What of the Me 410?

[stona]

The Me-410 was a light bomber. That's why it performed best at low altitude. If it had been designed to operate as a pathfinder @ 30,000 feet (i.e. like most Mosquitoes) it probably would have gotten different engines.

Hungarian built Me210s,with their lighter armament,armour and DB 605 A engines would be an exception.
GM-1 equipped versions flew with the Luftbeobachtungsstaffeln (don't you just love those compoumd nouns!). Fitted with a 300l drop tank under each wing they flew at high altitude above the US bomber formations reporting their numbers,position and course. They performed this role well into 1944. There is only one recorded loss,by Luftbeobachtungsstaffel 3 on 11 February 1944 which would certainly imply that they had adequate high altitude performance to evade the US escorts.
Cheers
Steve

 

[davebender]

I think Germans make up such words just to keep the English speaking world confused.

What version of the DB605 engine powered Hungarian built Me-210Cs? Restrictions were lifted during the fall of 1943 so it may have been powered by DB605ASM engines (with MW-50 injection).

 

[Erich]

personally I am rather doubting the use of the ASM type engines till spring of 44 installed in the Bf 109G-6/AS, the 210 by then was out of the question, and by late June due to losses both ZG 26and 76 were going to at least the trasnsfer slowly of eliminating the T/E stock for a new paper name(s) and Bf 109G's for Reich defense.

slightly Ot but you all have seen the pics of the Hungarian bomber killer 210 with the single 3.7cm and triple rocket launchers under each wing ?

 

[davebender]

No I haven't. Is there a web site with these pictures?

 

[Erich]

not sure Dave but Squadron Signal softback on the craft I believe has a couple pics under a ? test Kommando ? anyone confirm this please .............

 

[Crimea_River]

Yup, here she be. From Squadron Signal Me 210/410 In Action.

 

[davebender]

Pretty late in the war. So what type DB605 engines power that aircraft?

 

[Crimea_River]

2 other pictures of the same aircraft appear in Petrick and Stocker's book on the Hornisse. Captions state that these mods were commenced on 3 March 1944 so the engines might have dated to much earlier than October. No mention of engines but Hungary only produced a total of 270 Me210Ca-1's of which 100 were delivered to the LW. Some sources on the net say all were powered by 605B's but I've not been able to verify this in any of my references so far except to say that the Mushroom series book states the spec sheet for the Ca-1 as powered by the 605B with no other notes.

 

[mhuxt]

The Me-410 was a light bomber. That's why it performed best at low altitude. If it had been designed to operate as a pathfinder @ 30,000 feet (i.e. like most Mosquitoes) it probably would have gotten different engines.

I'm not sure what you mean by this. The 410's best speed was at about 6400 m, roughly 21.000 feet. The B.IX Mosquito bomber with two-stage superchargers did best at 26,000 feet. The FB.VI, the most numerous Mossie, with single-stage Merlin 25s (standard fit for the FB.VI from July 43) did best at 13k ft, only about 15 mph more than it did at 5k feet.

Given a choice, as a Mossie fan I'd much rather encounter a 410 low than high.

 

[Oreo]

"Why would an Me 410 conceivably be selected to escort anything against the US from Bermuda? (it absolutely could not get halfway across the Atlantic from Spain/Azores). I haven't read your operational scenario but why do we think that it would not be even worse for the 410 against the P-38/P-47/F4U/F6F/P-51 ?? over the US? FW 190 would be far better choice of escort and how do you supply Bermuda unless you have totally annihilated USN and all land based USAAF bombers, USN torpedo and dive bombers?"

As I said, it was alternative history, and quite wildly speculative. In this scenario, the Kriegsmarine and Luftwaffe had wiped the map of the USN and RN, putting them drastically on the defensive, with the two purpose-built KM carriers, and six carriers converted from cargo ships, Bismark, Tirpitz, et. al working together in concert to starve the UK of fuels and destroy their shipping. The hopped up and cleaned down Me-410 escort fighters were capable in my scenario of P-38-like performance, and only experten familiar with the type were selected for this mission, the purpose of which was to force the US to keep good combat groups on the east coast when they could have been used elsewhere. My scenario had over half the Me 410's destroyed in combat, along with a goodly number of the bombers, but He-who-ordered-such-dastardly-things thought it was worth it to bring home the war to the enemy. My scenario did have the KM carriers fielding the redoubtable Fw 190T-6, which was used to replace all other types of carrier aircraft in the KM. It was capable of interceptions, escort, dive-bombing, surface strike with either rockets, torpedos, or heavy cannon packs, and reconnaissance. Basic armament was two MG 13's in the engine cowling and two MG 151/20's in the wing-roots. Wings folded upward, and span was increased by approximately a meter. Landing gear was strengthened, as were other crucial components. By having all one type of aircraft on a carrier, spare parts and maintenance issues were extremely streamlined. Performance clean was in the Hellcat range, approx. 380 mph max speed. The single-seat escort Me 410's flying from Bermuda featured the same basic armament as the Fw 190T, and the bomb bay was fitted with a self-sealing fuel tank, as well as the space behind the pilot's seat previously used by the gunner.

The bombers, with range well exceeding 4,000 miles, took off from the Azores and met up with the escorts about 200 miles off shore before dawn, heading over the targets right around dawn. My scenario had interceptions, successful and unsuccessful, by P-38's, P-47's, P-63's, and P-61's.

All fanciful of course. I know it never could have happened. But I found it entertaining to suppose it might have.

 

[stona]

What version of the DB605 engine powered Hungarian built Me-210Cs?

The book I was para-phrasing (Schmoll's "Nest of Eagles") simply says that the Hungarians replaced the DB 601 F engine with the DB 605 A engine when production at Dunai Repulogepgyar RT began at the "end of 1942". It only states the A series,not a specific sub type. It also says they were fitted with the GM-1 boost system (not MW 50) which makes sense as this was specifically to increase performance at altitude.
Cheers
Steve

 

[Njaco]

According to "Squadron/Signal: Me 210/410 in Action" - pg 18;

One Me 210 A-0 (radio code PN+PD WrNr 2100105) was re-engined with 1,475hp DB 605B engines without MW 1 Methanol injection. This aircraft served as a pattern aircraft for the Me 210 (in Hungarian service - my underline).... the aircraft was to be built in 2 variants, the Me 210C-1 and Me 210Ca-1.....Other than the engines, the Hungarian produced variants were the same as the modified Me 210As being assembled by Messerschmitt.

 

[stona]

They weren't the same as the German produced ones in other respects. Most obviously both the armament and armour changed. I'll post the details later rather than going from memory.

They certainly did not use the MW 50 boost system (Squadron got that correct) but the GM-1 system.
I know the GM-1 injection system could be easily converted to use MW 50,it was deliberately fitted to some later G series 109s with this express intention,but would have to check if this worked the other way around.

The GM-1 system works to increase performance at altitude which is why it was fitted to these aircraft.

Cheers
Steve

 

[davebender]

That cannot be true.

Me-210 A0 would be a pre-production aircraft with the short fuselage. Only about 95 Me-210A were built with short fuselages and they were all built in Germany. By July 1942 the Me-210 had a longer fuselage (Me-210C) which fixed the handling problems. Manfred Weiss (i.e. Hungary) built the Me-210C powered by locally built DB605 engines. However I have no idea which model(s) of the DB605 were built at Manfred Weiss.

 

[Njaco]

If you see the quote I posted, I did omit the lines referring to lengthened fuselage, etc. ( hence the "......") I was focusing on the engines. My bad.

 

[davebender]

Manfred Weiss produced armored combat vehicles in addition to aircraft and aircraft engines. I'm starting to think the entire Hungarian munitions industry consisted of a single factory complex.

43M Zrínyi - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Denniss]

Hungary built 377 Me 210C, 105 of which were sent to Luftwaffe duty.
They were probably known as Me 210C-1 in Hungarian service and Me 210 Ca-1 in Luftwaffe service (the small a was a german designation for foreign-produced aircraft and I doubt the Hungarians would have used it).
The Me 210C was built with DB 605B engines, those also powered the Bf 110G. B-version are A-engines with different engine/prop rpm ratio.
Mtt actually assembled 155 production A-1 and B-1 with short tail + 106 that were assembled but waiting for the long tail + several hundred more fuselages that went directly into storage. Most of the surviving short-tail A/B may have been rebuilt with the long tail (148 rebuilt aircraft reported but includes the 106 waiting for long tail). Additional 36 A-1 and 16 C-1 were built in Germany from stored components but with long tail. Almost 500 Me 410A were built from stored Me 210 fuselage components.

 

[davebender]

Sounds like the Me-410A never actually entered mass production.

 

[Erich]

the A was used in numbers by both ZG 26 and ZG 76 for two units on their US bomber hunts

 

[stona]

Thank you Denniss. Kovacs Lajos,who has researched Hungarian production extensively believes that only 270 Me 210 Cs were produced,he agrees that about 100 were delivered to the Luftwaffe. Some were returned by the Luftwaffe to the Hungarians in 1944.

Me 210 A-0 (W.Nr.2100105) did indeed serve as the pattern for the Hungarian Me 210 C-1.

The armament did vary from German versions.The full armament of the Hungarian heavy fighter version (C-1) was 2xMG 151/20 and a 36M 40mm Bofors cannon. Triple 140mm mortar tubes were carried under the wings.
This is different to the version employed by the Luftwaffe's Luftbeobachtungsstaffeln which carried only 2xMG 151/20s and only the standard 8mm armour plating. All the extra armour fitted to German versions was not installed.

Cheers

Steve