WW2 bombers. If Germany had the allies heavy bombers would they have won the war?

[BiffF15]

So....how was the F-15 cockpit heat?

Heat worked great! Just don't forget to heat the windscreen if descending after a long cruise at high altitude (no window heat like an airliner). The plane used bleed air air for that heat. The cooling was the problem. The crew chief had the ability to give more cooling air to the cockpit or to the avionics which he had to repair. Pilot lost that battle. Usually we left it on full cold and never moved it. In the winter time we would heat things up on the ground, but once airborne it pretty much was moved to full cold.

Cheers,
Biff

 

[tyrodtom]

The V1 had a guidance system called Ewald II under testing, the 3 ground stations for the first one had already been built. Ewald I was a beacon mounted on 5% of V1 at the beginning of the campaign and 50% at the end. Ewald was a simple beacon meant to allow correction of the aim of subsequent missile. However Ewald II was a proper midcourse guidance system. At a certain point on the missiles flight path Ewald would emit a single coded radar pulse at a predetermined time and 3 ground stations would calculate the missiles position from the time difference. There are few if any ways of jamming this kind of transmission since there is no IFF interrogation pulse to trigger spoofing of . The ground stations would then calculate a correction and this would be sent as single set of impulses and recorded on an endless loop magnetic tape on the V1. Accuracy would depend on how close to target the course correction was made but if actual midcourse of the V1 max range it was probably 2km but if within say 10km I imagine about 1% of that.

Ewald II had been developed for the BV246 Haggelkorn (Hailstone) glide bomb but was not ready in time. The missile was developed with the "Radischien" (Raddish) radio/radar homing seeker but I think it would have made a reappearance when the Ewald II system was operational. Range was about 150km when launched from a Fw 190.

Extended range versions of the V1 either used a reduced warhead or a disposable turbojet that Porsche and BMW were developing 109-005. The reduced vibration would have increased accuracy. Vibration caused difficulty.

The plain pulse jet was also receiving improvements and was expected to exceed 830km (500mph) at sea level. Most V1 developed reed valve faults within minutes of launch that dropped their speed from 390 mph to within the interception envelop of allied aircraft.

The most accurate long range missile probably would have been the A4b winged version of the V2. Not only could it be guided midcourse it could be manoeuvred during it terminal phase and was to have an accuracy of better than 80m. It used a giant Wassermann early warning radar laid on its side. The early V2 with the LEV-3 guidance system had a theoretical capability of 4.5km accuracy when tested (worse due to double cross system) but the SG-66 gimballed system with better gyros was expected to get a CEP of 500m radius as was the vollzirkel boost phase beam riding guidance system.

The V1 and V2 put in to service with interim guidance systems nearly 9 times less accurate than the ones they were intended to ultimately receive.

Every combatant in WW2 had fantastic weapons in their R&D sections, but what matters is what they managed to get into actual combat, in enough numbers and in time to make a difference.

 

[swampyankee]

So....how was the F-15 cockpit heat?

Isn't it pressurized and air conditioned? They need the air for the g-suit, and the electronics like to be kept comfy.

Wait! Am I getting my F-15s confused?

 

[BiffF15]

Isn't it pressurized and air conditioned? They need the air for the g-suit, and the electronics like to be kept comfy.

Wait! Am I getting my F-15s confused?

It is pressurized and air conditioned. Good ole MacAir looked out for us pilot types. Bleed air was used for pressurization, external tanks to force them to feed, heating & cooling, G suit and chest suit (I never plugged that damn thing in), as well as canopy defog and external water removal (no windshield wiper, just high speed air blown over the exterior windscreen). If you left the canopy heat on too long you could melt the windscreen.

Cheers,
Biff

 

[Greyman]

Just don't forget to heat the windscreen if descending after a long cruise at high altitude ...

Unlike the gun freezing issue, of which I can find no mention from Battle of Britain Spitfire pilots -- the windscreen misting up in situations like this was a constant complaint. Jeffrey Quill described it as 'a very serious defect' after his stint of combat in 1940.

Zero mention of guns freezing, though.

First mention I find of that is A&AEE testing of the 'B' wing in early 1941 -- where the .303s consistently fail to fire above 30,000 feet. The Hispanos worked fine, for what it's worth.

 

[nuuumannn]

My claim still stands, no Spitfire ever appeared with heated guns before September 1942 so the JU89 would have been invincible over the UK 1939-1942

As has been pointed out to you, Spit Is and IIs did have gun heating in 1940, also, how do you account for the fact that much BoB combat took place above the maximum altitude of the Ju 89? Just...

It clear that the Ju 89 could have been a 4 engine bomber about as good as the Lancaster or Halifax especially as better engines became available and it might directly evolved into a Ju 289 with a 4000 mile range.

So, why didn't it happen? The Ju 89 was far too slow, terribly defended and with a bomb load less than that of an He 111, I doubt it most sincerely.

Would'a could'a should'a. Ask yourself why the Germans winning the Battle of Britain is such a good thing anyway?

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Friendly reminder...

Play nice everyone.

 

[Koopernic]

The other issue is, of course, that high altitude bombers couldn't reliably hit a target much smaller than a major city. Before PGM, accurate high-altitude bombing was more myth than reality.

High altitude bombing would require a wind correcting computing bomb sight such as the Norden or a blind bombing system such as X-gerate. The Lotfe 7 entered Luftwaffe service in 1942. There was nothing magical about the Norden, it used the same computing and gyro techniques that Navies had used in big capital ship guns, torpedo computers and AAA/FLAK directors but the USN had though to apply it to level bomb sights and so it seems only the US was equipped. My understanding is that the German BoB bombsights were gyro stabilised and had optical magnification but lacked a computing mechanism to calculate wind drift etc, they were just set for the correct bomb trail error. Interestingly X-geraet calculated head winds and potentially I imagine side winds.

 

[Koopernic]

You have become really confused between "I found a map of oil" and "here is where the Luftwaffe got aviation fuel from".

The vast majority of Luftwaffe fuels came from three sources only:

1) Prewar imports (gone by 1941)
2) Captured stocks (all used up in Russia)
3) The hydrogenation plants

A miniscule proportion came from crude oil obtained from Germany or other nations, its actually so small that I cant even quantify it
because it resides in the "other" category of the charts and graphs.

SNIP.

I believe German and Austrian oil wells provided about 3% of German crude oil requirements. I probably got that from the fischer-tropsch.org archives.

Other sources are
1 Coal Pyrolysis (heat coal without air by steam or direct heat) that drives of liquids and gases. With certain types of coal provides about 5% by weight liquids. This was the main source of aviation fuel for the Japanese after the naval blockade and the first source of fuel after bombing of the German synthetic fuel plants

2 Bergius Hydrogenation. Hydrogen was pressurised into a coal toluene slurry at 700 bar with a few iron filings as a catalyst. This produced a good quality 72 octane fuel that was upgraded by addition of TEL and iso-octane. All aviation fuel came from these giant plants.

3 Fischer-Tropsch, coal was gasified and passed over cobalt catalysts to make diesel fuel and lubricants. The diesel fuel cetane rating was rather high and it had to be diluted down with the diesel obtain from the hydrogenation plants. The hydrogen and fischer-tropsch plants complemented each other. There was a 45 octane by-product. I suppose it could run in a model T era engine with CR less than 3.9 perhaps with some TEL or alcohol. The quality of gasoline that came out when using iron catalysts was too low for aviation but they seem to have developed uranium based catalysts. The FT plants could be much smaller. about 1/5th the size.

4 There was a fischer tropsch like plant that produced pure iso-octane and used a chromium catalyst to produce butanol which was dehydrated to butylene which was converted to iso-octane by polymerisation. The butylene was needed for production of n-buna and s-buna synthetic rubber so production of iso-octane had to be lower than rubber production leaving the Luftwaffe without the ability to convert to 100% 100 octane. The Germans did start to implement other techniques such as acid alkylation and hydroforming. An acid alylation plant was started in 1940 but only 1 completed by 1943.

5 The Japanese had school children collecting pine tree cones as pine oil can produce a nice 100 octane fuel. I know that the Germans did collect pine tree oil from the paper industry before WW1. You get about 16L of pineol for each ton of paper pulp produced. The Finns had an agreement to produce hesselman engines to power Saab and Talbot cars that were to use kerosene derived from fischer tropsch using pete in Sweden and pine oil in Finland. It worked quite well but some socialist government in Finland made the tax for pineol the same as petrol and the industry died out.

 

[Glider]

At the end of the day, even if the Luftwaffe had the B29 in 1942, they still wouldn't have had the economic capacity or the industrial capability to produce it in the numbers needed. So the brief and accurate response to the question, is no, they wouldn't have won the war

 

[Dimlee]

As was stated earlier, the USSR can relocate their factories as far away from the front as needed to be kept out of range from any bomber force. Assuming a critical 1941-1943 timeline, there is still no long range fighter escort in existence that would be able to mitigate mission losses.

It was not so simple. Please consider what has happened in real history.
1. USSR has relocated a lot of factories that were threatened by German ground advances, indeed. At the same time, the industry in non-occupied areas remained where it was, with very little exception. To move all factories just to avoid bombing raids was a luxury the Soviets could not afford economically. Aviation works, for example, once moved, could not return to normal production schedule for many months. I dare say that such a project would be more costly and longer than the relocation of the UK factories to Canada.

2. USSR had vast territories but with poor infrastructure. There were not so many places in the rear where the factories could be relocated or built up from scratch. Power supply, raw materials, reliable railway link, enough rolling stock, qualified labour force, etc... It was all in deficit.

3. Historically, Luftwaffe bomber force operated almost with impunity against major Soviet industrial centres within the range, except Moscow and Leningrad.
Soviet PVO has failed to protect factories even in such important cities as Gorky (including its famous GAZ), Yaroslavl, Saratov.
According to this excellent book (I wish it was translated in English) www.shorturl.at/hnop1 operation Carmen II of Luftwaffe in June 1943 resulted in the loss of production of almost 2,000 tanks (mostly T-34) and of 20,000 metric tons of fuels in that year, complete stoppage of T-80 tank production, immediate loss of 31,000 metric tons of fuel, etc. Just for comparison: combined fuel stock of 5 fronts of the Red Army before the Kursk Battle was about 21,000 metric tons.
Tire factory in Yaroslavl (the main supplier of tires and wheels for artillery) did not resume production until September 1943.
GAZ has stopped for almost 2 months and its annual output of tanks, trucks, APC, and of various supplies to other plants has dropped by from 150% to 400% between the categories, according to official statistics (which were considered too "optimistic" by post-Soviet historians).
Saratov air factory No.292 has reached the pre-bombing rate only in October.
Flour mills in Gorky stayed idle until September leaving the Red Army and Leningrad without 200,000 metric tons of flour.
Critically affected was the production of ball bearings, artillery units, ammunition, components of aircraft and tank, and not just in the bombed areas but all across the network of the factories. Etc...
Losses of Luftwaffe: 17 aircraft of 733. Bombing raids from 04th to 22nd June, in the night time, without fighter escorts.

So, in the nutshell.
Yes, the relocation was possible but it was of enormous difficulty for the USSR.
German bomber force consisting of Ju-88 and He-111, once given the task, could hit the Soviet industry very hard and met very little opposition.

 

[Koopernic]

It is pressurized and air conditioned. Good ole MacAir looked out for us pilot types. Bleed air was used for pressurization, external tanks to force them to feed, heating & cooling, G suit and chest suit (I never plugged that damn thing in), as well as canopy defog and external water removal (no windshield wiper, just high speed air blown over the exterior windscreen). If you left the canopy heat on too long you could melt the windscreen.

Cheers,
Biff

Su 34 toilet, Sukhoi comfort.

 

[Koopernic]

They (the Allies) didnt really understand the sources of German aviation Gasoline until very late in the war (although many guessed correctly). They knew there were synthetic plants, but didnt know which ones were being used and in what capacity for which fuel type. (eg. almost none of the Fisher-Tropsch synthetic plants output went into aviation fuel).

Its a bit difficult to separate bombing coal and the sythetic fuel plants as they BUILT the synthetic plants next to all the major coal mines. (for obvious reasons).

As an aside, before the war one engineer (Professor Steinmann at Berlin Hochschule) said "hmm maybe we shouldnt put all the fuel plants OVER ground next to the coal mines as it will be really obvious were they are..."

The Nazi leadership replied "Nah.. it`ll be fine!"

Research tip, if you want to understand Luftwaffe fuels - read up on the "Wirtschaftliche Forschungsgesellschaft", which had NOTHING to do with Economic Research and was basically a cover-name for the Luftwaffe/Wehrmacht/Kriegsmarine fuel distribution network; but in reality ended up basically mostly a tool of the Luftwaffe.

Albert Speer rejected the building of underground coal to fuel plants on the grounds that the effort and resources would best be put elsewhere presumably such as building more synthetic fuel plants to get production up and building offensive and defensive weapons. At the time many of the plants were out of each of allied bombers. In the end allied bombing timed to disrupt fuel supplies in the lead up to overlord lead to the Geilen plan to restore production and this envisaged 1 or 2 massive underground hydrogenation plants plus a dozen or underground fischer-tropsch plants. Not cheap.

I imagine the TEL plants were extremely well camouflaged. Messerschmitt's Oberammergau plant had a pine forest trees planted on its roof and was indistinguishable from the srounding forrest.

A complete destruction of the TEL facilities would have left iso-octane production intact and a certain amount of production of B4 fuel could probably be achieved by a 50:50 blend of iso-octane with the 72 octane that came out of the hydrogenation plants. There is some kind of a lubricating effect with TEL but doubt it would be significant. I suspect no TEL would drop B4 production to about 20% and C3 production to 10%. Methanol was used in production of the A4 aviation fuel (I think 30%) used in trainers and was available from the chromium catalysts that produced butanol, so it might have been used as an up blending agent as the chromium catalyst produced 17% butanol and 80% methanol. (the methanol was simply cycled through till it all became butanol).

There was some work on uranium based catalysts to produce high octane fuel from the fischer-tropsch plants. This uranium was to be transported to Japan on U-boat U235 and was marked U235 leading to the claim that the Germans were gifing the Japanese weapons grade uranium.

 

[Koopernic]

It was not so simple. Please consider what has happened in real history.
1. USSR has relocated a lot of factories that were threatened by German ground advances, indeed. At the same time, the industry in non-occupied areas remained where it was, with very little exception. To move all factories just to avoid bombing raids was a luxury the Soviets could not afford economically. Aviation works, for example, once moved, could not return to normal production schedule for many months. I dare say that such a project would be more costly and longer than the relocation of the UK factories to Canada.

2. USSR had vast territories but with poor infrastructure. There were not so many places in the rear where the factories could be relocated or built up from scratch. Power supply, raw materials, reliable railway link, enough rolling stock, qualified labour force, etc... It was all in deficit.

3. Historically, Luftwaffe bomber force operated almost with impunity against major Soviet industrial centres within the range, except Moscow and Leningrad.
Soviet PVO has failed to protect factories even in such important cities as Gorky (including its famous GAZ), Yaroslavl, Saratov.
According to this excellent book (I wish it was translated in English) www.shorturl.at/hnop1 operation Carmen II of Luftwaffe in June 1943 resulted in the loss of production of almost 2,000 tanks (mostly T-34) and of 20,000 metric tons of fuels in that year, complete stoppage of T-80 tank production, immediate loss of 31,000 metric tons of fuel, etc. Just for comparison: combined fuel stock of 5 fronts of the Red Army before the Kursk Battle was about 21,000 metric tons.
Tire factory in Yaroslavl (the main supplier of tires and wheels for artillery) did not resume production until September 1943.
GAZ has stopped for almost 2 months and its annual output of tanks, trucks, APC, and of various supplies to other plants has dropped by from 150% to 400% between the categories, according to official statistics (which were considered too "optimistic" by post-Soviet historians).
Saratov air factory No.292 has reached the pre-bombing rate only in October.
Flour mills in Gorky stayed idle until September leaving the Red Army and Leningrad without 200,000 metric tons of flour.
Critically affected was the production of ball bearings, artillery units, ammunition, components of aircraft and tank, and not just in the bombed areas but all across the network of the factories. Etc...
Losses of Luftwaffe: 17 aircraft of 733. Bombing raids from 04th to 22nd June, in the night time, without fighter escorts.

So, in the nutshell.
Yes, the relocation was possible but it was of enormous difficulty for the USSR.
German bomber force consisting of Ju-88 and He-111, once given the task, could hit the Soviet industry very hard and met very little opposition.

I recall reading that when He 177 operated over the Soviet Union and Urals their performance at high altitude was such that they were not actually bothered by Soviet fighters much.

In terms of a hypothetical Ju 89 (and maybe Do 19) during the BoB there is no doubt that they would have been much tougher to bring down. Both these aircraft would have had a 20mm tail gun or two and caused considerably times more loses to the RAF fighters than the rifle calibre MG15 and MG81 on the He 111, Do 17Z and Ju 88A1. The rifle calibre guns had minimal effect and one imagines the MG131 had it been in service might have caused more harm and been more effective.

The problem you have is one of production. The DB601 and Jumo 211 were in extremely short supply. That means you have to take engines away from He 111, Ju 88, Ju 87, Bf 109 or Bf 110 unless you settle for the Bramo 323.

The Do 17 was meant to be powered by the DB601 and the DB601 powered Do 17 was known as the Do 215 could do 290mph (Later 316mph with DB601N on WEP 2800rpm) yet the shortage forced the Do 17 to use the Bramo 323 which gave it a top speed of only 255-265. That made it much easier to intercept at medium altitude had it had the DB601.

So if you sacrifice the Do 17 and swap them out say 1.5:1 with the Ju 89 or Do 19 this becomes possible. Junkers can abandon the Ju 90 and Ju 252 to find the resources or Dornier can abandon the Do 17. A Bramo 323 powered Ju 89/Do 19 would probably be slightly faster than a Do 17Z and certainly much longer ranged, armed and armoured. In due course of time when DB601, Jumo 211 and eventually Jumo 213,DB605,DB603 engines are supplied the performance would grow but its hard to see that more than.

The main effect is probably support of the U-boats. Such an aircraft is much better than the Fw 200.

There were about 420 Do 17Z made with about 140 looses in the BoB and 105 Do 215 so potentially ypu could swap out 520 Do 17/215 with about 300-350 Ju 89/Do 19

They key however, as I see it is you need a long range escort, that could be the drop tanks on the Bf 109 and Bf 110 but I suspect the Fw 190 with Jumo 211 or DB601 would be needed for long range.

So, why didn't it happen? The Ju 89 was far too slow, terribly defended and with a bomb load less than that of an He 111, I doubt it most sincerely.
SNIP

The engines available were not powerful enough. They had available to them Jumo 210, early Bramo 323 and the 900hp DB600. Had they have waited for the Jumo 211A or DB601 the performance would have been adaquet.

 

[PAT303]

Both these aircraft would have had a 20mm tail gun or two and caused considerably times more loses to the RAF fighters than the rifle calibre MG15 and MG81 on the He 111, Do 17Z and Ju 88A1. The rifle calibre guns had minimal effect and one imagines the MG131 had it been in service might have caused more harm and been more effective.

The trouble is you would still have a bloke standing behind the gun trying to calculate the lead and deflection angles of a Spit or Hurri flying in three dimensional space in the fractions of a second it took them to flash by while he himself is doing the same, the most likely outcome of fitting 20mm cannons in a 1940's bomber would be the gunners would miss with bigger bullets.

 

[Glider]

The trouble is you would still have a bloke standing behind the gun trying to calculate the lead and deflection angles of a Spit or Hurri flying in three dimensional space in the fractions of a second it took them to flash by while he himself is doing the same, the most likely outcome of fitting 20mm cannons in a 1940's bomber would be the gunners would miss with bigger bullets.

I totally agree with this plus the slower rate of fire and the gun being far more cumbersome to handle. In addition the arc of fire of a 20mm would be far less due to the much bigger bulk of the 20mm breach inside the very limited space inside the bomber. Reloading the gun would be a major issue as well as early war 20mm were drum fed.

 

[PAT303]

They key however, as I see it is you need a long range escort, that could be the drop tanks on the Bf 109 and Bf 110 but I suspect the Fw 190 with Jumo 211 or DB601 would be needed for long range.

You also have to remember that the long range escorts would be flying into a well organised and controlled integrated air defense network, worlds best at that time, you also have to contend with Dowding and Park, Park's organisation and tactic's during the BoB were exemplary and he poses a formidable opponent to any commander facing him. Giving the Bf 109 extra fuel to range over England with the bombers just exposes them to more intercepts from more fighter groups further from home with the same 9 seconds of 20mm ammunition. The RAF fighters on the other hand hit you crossing the channel coast, again inland over the target and a third time at the coast after they have landed and rearmed refueled, even relaying has them getting bounced at any point before they get on station. Bf 109's flying over England in 1940, likewise, Spitfires over France in 1941 faced a much different situation than P51's in late 1944-45.

 

[swampyankee]

The trouble is you would still have a bloke standing behind the gun trying to calculate the lead and deflection angles of a Spit or Hurri flying in three dimensional space in the fractions of a second it took them to flash by while he himself is doing the same, the most likely outcome of fitting 20mm cannons in a 1940's bomber would be the gunners would miss with bigger bullets.

How did that work in the He177, at least some of which had a 20 mm gun for the tail gunner?

Since the Luftwaffe is now flying heavier bombers over Britain, how much earlier will the RAF get 20 mm guns into its Spitfires?

 

[Shortround6]

A lot of times the discussions seem to assume the Germans would somehow have 1941-42 guns and mounts for their hypothetical 1940 4 engine bombers.
Germans fought the vast majority of the BoB with 7.9mm MG 15s with 75 round saddle drums and 20mm MG/FF or MG/FFM cannon with 15 or 30 round round drums in the flexible positions. The Ju 89 prototypes never got guns and the Do 19 might have had guns on the last aircraft (?) but descriptions paint a dismal picture. two man turret with one man controlling traverse and the other man controlling elevation.

The planes would have been little, if any faster, flown very little higher and not been a whole lot better armed than the twin engine planes. Hard to see any real advantage.

 

[Shortround6]

How did that work in the He177, at least some of which had a 20 mm gun for the tail gunner?

Since the Luftwaffe is now flying heavier bombers over Britain, how much earlier will the RAF get 20 mm guns into its Spitfires?

He 177 didn't show up until they had the Mg 151, however the very early He 177s only had an MG 131 in the tail.