Heavy bombers: B-17G vs. He 177A-5

[Nilsen]

Id love to see the HE177 in the game, but only after we get the much asked for HE111 and/or Do 217.

[RRAM]

As much as I like the He-177A5, which was a quite good heavy bomber, comparing it with the B-17 simply is bad news for the Heinkel. If I was given the chance to choose between both, I'd go with the B-17 at once.

Reason?. He-177 small wing and supercharged engines gave it a service ceiling of 7km.
B-17's with large wing area and turbos had a service ceiling of almost 11km altitude, and a much lower wingloading that made it a very easy plane to fly.

WWII showed that the ability of a bomber to fly at high altitudes in close formation was vital for doing daylight bombiing missions on defended enemy territory. A he-177 flying at 6km would've had problems keeping a tight enough formation, while it was not rare for B-17s to roam all over germany at 7.5Km altitude while perfectly keeping a close box formation.

Said that, the Heinkel was a highly capable bomber (at least when the reliability problems were solved). But comparing it with the B-17 is not a good business from my point of view.

[AquaShrimp]

Actually, post-war studies found speed and escort fighters were the most critical elements to a bombers success  in reaching its target.  Altitude certainly helped too.  But defensive formations were not effective.

[Lumpy]

It was inevitable that this thread would degrade to the usual level of accusations and recriminations like those forwarded by Bronk. If it’s allowed to continue I’m sure before the end we’ll have argued over Spitfires and 109s and how the P-51 won the war, maybe even Hiroshima and Dresden.

But it is all irrelevant at this point because this thread has served its purpose; we have confirmed that the He 177A-5 was a capable heavy bomber … something some people do not know or seem to believe. That it had a troubled development; was too late to serve the German war effort in any meaningful capacity; was the spawn of a twisted evil empire is all very interesting, but essential irrelevant.

Moot is actually correct, this thread is about Aces High … I’ve started a thread about adding post 1940 German bombers to the game, but I knew that the He 177 would draw flak like it has here. So I started this thread as a pre-emptive measure to settle the He 177 issue and draw fire away from the other thread, hopefully allowing it to serve its purpose before turning into an alliedweeb/luftwobble melee.

Well, the He 117A-5 was an excellent bomber, fully sorted and quite capable.

What Widewing stated in one concise sentence on page one was what I was looking for, but please continue to squabble amongst yourselves Gentlemen. Compare it to the B-52 if it fancies you.

[RRAM]

Actually, post-war studies found speed and escort fighters were the most critical elements to a bombers success  in reaching its target.  Altitude certainly helped too.  But defensive formations were not effective.

A 230mph bomber flying at 20000 feet was easier to intercept than a 200mph bomber flying at 27000 feet. Escort fighters were vital, of course ,but that's out of the scope of a bomber vs bomber comparison.

Speed was good when you had LOTS of speed (as the mosquito had over conventional WW2 bombers). The He177 was faster, but not fast enough to overcome the fact that it was always going to be much lower than a B-17 when in operations.


I hardly am biased towards US planes...but even giving credit to the 177 quality, I see the B-17 as a better bomber. Said that, I'd love to see a 177 in the game. That and/or a Do217 (which also was a terrific buff).

[Lumpy]

Being (preposterously) designed as a dive bomber did give the He 177 a slight edge in that regard RRAM. The greater tolerance for high speed allowed the He 177 to bomb England in daylight in 1944, by climbing to max altitude and crossing the channel in a 420 mph shallow dive. Very difficult to intercept, but the raids were nothing more than a nuisance of course.

[RRAM]

Being (preposterously) designed as a dive bomber did give the He 177 a slight edge in that regard RRAM. The greater tolerance for high speed allowed the He 177 to bomb England in daylight in 1944, by climbing to max altitude and crossing the channel in a 420 mph shallow dive. Very difficult to intercept, but the raids were nothing more than a nuisance of course.

Aye, that did happen and worked. The 177 was hard to intercept in such operations.

But keep in mind that worked because there were low distances involved (upping in france/low lands going to bomb London is not the same as upping in East Anglia and going all the way to Berlin) that allowed the bombers to do that shallow continous dive.

However as I said that worked for london and/or targets in SE England. A He177 couldn't do that stunt if the targets were in, say, the Midlands. It would've had to level at some point and from then on it would've been a field day for defensive fighters.

Not trying to steal credit from the plane...but I still think it's limited ceiling was a big handicap for its use as a strategic bomber. A He277/274 with four engines (And much larger wing area, lower wingloading and higher ceiling) would've been a much better bomber, even at the cost of a slower top speed and lower speed structural limits. But those never entered production even while they were tested.

[Lumpy]

Not really when you consider that the allied fighters at the time were just as good at 30K as they were at 20K, perhaps even better. If the He 177 had been an allied bomber your argument would have been sound because German fighters had performance deficiencies at 30K. In fact if the He 177 had flown at 30K in massive escorted formations like American bombers did it would have been more difficult for German fighters to protect them than at 20k. And if both sides had equally good engines at high altitude it really wouldn't have matter what altitude the bombers flew at.

[Lumpy]

Oh ... and another ting to ponder: Since the He 177 does 351 mph at 21,000 feet it might very well still do 300+ mph at 30,000 feet. The DB 610 was basically two DB 605's bolted together and the 109G-6 loses ~30-40 mph from 21-22,000 to 30,000 feet. The loss in speed would be slightly less for the He 177 since the top speed is less. This might be very arbitrary of course, but something to ponder: The He 177 is perhaps as fast or faster then the B-17G at 30,000 feet with a similar (light) bomb load?

[MiloMorai]

[Lumpy]

He 219?

And why can't people scan documents in readable resolutions?

[MiloMorai]

  Was right beside the He177.

You will have to ask the person who did the scan.

[Lumpy]

Was more of a grumpy declaration of displeasure than an actual question.

[moot]

This should explain it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIZ-SGljHik

[SIK1]

The B-24 carried more bombs flew further, and on paper was a better bomber. yet the aircrews still prefered, for the most part, the B-17.
So I say the He177A-5 must of just sucked.