WW2 Luftwaffe question

Discussion in 'Warfare / Military' started by xAWACr, Feb 7, 2014.

  1. xAWACr

    xAWACr Member

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    Something I have never understood is why the Luftwaffe kept the Bf-109 in production right up to the end of the war? The FW-190 was superior in every way, so why didn't they switch all the 109 production lines over to FW-190s/Ta-152s? What do you think?
     
  2. Strasser

    Strasser Banned

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    Because retooling and retraining would cause a delay in production the Nazis couldn't afford, not to mention building the new machinery would eat up scarce resources and time as well. They didn't have unlimited supplies of material to waste on production mistakes that would have occurred while retraining and retooling, and a dire shortage of skilled labor to boot. WW II was a very short war after the U.S. entered it; it didn't leave the Nazis any kind of breathing room for that sort of major production change. It would have taken months, time they didn't have. At least that's my opinion.

    A similar example is how long it took Russian production managers to get design changes implemented in the rather crappy T-34 that finally made it the excellent tank it became in 1944, something like two years to convince bureaucrats to allow the changes. Nazi bureaucrats were no different when it came to perceiving any change as a threat to their power and competence.
     
  3. Strasser

    Strasser Banned

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    Other factors are how long a FW took to produce versus a 109. I don't know any details of the planes and their differences re types of steel or whatever needed in their production, but some probably existed and maybe not available in large enough quantities compared to the 109 stock. Even the type of factories available and their locations can influence what is produced.
     
  4. Taxcutter

    Taxcutter New Member

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    The Me-109 stayed in production for a couple of reasons.

    First it was very easy and cheap to produce.

    Second (and mostly) it offered superior high-altitude performance to the Fw-190A. The BMW 801 engine had poor performance above 20,000 feet altitude. The engine (though very similar to the Pratt & Whitney Double Wasp, but the P&W had better superchargers) did not have the sophisticated superchargers that the Daimler-Benz 601 and 603 had. This was not addressed until the Fw-190 D (“Dora”) version came into production in August of 1944. The Dora was a high altitude specialist and needed the Junkers Jumo 213 engine (which had superb superchargers) and a substantial redesign of the aircraft to make it a high altitude plane. The Fw-190A had an exemplary roll rate due to its short wings. At high altitude, these wings were too highly loaded and the plane was prone to stalling and spinning. The Junkers engine was an inline engine and required radiators. The BMW radial in the Fw-190 A did not, so accommodations for radiators had to be added to the Fw-190D. The Dora also had a pressurized cockpit which also added to development time for the Dora. At the end of the process the Dora was a very different aircraft from the Fw-190A.

    The Fw-190A was the boss fighter below 20,000 feet, but especially on the Western Front the Allies liked to operate at outrageous altitudes. Even the Battle of Britain in 1940 was mostly fought above 25,000 feet. No problem for the Me-109 but the Fw-190A would have been at a disadvantage. Later in the war, the American P-47 and P-38 fighters were mostly used for ground attack, but both had sparkling high-altitude performance due to their huge General Electric turbochargers and big wings. Over North Africa, Italy and Northwest Europe the Me-109 had to hold the fort at high altitudes. All the Spitfire marks used the excellent superchargers available to the British.

    On the Eastern front operational altitudes were lower and the Fw-190A ruled the skies.
     
  5. KGB agent

    KGB agent Well-Known Member

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    Most of engagements on our front happened on low altitudes, where Bf-109 performed better than Fw-190.
     
  6. Herkdriver

    Herkdriver New Member

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    The reason is financial.
    The Messerschmitt company was facing a major cut in BF 109 production, and the company convinced the Reich hierarchy (Erhard Milch primarily) that conversion to FW 190 production would cause a huge production loss. The Messerschmitt company was saving itself from going under.
     
  7. Strasser

    Strasser Banned

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    Here is a history of the Focke-Wulf 109 series.

    http://www.thefullwiki.org/Focke-Wulf_Fw_190

    http://fw190.hobbyvista.com/werkn.htm

    It's manufacturing and performance issues didn't make it viable as a replacement for the Me. The 152 version didn't come along until late in the war.

     
  8. Strasser

    Strasser Banned

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    According to this post at Axis History, that is part of the reason.

    Post Number:#18 Postby brustcan on 24 Jun 2004, 01:43


    http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=51720&start=15

     
  9. Jarlaxle

    Jarlaxle Banned

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    You have it backwards: the Fw-190a was superior below 20,000'. The Bf-109 was better above that altitude.

    I have to say that I can make a pretty good case that the "Dora" (Fw-190d9, sometimes called the Fw-290) was the best piston-engine fighter of the war!
     
  10. KGB agent

    KGB agent Well-Known Member

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    In terms of speed perhaps. According to vets' memories, Bf-109 was more agile and harder target than FW-190.
     
  11. Jarlaxle

    Jarlaxle Banned

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    190 was a speed fighter, 109 was a turn fighter. Simple as that.

    The Fw-190 was also MUCH better armed, better-protected, and generally easier to fly.
     
  12. Strasser

    Strasser Banned

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    The Fw-190 wasn't as versatile as the 109, which was adequate enough for both high and low altitudes, and also cheaper and quicker to produce.
     
  13. Taxcutter

    Taxcutter New Member

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    Taxcutter says:
    Below 20,000 ft. the Fw-190A outperformed every version of the Bf-109. Speed, climb, roll rate, dive speed, even range (not a huge edge). The RAF thought the Fw-190A was specifically designed to beat the Spitfire Mk. V.

    Only the Bf-109G and K models had the firepower of the early Fw-190A. As a rule the Luftwaffe would set -109s on high CAP and let the Fw-190s fly lower. The -109s could look good to green pilots because on the Eastern Front they flew higher than any Soviet aircraft, so they could use their energy and do "boom-and-zoom" heavy fighter tactics. The Fw-190A had to rely on the power of the BMW 801.

    The Dora was an excellent aircraft but cost as much as a squadron of P-51s. It was also a high-maintenance bird and wasn't always available to sortie.
     
  14. KGB agent

    KGB agent Well-Known Member

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    Not sure you can say that. Fw-190 hadn't any significant advantage over Bf-109 in speed, it was inferior in maneuverability, but yes, it was better armed and easier to fly. The main question: was it worth paying 3 times the cost of Bf-109? Apparently, not.


    Prooflinks or GTFО.

    For instance,
    Bf-109 G-6 climb rate 17.0 m/s
    Fw-190 A-8 climb rate 15.0 m/s

    Fw-190 sucked balls in terms of maneuverability against Soviet fighers, excluding roll rate, nor it had an advantage in speed worth mentioning.

    Again, as I said, most of engagements happened on low (below 5000m) altitude, so servise celling is irrelevant.
     
  15. Taxcutter

    Taxcutter New Member

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    Climb rate varies with altitude. As the two planes approached the practical ceiling for the Fw-190 the Bf-109 would pull away but below 3,000 meter the Fw-190A - with its superior HP - would outclimb the -109.

    Ceiling is important if you use heavy fighter tactics. You climb as high as you can (and still find the enemy) then dive down at near the Mach, take your shot and zoom-climb away at a high energy state. The USAF preferred "boom-and-zoom" as it minimized lateral turning radius differences. the P-47 was rather clunky but had a very high ceiling so it could climb up then swoop down and give the enemy a taste of eight .50 cal and roar off at 425+ MPH. The British liked "boom-and-zoom" as it tended to minimize pilot casualties and they always had a problem with casualties. the superb superchargers of the Rolls-Royce engine gave the Spit and the P-51 a big energy advantage over the Fw-190. Even the later version P-38s (P-38J and later where the compressibility issue had been addressed) was credible as a heavy fighter, although by then they were mostly fighter-bombers.

    Ceiling was no big deal to the Japanese. The Zero and Oscar were designed specifically for lateral maneuverability and their low wing loading precluded high-speed dives.

    Airplanes turn by banking and a good roll rate is the number one parameter of lateral maneuverability.

    "Fw-190 sucked balls in terms of maneuverability against Soviet fighers..."

    That would have been news to Adolf Galland.
     
  16. Jarlaxle

    Jarlaxle Banned

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    Didn't Galland generally fly a Bf-109?
     
  17. Taxcutter

    Taxcutter New Member

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    Taxcutter says:
    He did until the Fw-190A came along. Galland could fly anything, generally better than anyone else.
     
  18. Pregnar Kraps

    Pregnar Kraps New Member Past Donor

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    Great explanation. That's the same impression I had but was struggling with just how to put it on the screen and whether i'd gotten the correct impression from watching numerous History Channel and Military Channel shows on WWII.
     
  19. Taxcutter

    Taxcutter New Member

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    In the World War II time period, aircraft design was driven by the available engines. Most European countries and the US Army Air Corps preferred inline engines for their smaller frontal area and were willing to take their chances with the vulnerability of the liquid cooling inline engines had to have.

    The Fw-190A broke with this preference using the BMW 801C engine. The 801 was a fourteen cylinder radial displacing roughly 42 liters, weighing about 2,200 lb and developed a little more than 1,500 HP using 80 octane gasoline. It used a single stage, two-speed mechanically-driven supercharger.

    By comparison, the US-built Pratt & Whitney R-2800 Double Wasp was a 18 cylinder double-row radial displacing 46 liters, weighing about 2,300 lb and easily developed 2,000 HP on 100 octane gasoline (commonly available in the US) and up to 2,400 HP on 130 octane avgas. The variant used on F6F and F4U USN fighters used a two-stage, two speed mechanically driven supercharger. The variant used on P-47 fighters used a General electric turbocharger.

    As you can see, they were very similar engines. Not surprising as in the early 30s, Prat sold the license for the (single ) Wasp to BMW for commercial aircraft. BMW developed that to the 801. Both engines had an innovation for their time – single lever power controls that automatically controlled engine speed and mixture. This was quite an advantage for a single-seat fighter pilot who had better things to do than fumble with two engine controls in air-to-air combat. The Pratt engine could have manual override mixture control for optimized fuel economy (important in the Pacific where long legs are imperative).

    The Pratt engine used the same two-stage supercharger developed for the Rolls-Royce Merlin (upsized for the bigger engine). That gave the engine roughly the same altitude capabilities as the Merlin and the Daimler-Benz 601 (Spitfire, P-51, and Bf-109). The USN (after being out-performed initially by the Zero) wanted the altitude capability to do “boom-and-zoom attacks on Zeros. The Germans, despite capturing any number of Spitfire/Hurricane aircraft never seemed to figure out the advantage of a two-stage supercharger.

    So it is not surprising that Fw-190s, F6Fs, F4Us, and P-47s had roughly the same performance. The Fw-190A was a bit faster than its US counterparts. It did not have to have the STOL characteristics and sturdy (heavy) landing gear of a carrier plane. The Fw-190A’s better roll rate was due to its shorter wings, but that sacrificed the range required to be the lords of the Pacific.

    If the Third Reich had stayed in an offensive mode longer, it is likely that Kurt Tank would have made the same observation that Chance Vought made with the Corsair. By eschewing the GE turbocharger (his customer - the USN - wanted no part of it anyway) and lengthening out the center of the fuselage, Vought generated the space for an internal fuselage fuel tank. The F4U had a 1,000 mile range where the Fw-190A had a 500 mile range. But when the Germans had to go defensive a short-legged but more nimble plane was preferred.

    All four of these radial-engined planes carried fearsome firepower and in combat the radial engines proved very rugged and reliable.
     
  20. Panzerkampfwagen

    Panzerkampfwagen New Member

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    The Bf109 remained competitive throughout the war. In fact, all combat pilots who achieved 100 kills did so in the 109
     
  21. Taxcutter

    Taxcutter New Member

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    Taxcutter says:
    Actually it was competitive (against lesser foes) after the war. The Me-109 was a staple of the nascent Israeli air force in 1948.
     
  22. KGB agent

    KGB agent Well-Known Member

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    Aha. Cool story brah, but I am not buying.
    Bf-109 F series had the same service celling as Fw-190, and I'd expect them perform even better on that altitude due to water cooling engine.
    Also, Bf-109G Power/mass: 344 W/kg (0.21 hp/lb)
    Fw-190A-8 Power/mass: 0.29-0.33 kW/kg (0.18-0.21 hp/lb)


    I doubt. Common knowlege, actually. It doesn't take a genius to look at controls size, for one.


    Face it, Fw-190 was worse, than Bf-109, except some valuable innovation, like onboard computer's grandpa.
     
  23. Taxcutter

    Taxcutter New Member

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    The Daimler-Benz engine used in the Bf-109 displaced 34 liters.
    The BMW 801 engine in the Fw-190A displace 42 liters.

    They both used the same two-speed, single stage supercharger. Feeding the bigger engine the boost degraded on the Fw-190 at a lower altitude than on the smaller-engine Bf-109.

    "Service ceiling" (in German parlance) was the highest altitude where the plane could maintain a 100 meter per minute climb rate. In air combat, 100 meters per minute is essentially level flight. Yeah the Fw-190A could be coaxed to high altitudes but they weren't doing so in a fighting situation.

    The king of this was the P-47N. With its big Pratt Double Wasp and the biggest aircraft turbocharger GE ever made, it could maintain full power up to 57,000 feet. The P-47s wings had stalled 5,000 feet down. The plane was militarily unflyable above 49,000 feet. Yeah, aces like Gabreski would coax the thing over 50,000 feet then use the Jug's phenomenal dive rate (Mach 0.95) to swoop down for a ultra-high speed pass and zoom away, but the average pilot couldn't do this.

    To the larger point. The Bf-109 was an excellent design and withstood a lot of changing conditions, but by 1944 the design was played out. Fighter exist not to outmaneuver the enemy but to shoot him down. Willi Messerschmidts design was built on light weight, small frontal area and thin wings. In 1940 it got away with a collection of rifle caliber machine guns, but shooting down a B-17 without exposing yourself to all those defensive guns too long required firepower. Messerschmidt's thin wings would not allow such an artillery battery. The -G and -K models mounted cannon in gondolas slung under the wings. It worked but imposed a speed penalty on those versions.

    As pointed out, air war on the Eastern Front was generally under 6,000 meters and the engine limitations of the under-supercharged meant nothing. The raw killing power of the -190 made it the king of the front. Even the very sturdy Sturmovik was routinely reduced to widely scattered aluminum by the -190.
     
  24. KGB agent

    KGB agent Well-Known Member

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    Your posts are traditionally wrong on soooooo many levels. Starting with Fw-190 never present on the Eastern Front in numbers worth mentioning thus effectively preventing it from being a "king" of anything, except your wet dreams, in fact it had it's ass kicked so hard that decent and proven Bf-109 remained the sole fighter pretty much till the end, and ending with IL-2 being made of steel armor, not aluminium.
     
  25. Taxcutter

    Taxcutter New Member

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    The Il-2 was strong against ground fire but even the Finnish Brewster 339s routinely shot them down.
     

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