Bf109E-4 Questions....

[juzz]

niklas, those calculations in "Fighter" I posted about before?

They were redone by some British Aero Engineers with the correct weight for the Bf 109E, and of course it came out turning a bigger circle than the RAF fighters.

Then they did radius calculations using a different method, figuring it out at sustained corner speed and at a Cl of 1.0, and at Clmax(which was higher for the 109).

Again the British planes had smaller radii.

I'll have to visit the library and find the reference.

[GRUNHERZ]

Hi

Andy 109E3 never mounted a nose cannon, none of the Es did.

thanks GRUNHERZ

[Wardog]

Grun..

Many 109E variants had cannon through propeller hub.

The E1 had 4 MG17 (2 above engine 2 in wings) and many later variants of the E had 2 MG17 in wings and 20mm MG FF in hub. Also variants of E had 2 MG FF in wings.

Interesting note, the 109C had 5 MG17s ( 2 in wings, 2 above engine and 1 in propeller hub).


Dog out..........

[Andy Bush]

Grunherz

I think if you get into the books that you will find that the E-3 model did in fact have a 20mm firing thru the spinner. This gun was removed in the E-4 model.

Andy

[niklas]

andy

which other fighter had those slots at this time? Which fighter had such a high wingloading and was able to turn with fighters which had a much lower wingloading?

The elliptical wing of the spit is nice, but it never offered the possibillity to install such slots due to the elliptical shape. I mean those leading edge slots for the 109 where developed by Handly Page afaik. It was not a german development.
The 109 had imo from the beginning a much better flaps design (slotted, various positions)
automatic controlled cooling system in the wing (again look at the quite complex flaps system)
The problems of the early spit engines with neg. G-load

What i said, people like to compare only wingloading when they talk about turnfighting. This is imo a bit too simple.
With the installation of "high tech" componenents for this time the 109 was able to overcome it´s basic design disadvantages.

Karnak, this is the point: Here the sentence (only one sentence without context) "he beat mölders". It would be a typical statement in the "A outturned B"  "B outclimbs A" category...
And now compare this to what Leykauf said. Where have you ever read such a detailled description of flying technics? He describes how to use it, what errors can be made, how the manoevre looks like AND that he had success. Not once not twice, 6 times.

What skill does a pilot need to fly a flat sustained turn?

This is not the first time that i heard or read somewhere that the emil could outturn the spitfire. I always was a bit irritated so far because some sources say they could outturn them, others say they couldn´t. Now, maybe is Leykauf´s statement is the clue to the solution.

juzz when you find the reference pls send me a copy. If you can´t get the hole document than the most important numbers will do it too (Clmax, radi, speed)
Thx

niklas

[Andy Bush]

niklas

When Willy M. put pen to paper, he wanted the biggest engine in the smallest possible airframe. That's where the high wingloading came from.

He also wanted a decent turn capability...and that meant high lift device...in this case, a slatted wing that was based upon a Brit design as you pointed out. The slat itself is not a high tech item. It is just an aerodynamic answer to an existing problem (high wingloading).

The radiator design was superior to the underwing Spitfire coolers because of its reduced drag.

But of all the technological items that could be mentioned, I think the fuel injected engine was most important from a pilot's perspective. It allowed a freedom of maneuver that a carburetor equipped engine simply did not have.

As far as the Spitfire and Hurricane not having slats...that's east enough. They didn't need them! To not have slats is not a technological deficit.

Andy

[juzz]

Me 109 slats are there for stall characteristics, nothing more. Unless you think the Me 262 had an entire leading edge of slats to help it turn... think what happened to the F-86 wing and it's slats.

A slightly later period fighter than the Me 109 with slats would be the LaGG-3, carrying through to the La-7.

Btw: those radiator/flap design features which niklas mentioned weren't present on the Emil, they came later when the wing was redesigned for the Franz.

[This message has been edited by juzz (edited 11-08-2000).]

[niklas]

hey juzz, of course the slats were there to improve stall characteristic. i agree 100%  
Clmax is a basic number if you look at best turnrate.
Slats allowed the 109 to turn at higher Clmax, of course with more drag too.
This was THE advantage of the 109. Without slats a high wingloading, low drag design >> fast fighter. With slats out a competetive turnfighter. The 109 had the option to be fast or to be a good turnfighter.
Spitfire? Lot of wingarea, Low wingloading >> good turnfighter, but no way to be as fast with same HP.

You´re right, the La5 had slats too, and according to a report from Rechlin they were fitted well into the wing.

I´m not wrong with the cooling flaps of the emil. The emil already had the splitted flaps at the outlet of the radiators
The emil doesn´t had those front lips at the cooling entrance, which will close the area for the radiator in special flight conditions (The "ramjet" bases on the same idea: small inlet, air slows down in the bigger diameter of the radiator>> less drag, small outlet>> jet effect. BTW the idea is based on a Hugo Junkers patent of...1915!!!!) . This was introduced with the Franz. A nice aerodynamic feature btw. (believe me: the cooling of such high performance engines was VERY difficult, especially in high altitudes,  and a lot of knowledge was required!!!!- again: a fighter is more than only....)
Spits never had this feature afaik.

Hope you slowly get an impression why the 109 was considered to be superior...

niklas
 

[GRUNHERZ]

Hi

Andy thats an old myth in actuallity. Messerschmitt always wanted to have an engine mounted weapon in 109s but he wasn't really ever able to work it out till the F. The earliest production 109 the B model had an engine mounted MG17 7.92mm weapon, but it often jammed after a few rounds due to cooling and vibration issues. The 109C initally tried to mount an MG/FF 20mm engine cannon but it wasn't a succes, Messerschmit overcame this by mounting 2 MG17s in a slightly modified wing, increasing the armament to 4 MG17, the unsatisfactory engine weapon having been deleted. The D, and E1 also had this armament setup. The E-3 had the 2 MG/FF with 60rpg in drums. There was a variant called E-2 that tried mounting the MG/FF, but again it was a failiure.

The following is from Bf109 In Action, part 1 by John Beaman

" The Bf109 E-2 had been another unsuccesful attempt at introducing the engine mounted cannon. Again vibration and jamming of the engine-mounted weapon caused its rejection"  

About E-3 engine cannon.

"Again provision was made for the introduction of the engine-mounted cannon (in the E-3) and again it was found to be to be unsatisfactory; those few delivered with the the engine-mounted armament invariably had had them removed."

From JG26 War Diary Volume 1 1939-1942 by Donald Caldwell

Entry for 1, January 1940
" The Geschwader took on strength a number of Bf 109E-3s, in which the the two wing-mounted machine guns of the Bf109E-1 were replaced by 20mm MG/FF cannon. Efforts by the Messererschmitt firm to equip the new model with a third 20mm cannon, mounted between the engine cylinder banks and firing through the propeller hub, were unsucessful, and apparently slowed production"
 
E-3 had provision to mount them and a few did but no operational E-3 ever had the 20mm engine cannon for any amount of time, they simply didnt work.

thanks GRUNHERZ

[Andy Bush]

Grunherz

This is what you said:

>>109E3 never mounted a nose cannon, none of the Es did.<<

Now, we can quote sources until the cows come home...but what I read is that the E-3 model was originally designed with the nose 20mm.

Further reading of a number of references mentions the unreliable nature of that installation as well as the distaste that some 109 pilots had for the weapon. For that reason, the gun was deleted from the E-4.

How many were actually used in the field is open to question...but the fact remains that the E-3 was designed with three 20mm weapons, not two.

I dislike 'dueling books' contests, particularly over an issue that was so long ago. Given the many mods that the 109 came in and the variety of areas that it flew in, someone could probably find an exception to anything.

I like to avoid words like 'never' and 'none'...sometimes they can bite a person on the butt!

Andy  

[M.C.202]

niklas said:
> Which fighter had such a high wingloading and was able to turn with fighters which had a
> much lower wingloading?

M.C.200  Area 180.83sqft,  5,715 lbs,  31.6
M.C.202  Area 180.83sqft,  6,636 lbs,  36.7
Bf109E-3 Area 176.53sqft,  5,875 lbs,  33.3

> What skill does a pilot need to fly a flat sustained turn?

To hold it at the edge of a high G stall? Tons.


 

------------------
M.C.202
Dino in Reno

[GRUNHERZ]

Hi

Andy plese dont fight this by nit picking single words in one of my quotes which I took 3 seconds to write   tho never is too strong, the longer message was to explain my position in more precise detail.  The simple fact is the engine cannon in 109Es wasnt perfected and didnt  work  right due to jams and malfunctions. It was dead weight to the pilot and they were removed from the planes in the field right away to save weight, you were a figher pilot, right? Wouldnt you remove a useless weapon to improve aircraft performance? And the factory gave up on trying it too. John Beaman and Don Caldwell are the foremost LW researchers of this time, they know what they are talking about. This is well known myth that the E3 had 3MG/FF, it could mount them, yes, but the engine cannon was deleted by units in the field as  quickly as possibble and was also eliminated on  new build E3 machines after no solution was found. So yes E3 mounted 2 cannon not 3.

thanks GRUNHERZ

[Andy Bush]

Grunherz

Uncle! I give. You win! Your books are better than mine!

Now, since I am always on the lookout for the best in WW2 literature, how about passing along the names of your references...I'd like to pick them up.

Andy

[-aper-]

In 1940 four Bf-109E were bought by Russian delegation in Germany and tested in NII-VVS.
The test pilot Ivan Seleznev who flew bf-109E said that 109 was a very good plane. It was very easy to fly and handle. The plane was very stable and could fly srtaight for a long time with released stick. Also 109E showed that it was very forgiving plane. Seleznev told that he specially made rough piloting mistakes trying to turn plane too hard while combat manoeuvering. The plane released slats and gave pilot a long vibration stall warning.

In spite of it 109E wasn't a good turn fighter. Pilots said that the plane started to 'burying' in turns loosing speed drastically. 1941-42 tests of bf-109F showed that 109F had much better sustained turn than 109E.
The reason could be in better airodynamics of 109F or in rounded wingtips or in better slats working algorithm.

[-tronski-]

Octobers "Aeroplane" issue has a BOB hurri/109/spit comparision has a quote :

"The cannon fitted to the 109 were not much use against enemy fighters, and the machine-guns on top of the engine often suffered stoppages. The cannon were good if the scored a hit, but thier rate of fire was low. The cannon has greater range than the machine guns. But we were always told that in  a dogfight one could not hope to hit anything at ranges greater than 50m."

Oblt Hans Schomoller-Haldy, JG54
page49

..interesting to see if the 109F had kept 2x20mm cannon in wings like Adolf Gallands personal 109F

-tronski-
 


[This message has been edited by -tronski- (edited 11-11-2000).]