What would have been the ultimate German jet fighter design to go into service?

[pinehilljoe]

Aside, Frank Whittle was a true genius and damn good engineer, and he got it right the first time.

 

[GrauGeist]

I have never seen a documented case of an Ar 234 B carrying bombs under the nacelles on an actual operatio...

The best example of the Ar234B carrying and delivering a max. loadout of bombs was against the Ludendorf bridge in March of 1945.

There were other instances of the 234B bombing Allied targets in late 1944, such as against the dockyards in Antwerp, a railyard in Brussels and in January, against artillery positions north of Bastogne during the Battle of the Buldge.

The Ar234 also has the notoriety of bombing RAF 616 Sqdn's base in Belgium, which had Meteors. This was the closest that Axis and Allied jets ever came during the war.

 

[Nick Beale]

The best example of the Ar234B carrying and delivering a max. loadout of bombs was against the Ludendorf bridge in March of 1945.

There were other instances of the 234B bombing Allied targets in late 1944, such as against the dockyards in Antwerp, a railyard in Brussels and in January, against artillery positions north of Bastogne during the Battle of the Buldge.

The Ar234 also has the notoriety of bombing RAF 616 Sqdn's base in Belgium, which had Meteors. This was the closest that Axis and Allied jets ever came during the war.

Taking those out of order:

For 24 December 1944, KG 76's first Ar 234 operation, there is this ULTRA decrypt in National Archives HW 5/637:

CX/MSS/T409/35
From KABEK ((KG)) 51 ((IA)), No. 1297 stamped 1230/24/12.
Battle report 25/12:
Formation: (C% KADOP) ((III./KG)) 76.
Operated: 9 Ar 234. Take off 09.14 to 09.26 hrs. Landing 10.22 to 10.48 hrs.
Task as for ops order (+).
Result: Gliding from 4000 to 2000 metres with 9 SC 500 Trialen. Time of attack 09.50 to 10.00 hrs. Flak defence badly aimed. Up to 6 Spitfires and Thunderbolts. No attack.
Losses: None.
Successes: 8 a/c on Liège, 1 a/c on Namur, direct hits on railway installations (smudge).
Special observations: Railway stations Liège and Namur (B% completely) occupied. Airfield north Liège occupied by fighters and 3 4-engined a/c.​

For the Remagen period we have the daily reports in Bundesarchiv RL 2-II/842: Morgen-, Abendmeldungen, Nachträge, Nachträge zu Schadensmeldungen (Lw. FüSt. Ic Meldewesen). Bd 7: West (März 1945). This file is free to download and there is an English translation in National Archives AIR 20/7891 (hard-copy only).

9 March 1945: (first KG 76 operation against the bridgehead): 2 Ar 234 attacked, each with 1 x SC 250 bomb.
10 March: 5 Ar 234 attacked the bridge from 1600 hrs., 'reports of results still awaited' — so no details of bombloads.
11 March: 5 Ar 234 took off, 2 reached the target, each dropped 1 x SC 500/10 container.
12 March: 20 Ar 234 sorties in all (2 turned back), also 4 Me 262 (2 turned back), 8 of which attacked at Remagen. No detail of bombloads.
13 March: 11 Ar 234 sorties to Remagen (2 turned back), dropping 1 x SC 100, 5 x SC 500, 3 x AB 500/10. Also 5 sorties eslewhere dropped 4 x SC 100 and 1 x AB 500/10.
14 March: 19 Ar 234 sorties to Remagen and Antwerp: 10 reached main target (8 x SC 500, 2 x SC 1000); 2 attacked secondary target with 1 x SC 500, release gear failed on one aircraft.
15 March: According to an ULTRA decrypt, 14 Ar 234 sorties to Remagen and 20 to Xanten, no details of bombloads.
16 March: No information on any ops.
17 March: 5 Ar 234 sorties to Remagen (intended blind-bombing with SC 500 under EGON control), 'report of details not yet received'.
18 March: 5 Ar 234 sorties inc. 2 to Remagen where 2 x AB 500/10 dropped.
19 March: 5 Ar 234 dispatched to Bad Kreuznach, 4 of which attacked with 3 x AB 500/15 on parked vehicles and tanks; 15 Ar 234 to Brussels Marshalling Yard (2 x SC 1000, 9 x SC 500, 4 x AB 500/15); 1 broke off op.; 4 on alternative targets and 1 emergency jettison (5 AB 500/SD 10). Three of the alternative targets were rail installations and the other was an airfield (i.e. 616 Squadron at Melsbroek).
20 March: 15 Ar 234 attacked Bad Kreuznach with 5 x AB 500/10, 6 x AB 500/15, 4 x SC 500.
21 March: 14 Ar 234 attacked Bad Kreuznach with 7 x AB 500/15, 4 x AB 500/10, 3 x SC 500.

All of which is a very long way of saying that where we have the details, the load was always 'one Ar 234, one bomb'.

 

[bada]

It surprised me that the Airacomet flew before the Meteor.

Let me correct the sentence : " It suprised me that the Airacomet limped in the air before the Meteor"

 

[GrauGeist]

It surprised me that the Airacomet flew before the Meteor.

What's interesting, though, is where the He280 sits in the timeline.

As an aside, the U.S. had quite a few jet projects (far more than the Germans) that either first flew late in the war, or shortly after.

Douglas XBTD-2 - May 1944
Ryan FR - June 1944
McDonnell FD - January 1945
Curtiss XF15C - February 1945
Vultee XP-81 - February 1945

 

[Shortround6]

Ryan FR - June 1944
McDonnell FD - January 1945
Curtiss XF15C - February 1945
Vultee XP-81 - February 1945

Of the l four listed only the McDonnell FD was a pure jet. The other 3 were hybrids with a piston engine (2 of them) in front and jet engine in the rear. The XP-81 was supposed to have a turbo prop in the nose and a jet in the back.

But the turbo prop was a lot harder to figure out than they thought and it never came close to making the hoped for power and the combination of jet and propeller engines was not a success. Max efficiency of a pure jet was at higher speed than the efficient speed range of a propeller.

 

[GrauGeist]

Key word: "Jet Projects"

The American jet project designs were a great deal more conventional than what Germany had in the works.

Not sure why that is, either. All the weird aircraft the U.S. had (XF5U, XP-55, XP-54, XP-53, etc.) were all prop jobs.

In regards to turboprop, Heinkel was working on one, the HeS21 (109-021) but it ended up in Daimler-Benz's lap before they made any progress. DB renamed it 109-021-PTL and made little progress before the war.

 

[z42]

Key word: "Jet Projects"

The American jet project designs were a great deal more conventional than what Germany had in the works.

Not sure why that is, either. All the weird aircraft the U.S. had (XF5U, XP-55, XP-54, XP-53, etc.) were all prop jobs.

The US was safe with oceans on both sides, they could afford to take a slower more methodological approach, and not shove every new idea into the next project in order to produce a hoped for wunderwaffe?

 

[pinehilljoe]

Key word: "Jet Projects"



Not sure why that is, either. All the weird aircraft the U.S. had (XF5U, XP-55, XP-54, XP-53, etc.) were all prop jobs.

It could be procurement the US in the 1940s was not too different than today. Piston engines had a huge lobby with Curtis Wright, (at the time second only to GM in size of govt contracts) and Pratt and Whitney. Neither one had turbo jets in the pipeline.

 

[Howard Gibson]

The Germans did have some interesting projects from the Emergency Fighter Program, but which would have served them the best if they had enough resources or time to get them in the air?

What was wrong with the Me262? The He162 sounds like a decent aircraft if you make enough of them and you can find trained pilots to fly them.

Regardless of which jet fighters they develop, they don't have the alloy ingredients to make reliable turbines, and their engines have lifespans of 10-24 hours. They lost the war because they took on too many enemies at once. The American daylight bombing campaign was successful because the Germans did not develop and deploy two-stage superchargers.

 

[GrauGeist]

What was wrong with the Me262? The He162 sounds like a decent aircraft if you make enough of them and you can find trained pilots to fly them.

Regardless of which jet fighters they develop, they don't have the alloy ingredients to make reliable turbines, and their engines have lifespans of 10-24 hours. They lost the war because they took on too many enemies at once. The American daylight bombing campaign was successful because the Germans did not develop and deploy two-stage superchargers.

The Me262 was a Heavy Fighter/Interceptor.
It was not an actual fighter in the grand scheme of things.

The He280 was a pure fighter in design and execution.

 

[Howard Gibson]

The Me262 was a Heavy Fighter/Interceptor.
It was not an actual fighter in the grand scheme of things.

The He280 was a pure fighter in design and execution.

The Me262 was less manoeuverable than a P47. The P47 was less manoeuverable than a Bf109 or a Ki.43. Early in WWII, the Bf109 was the least manoeuverable single-engined fighter operating over Europe, and it was the most successful. Keep on using your superior speed, and hit and run tactics.

 

[Shortround6]

It could be procurement the US in the 1940s was not too different than today. Piston engines had a huge lobby with Curtis Wright, (at the time second only to GM in size of govt contracts) and Pratt and Whitney. Neither one had turbo jets in the pipeline.

How much was behind the scenes I don't know. Official story is they didn't want to disrupt the existing aircraft engine makers with turbo jet development programs and possibly slow down piston engine development. Had the War extended into 1946 we might have seen hundreds of Goodyear F2Gs with 3000hp P&W R-2360s
So they enlisted a number of steam turbine manufactures and a few others. American Military insisted on complete secrecy with not only the different companies forbidden to talk with each other but even GE had either no or little communications between Lynn (centrifugal engines) and Schenectady (Axial flow)planes.
For the US with it's need for long range aircraft the early Turbo Jets with their low efficiency (poor fuel economy) were not looked on with favor.

 

[GrauGeist]

The Me262 was less manoeuverable than a P47.

Many Allied pilots found out the hard way that if the Me262 retained it's speed, it was a dangerous adversary in a fight - it was the novice jet pilots that dropped their speed to fight piston fighters, which pit than at an immediate disadvantage.

 

[z42]

I would suggest the HeS30 (109-006) instead.

It's smaller, simpler design and it's superior thrust-to-weight ratio was far superior to any other 1st gen German jet engines and would have been ready for production around late '42 or early '43 if Heinkel was allowed to finish it's development.

Circling back to this argument, good point. In some ways Germany could have been better off trying to improve a few select engines rather than trying a wild number of different concepts. Which OTOH is also kind of understandable, since it was early days and nobody really knew what where the ingredients for a successful jet engine.

Britain, for comparison, was able to roughly double the thrust of the W.2/Welland/Derwent between the first and last production models, by improving the engine rather than starting from scratch every time.

So if Heinkel could have managed to increase the thrust of the HeS 30 by a factor of 1.5, they would have thrust in the ballpark of the much bigger HeS 11, giving it perfectly good enough thrust for a WWII era single engine jet fighter. Or heck, just getting the HeS 30 out there and then focusing on improving the reliability and making it easier/cheaper to produce, and then accept you need two engines for a decent fighter.

 

[GrauGeist]

Something to take into consideration, is the HeS30's dry weight and thrust-to-weight ratio especially when compared to the Axial jets the RLM was obsessed with.

HeS30
Weight: 860 pounds
TWR: 2.20
Max. thrust: 1,896 lb/f

BMW003A
Weight: 1,375 pounds
TWR: 1.13
Max. thrust: 1,760 lb/f

Jumo004B
Weight: 1,585
TWR: 1.25
Max. thrust: 1,980 lb/f

And for consideration, the engine that the RLM (Schelp in particular) wanted developed instead of the 109-006, the HeS011A:
Weight: 2,094 pounds
TWR: 1.29
Max. thrust: 2,900 lb/f

The He280 was intended to be fitted with the 109-006 as they became available, however, it performed remarkably well with the HeS8, which itself was problematic due to not being fully developed.
HeS8
Weight: 838 pounds
TWR (later versions): 1.61
Max. thrust: 1,600 lb/f

So the HeS8 and HeS30 may not have had seemed impressive at first glance, but take a closer look at their Thrust to Weight ratios and it becomes clear that the HeS8 and 30 were actually a far better investment early on, especially the 006, which was the most powerful of Germany's first generation jet engines.

 

[z42]

Something to take into consideration, is the HeS30's dry weight and thrust-to-weight ratio especially when compared to the Axial jets the RLM was obsessed with.

AFAIU the HeS 30 was also an axial flow engine?

Anyway, an additional advantage for the design is the smaller diameter. Per wikipedia, 62cm vs. 81cm for the Jumo 004. Despite having slightly lower thrust than the 004, the lower weight and lower drag due to the smaller frontal area (frontal area of the 004 is a factor of 1.7 higher than for the HeS 30) would likely have resulted in a better performing aircraft than one equipped with 004's.

Provided it would have fulfilled these specs in practice if it had entered service, which I suppose will remain an unanswered question. I suppose some skepticism is warranted.