FW190 recovered in Norway

[Krusty]

A-3 had the Mausers inboard (MG151/20s), the 7mms in the cowling, and optional kits for MG/FF outboard. I don't see them on these photos (I could be overlooking them). It's similar to our 190A5 in Aces High, but performed different and had engine overheat problems.

[Hwkeye]

Does the article say if it will be restored and since I am assuming it will be, are they going to restore it to a flyable condition?

[Krusty]

I think the only problem with that is finding a suitable engine.

It's funny that the BMW engines made in WW2 were engineered so precisely that we cannot duplicate the parts to build new ones. We need the engine already intact, and can work with it as long as it already exists.

I think this one will be in restoration for at least a decade. Look at the massive corrosion on every part. Every piece on the entire plane will have to be re-made from scratch. Not so much a restoration as building a new one on an older pattern.

What I don't get is this: When you restore you literally strip, refabricate, and replace. Sure it takes *forever*, but once you've done one plane you have literally rebuilt that entire thing from scratch. Why don't they just record every piece and every dimension and every aspect of it? That way, for example, if they wanted another Glacier Girl, they've got all the plans, and they'd have to fabricate it anyways, why not just build it without the wreck? The pattern exists already?

Same for 190s. If they restore one of them, and record all the parts, they can then just build a second any time they want. Why do they need the wreck? (that is, of course, assuming they document every part, as if they were saving a record for future restoration/construction crews)

[Guppy35]

Originally posted by Hwkeye
Does the article say if it will be restored and since I am assuming it will be, are they going to restore it to a flyable condition?

The plan at this point is to display it as found after preserving it.  They are not ruling out future restoration however.

[Charge]

"Looking at that 190-A's in Norway page that someone linked, im stunned to see how many were lost to non-combat reasons like hard landings, or engine failures etc. I only saw a small handfull which were lost in combat. Or it that page not representative of the real picture?"

I'd say that at that time all old FWs were moved to fronts with less significance and especially the first batch of FWs still had the problems they had in the beginning, so their numbers lost in accidents due to mechanical problems (i.e. overheating etc.) probably remained high throughout their service life. Also the weather could be really bad in Norway so many weather caused forced landings because of running out of fuel were probably referred just as ditches.

I wonder how big proportion of losses during WW2 was actually caused by bad weather?

-C+

[Wmaker]

Even after seeing news about many, many salvage efforts like this during the past 15 years...they just never cease to amaze me.

I just look at the pics dumbfounded...wow.

[mandingo]

best fighter plane ever!!!  send it to the usa, where it belongs!

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by Masherbrum
Yer a moron

Heh.  True enough.  Gives me a warm feeling to have so much company.

Sorry for assisting in the thread hijack, that was rude (of all who assisted!).  Can see from the responses here, and even from a PM or two, that there are fertile fields for discussing this (again), but that should be in the O Club, and later.

Anyway, it's pretty kewl they found the plane.

- oldman

[Airscrew]

Originally posted by Dux
lol... Airscrew, your awesome reference did not go unidentified or unappreciated.

thanks Dux, I'm glad there are others who appreciate this guy  
My daughter "discovered" him a couple of years ago and we have managed to get all his CDs and DVDs.  She can practically reciet every one of his routines, especially the "Death Star"  Jeff Vadar .  Before she brought him home I had never heard of him.  I'm actually going to watch The Avengers again just because I found out he was in it

[indy007]

Originally posted by Krusty
Same for 190s. If they restore one of them, and record all the parts, they can then just build a second any time they want. Why do they need the wreck? (that is, of course, assuming they document every part, as if they were saving a record for future restoration/construction crews)

If I were to take a wild guess, I would imagine that the tooling no longer exists. For example, if you wanted to make a steel wing spar for a 190.. where are you going to have it forged? Who would have the necessary molds? I wouldn't think anybody would have that just laying around.

To put it in perspective, to make a simple, 50 cent plastic dustpan, it requires a $50,000 mold. Now, imagine what it would cost to re-invent all the tooling for literally thousands of parts to re-create an obsolete aircraft with no real market demand.

It can be done, but the money is not there. Take White 1 for example. Yes, it's a 262... yes many of the parts are correct, but items like the Jumo engines would be insanely expensive to re-create (and dangerously unreliable)... so they used off-the-shelf modern engines. Saved truckloads of cash and made it safer to fly.

[Krusty]

Indy, about that steel spar: They're going to have to have it re-worked anyways. It might be welded from multiple pieces to save time and money, but they'll refabricate it from scratch. Why? Imagine a plane like this Yellow 16... There's no way the original spar is intact, not heavily corroded, and in perfect condition. When you restore a plane you leave almost no original piece on the aircraft.

That's why restorations take so much $$$. Now if you had the $$$ and wanted the plane, couldn't you just copy the parts from a recent restoration?

[indy007]

Originally posted by Krusty
That's why restorations take so much $$$. Now if you had the $$$ and wanted the plane, couldn't you just copy the parts from a recent restoration?

Well, if money & time are no object, you can get anything you want... if you can find an exact duplicate (or at least "close enough") of what you're trying to restore. From what people are posting here, seems like this particular 190 is a bastardized model that underwent field retrofits & repairs. I have no clue how you would even begin to source replacement parts, or find plans you could feed into a CNC machine to make new pieces... maybe Bodhi could chime in on this?

[Sweet2th]

I hate to tell you guys but they are re-making 190's in Germany.


Check for yourselves.



http://www.flugwerk.de/



For around 500,000 $$$$$ you to can own one.

[Krusty]

Those aren't real 190s. They only look like it on the outside. There's a difference

[Sweet2th]

well Mr.Know it all since you can't read i will fill in the blanks.


They make those 190's from  the original plans and are made way better than they ever were.The only thing  they lack is firepower.