Ta183 vs Vampire

This has turned into an especially interesting thread.

lingo said:

This has turned into an especially interesting thread.

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It got off to a slow start
but I was hoping and sort of knew it would it would get interesting. By getting everybody on this forum to thrash out an argument on a little-documented type, we could end up with a reasonable pool of theories as to how it might have fared.

Waynos said:

Adler;

precisely. Which is why the Ta 183 would not have succeeded.

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Please explain how you can prove that? It was never built...

Waynos - I accidentally edited out the other portion of your original post when responding - sorry

Waynos said:

Not really - there could have been tooling and manufacturing considerations as well. Again, look where the Pulqui was to be built. At that time I don't think Argentina ever produced a production aircraft



Who are these "aerodynamicists"? How could they make such an assessment with out seeing wind tunnel data and testing?

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I wondered what had happened. I thought I was going insane
Is there any way to get it back as I don't have a copy and I was hoping several of the points I raised could be debated?

In answer to the questions posed by you and Adler though, I am referring to a point made in the book Luftwaffe secret Projects - Fighters 1939-45 by Walter Schick and Ingolf Meyer where, unfortunately, no names are given. I am not trying to offer it up as empirical proof as, as adler rightly points out, there is none. I am saying it is a viewpoint that I agree with. The line that Adler quoted above should have ended with 'in my opinion'.

I base that opinion on reading from the various histories on aircraft like the Hawker P.1040, Gloster Javelin, et al, where flutter was found to be s serious issue around the tail, threatening structural integrity and requiring modifications to be made.

There is no definitive link between these and the Ta 183, but none of the other aircraft had a tail as 'extreme' (for want of a better phrase) or slender in their design and the cure was relatively modest but still caused delays. My thinking is that if the structure of the tail of something a brutish as the Javelin was threatened by flutter, why on earth would the Ta 183 NOT be?

I also believe that the design of the Pulqui, at least in the tail area, was aerodynamically and structurally more mature than the Ta 183. I see no logical reason for it to be any other way and I don't think it would necessarily have been 'easier' to buil;d that the former, which was designed to be built rapidly in austere conditions anyway, even to the extent of using plywood.

I supposed that what I am basically saying is that IF I was in a postion where I was in charge of Luftwaffe procurement and I was told "you have the funding, time and resourses to put ONE of these designs into service (a luxury that did not really exist) I would have picked the Me P.1101.

Side issue, Does anyone (apart from me) think that the Saab 32 Lansen was lifted directly from the Me P1110 in its Feb 45 configuration ?

Waynos said:

I wondered what had happened. I thought I was going insane
Is there any way to get it back as I don't have a copy and I was hoping several of the points I raised could be debated?

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Sorry, I tried but the internet gods already swallowed it up

I thought it would still be on the laptop but when I rushed downstairs to make a copy I saw my wife just closing the lid, bitch!

I will try to remember some edited highlights, though they may spark more argument than debate as without their original explanations, which I don't have the heart to type out all over again, they may look a little curt and confontational. Sorry if this is the case as it was not written like that originally. Also flyboyj I have edited the last post on the previous page with a bit more explanation of my position, you may have missed it as I didn't realise we had gone over the page.

So, in a nutshell. Pic of Ta 183 with drag chute = cgi drawing with photo grain added for realism, a fake, but a very good one.

I also replied that the wind tunnel would not have shown a flutter issue, these never manifested until the flight test stage even into the 1950's as the test models were naturally solid and therefore stiffer.

I agreed with Delycross that it was Multhopp who penned the Ta 183 and added it was Tank who was trying different tails. I think he thought it migh be flawed, or at least wanted to examine other possibilites which I realise is not necessarily the same thing. Multhopp stuck with the 'thin fin' and it was this that was being built. I don't know why Tank could not simply overrule him, but I think that testing would have proven Tank correct and made the Ta 183 unsuitable for service *in that form* which (new stuff - not a retread) *I THINK* basically removes it from the competition with the Vampire as, in a continued war, a modified aircraft based on Tanks Design III would have faced the DH 107, not the Vampire. That is a face off I cannot begin to guess at as even less is known about the DH 107 than about the Design III. I don't believe the P.1101 would have had as troublesome a time, which again, I know is just my theory and not provable.

I'm sure I have forgotten stuff, and I have certainly added stuff, but hey, roll on guys!

Waynos said:

Side issue, Does anyone (apart from me) think that the Saab 32 Lansen was lifted directly from the Me P1110 in its Feb 45 configuration ?

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According to the Putnams SAAB Aircraft since 1937 the Lansen was originally to have been a larger, twin-engined machine designed to meet the Air Force specification for a recce/attack/night fighter to replace the B-18 and the DH Mosquito fleets. At one time a flying wing configuration was studied (as the 1119) before it was realised that it had become too big and expensive to proceed. The Lansen (project 1150) was the final design. Even then SAAB moved cautiously, testing the 39 degree swept wing on a Safir.
The Lansen was Swedens first true 'systems' aircraft and special development went into the integration of the electronic and weapons systems. The aerodynamic configuration caused many problems mainly the rear fuselage and its integration with the movable tailplane (solved after observing flow in a water tank) and the large Fowler flaps. Originally to have had flush engine intakes it had to be modified to have more open variety. The designers may well have been aware of the Me P1110 study, but it seems it was purely a step by step approach to the finished Lansen.

I guess I need to learn how to C&P pictures...

Grau Geist's drawings clearly show that the Mk II and III were completely different machines. The MkII is the far more radical design, and has been the focus of this discussion. It is very different from all the a/c discussed here, having very little in common with either the Tunnann or the La-15. Note how the wings begin very far forward and extend past the aft fuselage. Nothing like either of the other a/c. Both those, and the Ta 183 III, are are far more conventional in fundamental design than is the Mk II. All three use conventional elevators for pitch control, whereas the Mk II uses elevons. It seems to me that the 'tailplane' served to provide a modicum of aft lift to provide trimming so that flaps could be used to reduce landing speeds. Maybe someone here knows...

Tank's ill-fated (and handling...)Pulqui II was also essentially conventional in design. It is much more similar to the other early swept-wing jets than it is to the Mk II. It would be helpful if someone could post 3-way drawings of the Pulqui, Tunnan, and La-15 for comparison to the Ta 183's. Then everyone here could see that the Ta 183 II's configuration is radically different from the other jets.

My argument is not that the Ta 183 II is inherently flawed. Only that other a/c designers chose not to emulate it. Not even Tank...This suggests that people far more learned in fighter design than ourselves believed that it had little to offer, despite its futuristic appearance, And because there is nothing of similar design to extropolate its probable flying qualities from, speculation is essentially moot.

Waynos: I was not implying that the Cutlass was inspired by the '183. I was just referring to it because it was the only operational tailless swept-wing design that I could think of. And in reference to the Me P.1100's influence on Saab fighters, I think you mean the Tunnan, not the Lancer. The Tunnan IS very similar to the Messerschmitt.

JL

Here you go Butters. Pulqui II and J-29 (thanks Butters - I think that is what's called a freudian slip)





While looking for images I stumbled across this drawing of the two unpowered gliders used for early tests and noticed a rather obvious feature pertinent to this discussion;



Now a couple of rather poorer qualitiy images. This first one shows the 'production' version of the Me P.1101, and although such things are purely subjective, it may illustrate why I rate it much more highly than the Ta 183;



and finally Butters, I went off topic a bit but I did mean the Lansen in my earlier post. I was referring to this design below.

A couple of interesting points I noticed from lingo's very informative and interesting post above is that the Lansen was originally supposed to have flush intakes (look below!) and also, at a slight stretch, SAAB's project number seems to match the format of Messerschmitts very closely indeed! (although to be fairt so did Hawkers )



sorry for cluttering up the board.

Thanks, Wayno

I get it now, re; Lansen. And I hate to nitpick about the favor you did me, but the top a/c should be labelled Pulqui II, not Ta 183.

JL

Multhopp his team tested the various Ta-183 designs in windtunnels as-well as with scale models of the a/c to termine how it would perform in the air. After various tests and some minor corrections, leading to the design II mostly depicted today, the design was considered solid and capable. Attention then went on to the construction methods, tools materials needed to produce the a/c.

The design chosen was as already mentioned Design II which used elevons for controlling pitch roll as this was found to improve turn performance with a wing swepped as highly as that of the Ta-183 (Experience from the Me-163 project), and for lateral stability a long swepped tail with a high placed horizontal stabilizer purely for trim and stability was added.

Knowing the aerodynamic properties of the a/c and engines to be used an expected peformance figure was extrapolated, and they were phenomenal for their time, suggesting a top speed of 967 km/h and a climb rate of over 6,100 ft/min with the HeS-011 engine.

Two production models with different engines were submitted as the final design for full scale prototype testing:
Jumo 004

HeS-011


And there's really no doubt that after just a couple of the full scale prototype tests were completed it would've been realized that the design needed either wing fences or more preferably automatic LE slats to ease the nasty stalling characteristics of a wing that highly swepped. The slots on the Me-163 were added for the very same reasons.

Soren said:

And there's really no doubt that after just a couple of the full scale prototype tests were completed it would've been realized that the design needed either wing fences or more preferably automatic LE slats to ease the nasty stalling characteristics of a wing that highly swepped. The slots on the Me-163 were added for the very same reasons.

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Exactly! Look at what was done with the MiG-15 as far as wing fences!

Yes, I agree. My doubts however were not about the wing. Butters, I've edited it now, what was I thinking?

FLYBOYJ said:

Exactly! Look at what was done with the MiG-15 as far as wing fences!

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Yeah I believe wing fences would've been added very early on in the testing phase, either that or slats. But considering that the production and installation of wing fences was a lot cheaper, faster less complicated than adding automatic LE slats I believe wing fences would've been chosen, just like on the MIG-15, considering the situation Germany was in by then.

The Soviets captured more than 2,000 German aerodynamicists at the end of the war (A LOT more than the Brits US were able to get a hold on), and many of them came to work for the Soviet a/c manufacturers right away. And there's absolutely no doubt that the MIG-15 was the direct result of this. By the end of the war the Germans were a long way ahead in high speed aerodynamic research, and their knowledge proved invaluable to the development of new a/c by both the US, Britsh and the Soviets. And looking at the different designs it seems that esp. the US primarily had their focus on designs by Messerschmitt AG while the Soviets seemed more focused on the designs by Focke Wulf AG although many of the innovations by Messerschmitt were utilized as-well in other projects.

The F-86 was pretty much a mix of the Me-262 P.1011 design, while the MIG-15 pretty much was just a modified Ta-183 benefitting from the experience with wing fences by Messerschmitt.

Waynos said:

In answer to the questions posed by you and Adler though, I am referring to a point made in the book Luftwaffe secret Projects - Fighters 1939-45 by Walter Schick and Ingolf Meyer where, unfortunately, no names are given. I am not trying to offer it up as empirical proof as, as adler rightly points out, there is none. I am saying it is a viewpoint that I agree with. The line that Adler quoted above should have ended with 'in my opinion'.

I base that opinion on reading from the various histories on aircraft like the Hawker P.1040, Gloster Javelin, et al, where flutter was found to be s serious issue around the tail, threatening structural integrity and requiring modifications to be made.

There is no definitive link between these and the Ta 183, but none of the other aircraft had a tail as 'extreme' (for want of a better phrase) or slender in their design and the cure was relatively modest but still caused delays. My thinking is that if the structure of the tail of something a brutish as the Javelin was threatened by flutter, why on earth would the Ta 183 NOT be?

I also believe that the design of the Pulqui, at least in the tail area, was aerodynamically and structurally more mature than the Ta 183. I see no logical reason for it to be any other way and I don't think it would necessarily have been 'easier' to buil;d that the former, which was designed to be built rapidly in austere conditions anyway, even to the extent of using plywood.

I supposed that what I am basically saying is that IF I was in a postion where I was in charge of Luftwaffe procurement and I was told "you have the funding, time and resourses to put ONE of these designs into service (a luxury that did not really exist) I would have picked the Me P.1101.

Side issue, Does anyone (apart from me) think that the Saab 32 Lansen was lifted directly from the Me P1110 in its Feb 45 configuration ?

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Very good book up there by the way. I own it as well.

I just don't believe that we can say an aircraft will be successful or not without it being built. One can always change the design of things. I like to think that they would have been smart enough to do so. Also Soren added some good info about the fences and slats.

I do believe it was Focke Wulf that devised wing fences. The book me and adler share an admiration for refers to the Mig 15 having a Focke Wulf wing and the F-86 having a Messerschmitt wing, in terms of design concept. I think the P.1101 drawing I posted earlier bears that out as far as the F-86 goes. The same book also points out the similarity between the McDonnell XF-88 and a Focke Wulf design too.

I just don't believe that we can say an aircraft will be successful or not without it being built. One can always change the design of things. I like to think that they would have been smart enough to do so. Also Soren added some good info about the fences and slats.

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Nothing much there to argue with Adler , except, for the first part, Is it any more unreasonable to look at the real life tribulations in this area, shared universally by aircraft manufacturers around the world, and deduce that the Ta 183 might have been in line for the same results, than it would be to blithely assume that the Ta 183 would have progressed majestically untroubled by any tail flutter issue for no reason at all?

It is interesting to me that the glider test models of the Pulqui II seemed to try both versions of the tail, yet the T a183 style version was not selected. Its nothing concrete of course but it does suggest the tail design of the Ta 183 would have caused delays.

For the second part of what you said, about mods, that is my point. The delays brought about by redesign would, in my view, have put the Ta 183 up against the DH 107, not the Vampire. Or are only German 'what if's allowed in an extended war? It was only the end of the fighting in Europe and the sudden guillotining of funds that stopped the DH 107, and delayed the service entry of the Vampire. From the accounts I have read, it resembled a scaled down single engined DH 110 (or even a more modestly swept DH 108 with a Vampire tail) and the prototype would have been constructed with Vampire components plus a new wing, a la Hawker P.1052 which was also, incidentally, first proposed by Sydney Camm in 1945. So ( I would hope) the match would have been closer.

An underdeveloped prototype undergoing modifications in 1946 is no antidote to operational squadrons of Vampires (or P-80's)

Anyway, I know we disagree, but that is why I think what I do.

edit to add, OMG!! Can it really be true that the aerodynamically closest flying aircraft to the T a 183 was the Handley Page Victor?? with a shorter fin, naturally. The design concept, as described eloquently in previous posts is, I have just realised, exactly the same. Even down to the tail being added for trim to a basically tailless design. Crikey!

Soren said:

Yeah I believe wing fences would've been added very early on in the testing phase, either that or slats. But considering that the production and installation of wing fences was a lot cheaper, faster less complicated than adding automatic LE slats I believe wing fences would've been chosen, just like on the MIG-15, considering the situation Germany was in by then.

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And I remember reading that this was the reason why Mikoyan went with wing fences. Even with that the aircraft yawed a bit on landing. I flew in a UTI and noticed this when we were over the numbers.

Those are great drawings, Soren. It is too bad that the nearly completed prototype captured by the Americans was so badly damaged. It would have interesting to have it flown.

Wayno has summed up my view on the subject. Anyway, here's a so-so vid of a turbine-powered RC Ta 183.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95cB9qXflLk

JL

Waynos said:

Nothing much there to argue with Adler , except, for the first part, Is it any more unreasonable to look at the real life tribulations in this area, shared universally by aircraft manufacturers around the world, and deduce that the Ta 183 might have been in line for the same results, than it would be to blithely assume that the Ta 183 would have progressed majestically untroubled by any tail flutter issue for no reason at all?

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I agree that it would not have gone untroubled. Like all early jets (especially one that is an advanced design), it is going have problems.

Waynos said:

For the second part of what you said, about mods, that is my point. The delays brought about by redesign would, in my view, have put the Ta 183 up against the DH 107, not the Vampire. Or are only German 'what if's allowed in an extended war? It was only the end of the fighting in Europe and the sudden guillotining of funds that stopped the DH 107, and delayed the service entry of the Vampire. From the accounts I have read, it resembled a scaled down single engined DH 110 (or even a more modestly swept DH 108 with a Vampire tail) and the prototype would have been constructed with Vampire components plus a new wing, a la Hawker P.1052 which was also, incidentally, first proposed by Sydney Camm in 1945. So ( I would hope) the match would have been closer.

An underdeveloped prototype undergoing modifications in 1946 is no antidote to operational squadrons of Vampires (or P-80's)

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Actually there we agree. That is why I don't really care for this comparison between the Ta 183 and the Vampire. I don't see it as a realistic match up.