1. V-1 bombing (and to a larger extent, V-2 bombing) was not nor would ever be an effective interdiction weapon. Accuracy was never available in WW2 to provide a reasonable one bomb one hit performance. Probably, this would not become available until GPS entered the scene. Without this, the Germans were throwing pin pricks at the Brits (unless it was you who was at ground zero). .
Both the V1 and V2 were always meant to have precise electronic guidance systems. It was decided to employ them with crude guidance primarily because they could be gotten into service quicker. Guidance systems did however continue to be developed: for instance about 25% of V2 launched used an electronic beam.
The V1 'worked' as a weapon, despite its inaccuracy, because it was cheap. It could perform the equivalent of area bombardment. Of the 9000 launched some 2000 are credited with getting through which is credited with damaging 110,000 houses. I assume, following the 80:20 rule, that perhaps only 22,000 of those houses were thoroughly destroyed. The first V1 to reach London in fact destroyed a railway bridge not a house. The V1 would be destroying factories, shops, warehouses, bridges, offices in proportion to their area.
Assuming the system had an accuracy of 8km, how much would it be worth to double this accuracy to 4km or 2km or 1km or even 100m? That latter kind of accuracy
was available in WW2 from systems such as
Oboe or its German equivalent
EGON II. In Oboe simple morse code signals gave simple commands to the pilots and observer, in EGON II with Nachtfee a dial pointed to the commands, about 20. What's to stop the commands being used to trim a modified heading into the autopilot? The smarts, the expensive precision was in the ground station.
Because the V1 was a cheap weapon doesn't mean It couldn't be upgraded to an more expensive but much more accurate guided version and that this would mean the weapon was no longer worthwhile.
More range and accuracy widens the range of targets outside of the Greater London area and makes it possible to target large factories.
2. Improving speed, range, and survivability would not have much of an impact on British logistics. Even if all the 9000+ V-1 launched hit London, it would have had little impact on the war. In just one 24 hour period, Bomber Command dropped 10,000 tons of bombs on the Germans, and they still fought on effectively. How many tons of bombs were being dropped on Germany on a daily bases? I suspect a lot more than 9000 tons, the total amount of all the V-1s. .
The Arado works in Late 1943 employed 16,000 people in production of the Heinkel He 177 while a large number were likely at Heinkels own facility. If 16000 people worked a 48 hour week they produced 768,000 hours. This could produce in 1 week:
1 2,194 V1's at 350 hours each. (I fact about a production rate of 10,000 month is what seems to have been available)
2 192 V2 missiles at 4000 hours each (the figure for the 10,000th produced)
3 38.4 He 177 at 20,000 hours each. In fact the 20,000 hours is the Lancaster number (probably without engines) and a He 177 would be nowhere near that. I'd say 25 a week max. I believe the Germans were hoping for 200/month at one point with all plants.
It seems that by shifting the He 177 workforce to V1 production the Luftwaffe achieves a capacity of about 16000 to 20000 missiles a month which is 16000 to 20000 tons a month.
How many 10000 ton raids could Bomber command run per month? Launching and transporting a V1 required manpower but I'm sure its nothing compared to training a bomber crew, maintaining airfield defences and a fighter force. It's clear also the V1 was going to need improvements to improve its survivability.
However if V1 or V2 accuracy gets in the 1km range significant effects are likely to be achieved. Factor in improvements, such as a proximity fuse to airburst the missile (say near and airfield) the weapon starts to look disruptive.
The V2 looks not so bad compared to the V1 if explosives delivered are the metric as it achieved nearly 100% reliability in its final versions and couldn't be shot down. Of course the V1 lead to the direct death of 70 RAF fighter pilots engaged in interception not including others lost in the attacks on V1 launch sites.
In terms of guidance the V1 was to receive the Ewald II or Ewald-Sauerkirsche midcourse guidance system with which about 2km accuracy. I doubt the little bit of electronics would have increased the cost of the V1 by much. Assume the electronics doubles the price of the autopilot and our missile now costs 470 hours to make not 350 but in return for that our accuracy is 2km. If it is desired to attack the towns around Castle Bromwich (spitfire factory) or Birmingham either a turbojet is required or the V1 warhead needs to be reduced to half a ton. I doubt the electronics would cost so much. Vacuum tubes were by now mass produced in automatic machinery.
Higher accuracy would be possible by guiding the V1 to impact but it was not desired.
In terms of the jet engine note that in post #94 that BMW were able to fabricate the entire turbine blade and disks of the BMW 003A2 in only 10 hours. German disposable turbines were supposed to operate on cooled steel blades at 650C. Noteworthy is that the Whittle engine on the Gloster Squirt flew at only 600C and that the Jumo and BMW turbine inlet temperature was about 770C.
Most V2 launched used the LEV-3 guidance system which used gyroscopes and an accelerometer to cut of the motor when the desired speed had been reached.
About 25% used a guidance beam that operated at boost similar to the ones used to guide bombers, it was only two dimensional and did not control the missile in the vertical plane. It was called Viktoria Leitstrahl. It reduced lateral dispersion (cross range) by 50%; A small percentage of these may have used a Doppler system to measure missile speed thereby replacing the accelerometer which improved down range accuracy by 10%
A system that had been worked upon for many years and tested was the zirkel system in which the V2 was to ride a pencil beam (beam riding) based on a 7m dish tilted up. The beam was conically scanned and the V2 could centre itself in the beam (many ways of coding positional data on the beam). Radar measured down range distance and Doppler missile speed giving all the parameters need for a complete cut off calculation. An electronic differentiator damped out the residual speed of the missile at cuttoff.
The system ran in to problems because of ground plane interference but the adoption of 9cm waves solved that. In this form the system was called vollzirkel. It was expected to achieve an accuracy of 500m and fulfil Werner von Brauns promis of 1 mill accuracy (ie 100m at 100km or 1 part in 1000).
One would expect quite a loss of accuracy as the missile tumbled during reentry but even assuming 1000m accuracy it is enough to attack airfields or major factories.
A System called SG-66 with a gimballed system of gyros and accelerometers was hoped to achieve the same accuracy. Highly accurate fluid bearings were under development. One U-boot received an inertial guidance system.
The Winged V2 (A4b) was expected to offer an unprecedented accuracy of 120m to 180m since it could be steered by secondary radar command through the stratosphere to the point it entered a terminal dive to target and disappeared below the radar horizon. Three giant Wassermann (Aquarious) height finding aerials were to be laid on their side to give 0.01 degree accuracy and 10m range accuracy.
The guided and unguided versions of the V1 and V2 could be mixed in with each other. For instance unguided V1 can acts as decoys for guided ones.
