 15 Eagles and it would have made little or no difference to the wars outcome.
Yes I exaggerate but this constant glossing over the practical obstacles to (then) advanced types seeing widespread use is IMO rather silly.
 
I agree with "Gixxerman" above.

Getting new types from prototype to service involves huge amounts of development,both of the aircraft and the logistics and infrastructure to support it. Even in late war Germany,cutting every corner that could be cut and then some,this took much longer than many seem to appreciate.
Some of the types being discussed were not even close to the prototype stage. Some were merely mock ups and literally years away from entering service.

There is a parallel tendency for people to want to add armament and armour or change engines,even on aircraft that were successfully in service,without taking account of just what such a program entails. It's easily written but hard to achieve. There are few exceptions and they are noteable for being exceptions.

Cheers

Steve
 
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