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The rudder lacked trim in all variants, and made for tired right legs in the Bf 109 pilot community after a mission. The cockpit was narrow and there was no good way to get decent leverage on the stick sideways. Hence, Bf 109 pilots usually had good arm muscles.
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The above flight characteristics, true for ALL variants of the Bf 109 are why the Bf 109K was not really a danger if it was going fast. if it was at 450 mph, it was going TO or FROM a fight, but it wasn't dogfighting. At 450 mph, it was at a speed where the airframe was VERY stable in a straight line and greatly reluctant to be coaxed from that line to any great degree. To dogfight, it needed to be slower, which usually meant in a steep climb. They tended to be firing at bombers going down through the formation and then maybe dogfight with fighters, if required, when going back up at slower speeds for another pounce. If not, they did the next pounce from the high perch.
I am not sure the idea of peasant woodworkers really holds up. The Lagg's were constructed in large part with some pretty heavy duty "wood" components. From Wiki so usual disclaimer.
"Its airframe was partially made of wood delta-veneer (a resin-wood multi-ply veneer composed of very thin, 0.35 to 0.55 mm, wood veneer and phenol formaldehyde resin, baked at high temperature and pressure) used for the crucial parts."
I bolded the crucial parts. I am sure there were a number of not so crucial parts that were made out of ordinary wood.
Much like with the Mosquito the idea that WW II 350mph aircraft made of "wood" were closely related to the wooden aircraft of WW I needs to be thrown in the rubbish bin.
Shortround said:"Its airframe was partially made of wood delta-veneer (a resin-wood multi-ply veneer composed of very thin, 0.35 to 0.55 mm, wood veneer and phenol formaldehyde resin, baked at high temperature and pressure) used for the crucial parts."
When the veneers have been dried to their specified moisture content, they are conveyed to a
layup operation, where a thermosetting resin is spread on the veneers. The two main types of resins are
phenol-formaldehyde, which is used for softwood plywood and exterior grades of hardwood plywood, and
urea-formaldehyde, which is used to glue interior grades of hardwood plywood. The resins are applied by
glue spreaders, curtain coaters, or spray systems. Spreaders have a series of rubber-covered grooved
application rolls that apply the resin to the sheet of veneer. Generally, resin is spread on two sides of one
ply of veneer, which is then placed between two plies of veneer that are not coated with resin.
Added to that, the skilled labour needed to work this ,etal was in acute short supply in wartime Russia. Not so their skilled workers in woodworking. There were plenty of peasants able to work in wood that could not work in light alloys like Duralumin
There must have been tremendous competition for bodies between conscription and production.Skills were in deficit in USSR (not Russia) across all industries and problem of "brak" (defect) was common and persistent everywhere.
There must have been tremendous competition for bodies between conscription and production.
According to Harrison, of the nearly 2 million workers employed in the sector all but 215000 were unskilled or semi skilled in 1941. Since more than 60% of workers were press ganged peasants, it becomes unassailable that the majority of the workforce were ex-peasants. Later in the war, this massive imbalance between skilled and unskilled was partially redressed, with Gosplan reporting 1 in 5 of the annual intake of 800000 workers being in the skilled category.
There must have been tremendous competition for bodies between conscription and production.
I think you'll find there were a lot of early teens working maybe even younger. When someone's trying to exterminate you all, you're not going to need pressure to go and help wherever you can. Every family in the USSR lost someone in that war."...and statistics".
According to Gennady Kostyrchenko who has assisted Mark Harrison:
Jan 01, 1941- total workforce in aviation industry 466400, including 174361 workers at aircraft and engine building factories.
Jan 01 1942 - total 610300.
Jan 01 1944 - total 640213 and 435385 workers overall (factories and elsewhere).
Jan 01 1945 - total n/a (presumably about 620000), 273100 workers at aircraft and engine building factories.
Above numbers are taken from the works of Kostyrchenko published in various years, for example:
Авиационная промышленность СССР накануне и в годы ВОВ. 1939-1941 гг. Г.В. Костырченко
"60% of workers were press ganged peasants" - sorry, but this is not about aviation industry certainly. And I doubt this is about USSR military industry in 1940s at all.
There is no question that the wooden aircraft were built of something more than just rough wooden planks, but sometimes the material did not quite live up to its intended design. There were plenty of quality problems which resulted in the Delta wood material delaminating or otherwise failing. Also, just because the material was high tech does not mean that the labour doing the manufacturing was up to the same standard.
There were plenty of quality control problems there as well.
Lastly, the wooden structures were not nearly as strong as comparable weight all-metal structures but their strength degraded with time so that by end of the war, early aircraft that had miraculously survived for that long may not have been safe to fly. At the time of manufacture, this was not a great concern since the life span of the aircraft in service was averaged no more than a few weeks.
- Ivan.
Phenol-formaldyhide resin is a standard component of a lot of types of plywood, which us usually made under pressure and heat. In fact what you are describing is just a pretty standard way of making plywood though they had their own methods.
The Russians did have a very long history of using certain types of wood for sophisticated purposes going back centuries. Birch in particular. To this day they specialize in their own distinct types of birch plywood. One thing you have in Siberia is a lot of trees.
If you want to get into something slightly more exotic they were incorporating bakelite into the bodies of Yak-9s by late 1943...
Hi KevinJ,
. I show the Bf 109F starting in 1939 and, by the end of 1940, I show 4,1280 Bf 109Fs produced by the end of 1941, with F production total being 5,460, all delivered by the end of 1942. .
Design work may have started in 1939. The V 21, V 22, V 23, and V 24 don't fly until the summer of 1940? An early production schedule called for 133 109F-1s to produced from July of 1940 until Dec 1940. But plans don't always work out. In any case some sources claim the first 109F-1 showed up in Stab/JG 51 by Oct 6th 1940 when Werner Molders flew it. He did fly it on a combat sortie until Oct 25th. By the beginning of Nov 1940 several other units had gotten 1 or more F-1s, first combat loss was Nov 11th. (Oblt. Greorg Claus)Wow! they were producing the 109F in 1939? How many did they produce in 1940? 1941 and 1940 seem to be mixed together in the sentance above...
As I write this I happen to be in Siberia. In a local newspaper handout, the cover was a Babushka (old woman) dressed in factory overalls adjusting a heavy duty lathe. From her age I would guess a "Rosie the machinist". My Mom graduated from HS at 15 and was a "Rosie the spot welder" building cowlings for B-24 and B-17's. One can be trained to do a specific task, it's how the military functions and always has functioned in wartime with it's plethora of teenagers. In the South Pacific Captain Gatch, standing on South Dakota's bridge, surveying the scene below remarked to another officer about his mostly teen age crew.
Yes, the plywood wonders didn't hold up well and weren't expected to. Even the lightweight alloys used in some Japanese aircraft have crystallized over the years and a considerable headache for museum preservation types.
When one looks at the fine workmanship of USA made aircraft, it was apparent this was still a luxury operation.
I am a few blocks from the amazing Opera House her sin Novosibirsk, the Russians do this sort of thing very well, The most amazing part about it? Finished in April 1945, as if they weren't otherwise busy?
That is interesting thank you, I still find it amazing that they were producing 109F's in 1940, such a sophisticated design for that early on. It really is remarkable.