Bf 109F info

[Angus]

Logical wing increase for high alt jobs.
After all, what's the use of high top speed well under ceiling if your enemy is cruising above you like nothing. That is a completely reverse fighter tactic, - only defensive.

[Knegel]

Originally posted by gripen
I think G-6/G-14 supposed difference has been covered earlier. Regarding the rest, does the rarity of the gondolas actually speak for the larger airframe like the G.55 which could carry comparable load internally?

Nope, it simply speak for the need of an air superiority fighter, not another bomber destroyer.
Since there wasnt a DB603 available in big numbers, there couldnt be a G56.
The german fighters was so smal, cause the available engines dont had that much power and was smal. When the fighters got developed there wasnt a Jumo or Db603, although documents from 1941 already saw this engines as successor of the BMW801 for the FW190, but as we know, this engines came very late. With the size of the G55, the 109 would have been another Hurricane, Spitfire, P40 or G55, while the allied planes got particular much stronger engines in 1943. As result the "big" 109 would have been lost. With the disadvantage in power the 109´s still could disengage by diving and they was still fast(at least faster than the G55).

When germany got powerfull big engines they also created more big fighters, like the Ta152, Do335, Me309 etc, but that was in 1944, already much to late. And actually the Luftwaffe had a very big fighter from the beginning, the 110, strangewise this construction didnt follow the way of the 109, of an heavy wingload, otherwise the Luftwaffe would have had a german "P38" already in 1939. Not to manouverable, but very fast. A single seat version also would have been very interesting(200 -300 kg less weight right away).
Last but not least, the wingload absolutly dont matter, its the lift, produced by the wing that matter and due to the slats the 109 did produce the max lift of a more big wing. Most tests which refer to a bad turning 109 refer to the heavy elevator anyway, not to the smal wings, while the experienced pilot could use the trim to overcome this problem. Hermann Graf wrote about it and also Hartmann often did refer to the trim before making manouvers, while most experienced pilots simply didnt turnfight anyway.  They used the good vertical behaviour, the speed and the excellent slow speed handling(specialy important while high alt fights).  

Originally posted by gripen

For various reasons there were a lot G-14s without the MW50. In practice the factories tried to produce planes from what ever parts were available; as an example there is photo evidence of K type airframe with the DB 605AS.

I doubt there was many G14´s without MW50, while the G´s got the MW50 Rüstsatz. If a G14 was without MW50 it must have been very late in the war, or it was a AS only used for the high alt task, above rathed altitude, where the MW50 mainly gave weight, but in general the MW50 equipment was installed.
btw, was the 109´s able to use the MW50 tank as aux tank?? Never did read about it, unlike to the 190A´s, but they had fuel inside their "Sondernot-Tanks" anyway.

Originally posted by gripen

Basicly there is plans and then there is reality. Often these are not similar.

I dont found any proov that the reality wasnt similar to the plans regarding the G14´s and K4´s. There was variations, but where are the proofs that this variations was normal??

If the G14 dont had MW50 equipment, it would have been nothing else than the late G6 or G6AS, also they got the wooden tail and a "Erla Haube".

Originally posted by gripen

These values comes from the datasheet dated 13.8.1944 ie before the production of the K-4 was started. In January 1945 Mtt listed weight as 3400kg.

The 3400kg is a rounded calculation value that we see in many german tests, or do you think the K4 had exact 3400kg??  In the datasheets we also see a 3300kg 109G14, while the exact weight was below this.
In the datasheet from 13.8.1944 you can also find this rounded weight of 3300kg for comparison and calculations, while the take off weight vary up and down, depending to the plane.

Greetings,

Knegel

[gripen]

Originally posted by Knegel
Nope, it simply speak for the need of an air superiority fighter, not another bomber destroyer.

Fighting against enemy fighters was plain waste of men and material for the Germans 1944-1945. And larger airfarme could have done even that better if they really wanted to do that.

Originally posted by Knegel
With the size of the G55, the 109 would have been another Hurricane, Spitfire, P40 or G55, while the allied planes got particular much stronger engines in 1943. As result the "big" 109 would have been lost.

The airframe with wing around 18-20m2 would have been able to carry considerably heavier armament and more fuel than the Bf 109 and could have same or better performance with similar power. Note that even in it's cleanest form the Bf 109K was still a bumpy plane (with short combat range and not so optimal armament).

Originally posted by Knegel
I doubt there was many G14´s without MW50...

There is plenty of evidence of the G-14s without MW50; factory documentation as well as captured planes + plenty of pictures.

Originally posted by Knegel

The 3400kg is a rounded calculation value that we see in many german tests, or do you think the K4 had exact 3400kg??

Detailed weight breakdown by kg per kg for 3400kg can be found from Ebert-Kaiser-Peters (p. 249).

[Knegel]

Originally posted by gripen
Fighting against enemy fighters was plain waste of men and material for the Germans 1944-1945. And larger airfarme could have done even that better if they really wanted to do that.

Fighting against enemy fighters was the only way to offer te possibility for the "Schwere gruppen" to reach the bombers and to get home without to many losses. The topcover strategy was absolut normal untill the LW completely broke appart in early 1945(after Bodenplatte)

 

Originally posted by gripen

The airframe with wing around 18-20m2 would have been able to carry considerably heavier armament and more fuel than the Bf 109 and could have same or better performance with similar power. Note that even in it's cleanest form the Bf 109K was still a bumpy plane (with short combat range and not so optimal armament).

Yes, but the flight tests show that the clean 109G made more out of the engine power than the G55, at least regarding the flight performence.
The G56 still was to slow and not manouverable enough to fight the US fighters, while the K4 could.  The 190A8 on the otherside was better armned than the G56 and with GM1 or the later BMW801 engines they was good enough to attack the bombers in 24000k alt. The G56 with only 3 cannons and the DDB603 was much more heavy than the G55, so the flight performence must have suffered as well.

Originally posted by gripen

There is plenty of evidence of the G-14s without MW50; factory documentation as well as captured planes + plenty of pictures.

How do you see on a picture if there is MW50 or not??

Originally posted by gripen

Detailed weight breakdown by kg per kg for 3400kg can be found from Ebert-Kaiser-Peters (p. 249).

And where the 30kg got added and what sources E-K-P did use??


Greetings,

Knegel

[Angus]

Hehe, this got me pondering, - Knegel:
"With the size of the G55, the 109 would have been another Hurricane, Spitfire, P40 or G55"

While Hurricane and Spitfire in the early years shared the same engine the performance was quite different. Anyway, what's wrong with performing "just" like a Spitfire??? How about saying "Just lika a p51" anyway?

And here:

"The german fighters was so smal, cause the available engines dont had that much power and was smal."

DB 605 ended up with what, - 2000 hp? Almost a Griffon. And in 1944, when a P51 encountered a 109, was there much difference in power?
In 1942, - say autumn, when a 109 met a Spit IX, was there much difference in power? Well, at 37K there may have been, and anyway, at the high alt the wingloading starts becoming crucial.

[Charge]

"Fighting against enemy fighters was plain waste of men and material for the Germans 1944-1945."

AFAIK it was the other way around. The orders to avoid enemy fighters gnawed the axis fighting morale to a point where allied fighter pilots became more and more aggressive and axis pilots more and more defensive so that axis pilots lost confidence in engaging allied fighters and it was the fighters that finally killed their aces and pilots.

"And larger airfarme could have done even that better if they really wanted to do that."

I don't really agree. There is no benefit of having a large airframe interceptor. E.g. the TA had a very adequate armament for any job and it had less guns than 190A8. Almost the same airframe but longer wings for high alt job. Besides you can't have better performance with bigger airframe and same engine power -there has to be compromises. If a fighter is designed for a particular job it has advantages over a fighter that is modified to do the same job and possibly the airframe tampered to a level where the original cleanness of its airframe is disturbed. But I do agree that the 109 began suffering because of its size to some degree in the latter part of conflict.

It would be really nice to see a Lednicher type detailed drag analysis of a few 109 models where the design was more or less significantly changed. Say, E4, F4, G6, K4.

-C+

[MiloMorai]

What Fw190As got GM-1?

[gripen]

Originally posted by Knegel
Fighting against enemy fighters was the only way to offer te possibility for the "Schwere gruppen" to reach the bombers and to get home without to many losses. The topcover strategy was absolut normal untill the LW completely broke appart in early 1945(after Bodenplatte)

There are some cases when such tactics were succesfull but in generally this was a failure, top cover and "Shwere gruppen" suffering enermous losses in the hands of escort fighters.

Originally posted by Knegel

Yes, but the flight tests show that the clean 109G made more out of the engine power than the G55, at least regarding the flight performence.

That was a G-4 in the test while at winter-spring 1944 the germans were mostly using the slower and heavier G-6. Besides, with external tank the G-4 probably performed much worse than the G.55 with comparable load.

Originally posted by Knegel
The G56 still was to slow and not manouverable enough to fight the US fighters...

Probably untrue based on numbers but no reason argue about plain speculation.

Originally posted by Knegel
The 190A8 on the otherside was better armned than the G56 and with GM1 or the later BMW801 engines they was good enough to attack the bombers in 24000k alt.

There is very little evidence on combat use of GM-1 in the Fw 190s and the later BMW 801s were litterally late.

Originally posted by Knegel
How do you see on a picture if there is MW50 or not??

Several details; colour of the landing gear, hatches and stencils. Sometimes some equipment is visible in a damaged/repaired plane.
 

Originally posted by Knegel
And where the 30kg got added and what sources E-K-P did use??

There is no direct source claimed for that chart. There is a long list of sources listed in the end of book (including company records and W. Messerschmitt's personal documents). Kaiser worked for the Mtt during war (continued after war). The listing is following:

5% Nutzlast (170kg)
14% Brennstof (476kg)
13% Ausrüstung (442kg)
40% Triebwerk (1360kg)
28% Flugwerk (952kg)

[gripen]

Originally posted by Charge
AFAIK it was the other way around. The orders to avoid enemy fighters gnawed the axis fighting morale to a point where allied fighter pilots became more and more aggressive and axis pilots more and more defensive so that axis pilots lost confidence in engaging allied fighters and it was the fighters that finally killed their aces and pilots.

The point is that with larger airframe the Germans would have been more succesfull. With these small airframes with external loads they were slower and less maneuverable. Without external loads they were probably unable to intercept high flying bombers in most cases.

Originally posted by Charge
I don't really agree. There is no benefit of having a large airframe interceptor.

The advantages of the G.55 over the Bf 109G as an interceptor are clear; heavier armament and longer range with internal load.

[Charge]

"The advantages of the G.55 over the Bf 109G as an interceptor are clear; heavier armament and longer range with internal load."

Yes, and you don't need either of those in an interceptor role 109 needed to fit in. If there was no 190 the situation would have been quite a bit worse and G.55 would have been better choice but perhaps only for guns part. The vulnerability of the liquid cooled engine would have remained the same and you would not have much benefit from extra fuel except longer loitering times. The G.55 was probably a great fighter and in the Mediterranean the fuel capacity and heavy armament would have been essential due to lack of other bomber interceptor.

-C+

[gripen]

Originally posted by Charge
Yes, and you don't need either of those in an interceptor role 109 needed to fit in.

Could you explain what was the supposed interceptor role where 1 canon and less than one hour combat endurance was enough?

I think that in spring 1944 the Germans would have needed a single type capable to deal with high flying bombers and the escort fighters. In practice they have few types which could deal with the bombers (Bf 110, Me 410, Fw 190) but these could not deal well with the escorts.

[Knegel]

Hi Angus,

even the Spitfire was rather slow with the same poweroutput like the 109.
The high power DB605´s came very late, actually to late, while the critical year(1943) and specialy while time of construction there wasnt a powerfull inline  engine available. Missing power was the main problem of the Luftwaffe fighters in the critical year of 1943.

Hi gripen,

you talk about the droptanks like they couldnt get dropped. The advantage over the inbuild tank is clear, the pilot could get rid of the extraweight, BEFORE combat.

The test show a 109G4, yes, but the test also show the rather bad armned G55. With 3 x 20mm it would be more heavy as well, this would reduce the performence as well.
If the DB603 would have been abailable, the FW190/Ta152 would have made a much better airframe than the G55. As the Jumo powered 190/152´s show, but also the tested planes with DB603, they was as good or  better than the G55.

The 109G6 did count as good high alt fighter, which was able to fight the US fighters. It was able to outmanouver them in a dogfight, what the G6 did miss in comparison to the US fighters was speed, not manouverability. The G55 was more slow and not more manouverable, they would have had even more problems and 3 x 20mm wasnt enough to attack the 4mots anyway, even the 4 x 20mm of the FW190 often wasnt strong enough to do the job in one run.
Only with an more strong engine the G55(G56) could have been comparable to the US fighters, but this engines simply came much to late. in mid/late 1944 the game already was over.

The topcover/attack group tactic did work very well from the end of 1943 till mid 1944, afterward the number of escortfighters was so extremely high, even the 262´s had trouble to get to the Bombers and faster and more manouverable planes than the G56 got hunted down.

The real high losts started mid 44 and had its peak on 2nd November 44, where around 500 german fighters had to face around +1000 4mots and a even higher number of escorting fighters, of course under such circumstances every tactic will fail. At that time the quality of the pilots already did suffer badly, as result, even without escorting fighters, it was already very difficult to get  a group into a good attacking position.
Willi Resche wrote about the problems and advantages of the topcover/attack group tactic. Without topcover the "schwere Gruppen" was lost, not cause their planes was so heavy, but cause they wasnt able to get as one group behind the 4Mots. But this was the only way, for a normal skilled pilot, to attack the pulks without to many losses. Further more most of the "schwere Gruppen" dont had good fighter pilots, mainly former Zerstörer or Bomber Pilots, without any experience regarding dogfight.
The JG302 got one group specialy for the topcover task from JG50, when this group came, the losses of the schwere Gruppen decreased. Of course also this top cover group had losts, which dont got filled with experienced pilots, the result is clear.

170kg Nutzlast?? How fat the pilots was?? Looks like he took Goerings weight.  Nutzlast normaly is pilot + chute = 100kg, and so we have 3330kg again, oh wait, in your list the chute must be included in "Ausrüstung",  so Nutzlast is only the pilot, with around 70kg, so we are back at 3360kg.

Greetings,

Knegel

[gripen]

Originally posted by Knegel

you talk about the droptanks like they couldnt get dropped.

The G.55 in the test climbed as well as the G-4. So in practice the G.55 has clear advantage until the 109 drops the tank even in the case of the G-4. In the case of the G-6, the advantage is larger.

Originally posted by Knegel

The test show a 109G4, yes, but the test also show the rather bad armned G55.

The G.55 in the test had 1x20mm + 4x12,7mm while the G-4 had 1x20mm and 2x7,9mm so the G.55 was considerably heavier armed.

Originally posted by Knegel
With 3 x 20mm it would be more heavy as well, this would reduce the performence as well.

In the case of the G-6 with 3x20mm and 2x13mm + external tank the performance would be reduced much more.

Originally posted by Knegel
If the DB603 would have been abailable, the FW190/Ta152 would have made a much better airframe than the G55.

This is mostly speculation; the fact is that the LW did show considerable interest on the G.55 with the DB 603.

Originally posted by Knegel
The 109G6 did count as good high alt fighter, which was able to fight the US fighters.

Only the G-6/AS could compete in some degree with the allied fighters at high altitude. There is no reason to believe that the G.55 would have been worse with same engine.

Originally posted by Knegel

The topcover/attack group tactic did work very well from the end of 1943 till mid 1944...

Not true given the large losses suffered by the LW against 8th AF during winter/spring 1944. The peak months being March to May.

Originally posted by Knegel
The real high losts started mid 44...

The Battle of Normandy started 6th June and the activity in the Mediterranean and East front increased considerably during the summer as well. So these have nothing to do with tactics used againts US high altitude bombers.

Originally posted by Knegel
Willi Resche wrote...

Willi Reschke started operations 20th June 1944 ie after the air superiority over the reich was decided. He was shot down 8 times, one of the few survivors of the JG 302.

Originally posted by Knegel
170kg Nutzlast?? How fat the pilots was?? Looks like he...

Please cut the crap; the terms are not the same as used in the GL/C sheets so we don't know what is exactly included for each weight item.

[Angus]

Knegel:
"Hi Angus,

even the Spitfire was rather slow with the same poweroutput like the 109.
The high power DB605´s came very late, actually to late, while the critical year(1943) and specialy while time of construction there wasnt a powerfull inline engine available. Missing power was the main problem of the Luftwaffe fighters in the critical year of 1943."


I tend to disagree with you on this. The closest to compare are actually Spit I and 109E, where power, weight and topspeed are almost identical (you have to compare a CS screw to be true in comparison for the Spitfire, but actually top speed is less there).
You have the HP very close if you run the Merlin on 100 octs, the 109 is lighter, the Spitfire AFAIK will climb better, and top speed is very close.
As for power in Engines, the LW already has the powerful 190 BEFORE the USA enters the fray, and the US aircraft used by the British were not powerful single engined fighters. So for the engine power, I see Germany at no disadvantage before the arrival of the Napier-Sabre and Griffon. However, I don't take engine durability/powerloss into account, there the DB was probably at disadvantage.
If you look at the 109F it has roughly the same power as the Spit V, the 109G-2 - G6 has close to Spit IX, and the G-10 - K has close to the Spit XIV, - the ballpark swinging within the 10% depending on altitude  with the Spitfire being a heavier aircraft all the time.
ROC is close, so is top speed, 109 dives better, etc etc. But very much the same ballpark, and I definately don't see a punishment for a slightly lower wingloading any more then I see a general benefit in lower weight.

[Charge]

"Could you explain what was the supposed interceptor role where 1 canon and less than one hour combat endurance was enough? "

Could you explain what are the desired qualities of an interceptor?

-C+