Well, the droppable trolley / landing skid was only used for the first prototypes in fear that a normal landing gear wouldn't hold the stress of high speed landing. Other sources state that the wings were too high and to thin for a normal wing-mounted landing gear, and the fuselage was to narrow to fit a landing gear into it.
- First prototypes V1 and V2 were finished winter 41/42, but had to wait until February 43 for the Jumo 004 A-0 engines. August 43 the V3 was completed, already with pressurized cabin and ejection seat. V4 same as V3, V5 with Jumo 004 B engines, last A-series type V7. V6 and V8 four-engined versions.
For the B-series the fuselage was widened and a retractable, fuselage mounted gear was built in, since the trolley/skid combo wasn't considered combat ready. First prototype V9 with improved Jumo 001 B-1 engines. V10, V12 and V14 were prototypes for a bomber version. V11, V15 and V17 used for testing BMW 003 engines, V13 had 4 BMW 003 engines.
First small B-0 series batch of 20 planes build and were mostly tested for operational flight/combat readyness tests in Rechlin.
B-1 series was the long range recon version, B-2 series the bomber version (the version that will be in AH).
There was also some C series 4-engined prototypes, C-3 the bomber version, C-4 the recon version.
Some C series prototypes were intended as night fighter testbeds, actually only a single B-1 was converted to nightfighter (it had a gondola with 2 MG 151/20), which supposedly managed to shoot down some british 4-engined night bombers in the winter of 44/45.
Az
