The successor for the Ju-88?

[tomo pauk]

Ju-88 was one of the most known useful planes made in Germany, serving in the WW2 for some 5 years.
It's roles being bomber (of all kinds), fighter (ditto), recce plane etc, and in many of them it was the best LW was fielding in one moment or another. So you should specify it's successor, entering the WW2 somewhere in 1943. The plane should best the Ju-88 itself in most, if not all the roles - a design that is too 'tight', too small, might be a bad one. Please, make the specification plausible, with main 'ingredients' (engines, weapons, electronics, airframe construction methods etc.) being produced historically in the required time frame.

Another request from yours truly: keep the dirty politics worshiping away from the thread. Thank you.

 

[fastmongrel]

The Ju 188 with DB603 engines and a bigger bomb bay could have filled your requirements. The designers need a genuine 2,000hp plus engine to play with but not a multi bank monster.

 

[Erich]

the question still remains what to do with replacement of the Ju 88G-6 variant and future sub-types in the Night fighter capacity? lengthening of the fuselage to increase fuel load or replace altogether with the Me 262B-2 which would of had enclosed radar and fuel cells.

 

[tomo pauk]

Well, I'm looking at the best next-gen Ju-88 for 1943, primarily.
Anyway we cut it, it won't be as fast nowhere near the 262, but for 1943 (and beyond) there is still a need for an almost 550 km/h night fighter. With the Jumo-213 being as good as non-available for 1943, the 'designer' would be hard pressed to attain that kind of performance with the airframe used for the bomber's role, too. Of course, the succesor to the Ju-88 airframe should be somewhat better than the G-6, with same engine equipment.
The 262 can take over any time it's ready, but we are talking about late 1944/early 1945 - almost too late for this thread.

Hi, fastmongrel,

The Ju 188 with DB603 engines and a bigger bomb bay could have filled your requirements. The designers need a genuine 2,000hp plus engine to play with but not a multi bank monster.

Looks good; the 603s for the next-gen seem like a better thing than to mate them to the Me-410, ideally. Hmm, maybe the DB-610s would be too great to pass on, in case the airframe chosen happen to be a large one

 

[davebender]

Both aircraft require engines more powerful then the Jumo 211. The Ju-88G night fighter should be powered by DB603 or Jumo 213 engines. BMW 801 radial would be a good fit for the Ju-188 light bomber.

If RLM cannot provide 1,750hp engines then the Ju-88 should be replaced by the lighter Me-210 which had good performance when powered by DB605 engines.

 

[rank amateur]

I would say that ju 188 and ju 388 would have made fine successors if given sufficient development time and a couple of decent engines. I think the engines are the achiles heel for plane to follow in the ju 88 footsteps. You can go only so far with mw50. Perhaps we could start of with a cleaned up ju 188 fuselage perhaps slightly narrowed and with great emphasis on minimising drag. I understand the ju188 was considered only marginaly better than the ju88. For the bomber versions it would be advisable to have an internal bombload. Would it be such a bad idea to have 2 seperate fuselage versions? One for the heavy fighter end one for the torpedo/bomber version?

Or we could pick up the original schnell bomber concept: a bomber that depends primarily on it speed. In which case I would think somewhere in the lines of the mosquito: a fuselage just large enough to provide room for a 2 men cockpit, a 3000 kg bombload, fuel and 2 FDSL 131/1B remote-operated turrets. I would like to see a nosewheel, though I don't think it is really a must.

 

[davebender]

That would have been the Ju-288 which RLM effectively killed during December 1941.

 

[rank amateur]

Not really. The ju288 had a 4 men crew and was 3 m longer than the ju188 and had twice he weight. Though I have to admit that with the proper engine (jumo 222) it would have been more than sufficient.

 

[davebender]

Schnell bomber = Fast Bomber.
The Jumo 222A powered Ju-288 had a max speed close to 400mph. Isn't that fast enough for you?

 

[GregP]

Mosquito with DB 605's.

 

[GrauGeist]

What about the He219...it had the ability to do many of the things the JU88 did, especially night fighter ops.

 

[Juha]

Hello GrauGeist
IMHO Ju 88G-6 was a better night fighter than He 219A-5, so why?

IIRC LW bomber crews liked more Ju 88S than Ju 188, so it seems that they prefer Schnell Bomber idea, so maybe Ju 188 without the upper turret and a MG 81 in place of MG 151 nose cannon or maybe the Mossie with DB 605 engines like the Finnish Vihuri design. The WWII era twin, not the post-war trainer.

Juha

 

[rank amateur]

Schnell bomber = Fast Bomber.
The Jumo 222A powered Ju-288 had a max speed close to 400mph. Isn't that fast enough for you?

I take it that you missed out on the 'more than sufficient' part?

 

[rank amateur]

Hello GrauGeist
IMHO Ju 88G-6 was a better night fighter than He 219A-5, so why?

IIRC LW bomber crews liked more Ju 88S than Ju 188, so it seems that they prefer Schnell Bomber idea, so maybe Ju 188 without the upper turret and a MG 81 in place of MG 151 nose cannon or maybe the Mossie with DB 605 engines like the Finnish Vihuri design. The WWII era twin, not the post-war trainer.

Juha

I was also thinking of something like the Mosquito but with enough internal space for a decent bombload or else we'd be producing a me410 competitor. On the other hand, there is something to say for a plane that could replace both the ju 88/188 and the me 110/410.

 

[tomo pauk]

Okay, from 'classic' to 'radical' successor of the success story
A 'medium 88' design featuring somewhat larger bomb bay, capacity for 3 crew members in front of the bomb bay, laminar flow wing (goes for all proposals from your's truly), high lift devices like ones at Ar-240, engines ranging from Jumo 211 N/P/R, BMW-801 or DB-603 (depending on task availability).
The 'big 88' would be sized up to maybe Do-217, tailored towards DB-606/610 engines. A design better suited for bombing than for NF jobs (those should the succesor of the Bf-110 take over ).
An '88 mixer' would be a Douglas Mixmaster lookalike, two Jumos driving a prop each. Should be a good bomber NF.
The 'push-pull 88' is a clone of the Do-335, with two Jumos, but I'd really like to see such a design featuring the DB-610s at the ends. 6000 HP

 

[davebender]

Then why not just use the Do-217? It was an excellent airframe and unlike the Ju-88 it had a proper bomb bay.

 

[tomo pauk]

Well, my 'baby' would be tailored/stressed for about 2 times the engine power, with far better wings

 

[davebender]

The Do-317B was stressed to carry two 2,911hp DB610 engines. Max speed was 416mph. I doubt your "Super Ju-88" airframe could do any better.

 

[cimmex]

What was wrong with the 88 wing? AFAIK it was a strong and dive approved wing.
cimmex

 

[davebender]

In my opinion the Ju-88 requires only two major improvements.
- 1,750hp engines to boost power to weight ratio.
- An internal bomb bay able to carry at least four 250kg bombs.

I think the bomb bay can be fixed. The engine problem cannot be solved if RLM shoots down the DB603 as happened historically.