Actually, it was built, and enjoyed an active service life. Of the 70 Bf 109T-1 ordered, seven were completed to full carrier specification, and the remaining 63 as T-2 with the carrier gear deleted. They were initially used by 1/JG44 in Norway, and later as training aircraft. None appear to have gone to Italy (as at least one of the folding-wing Stukas) when the Germans assisted the Italians in developing the air group for "Aquila" - the Bf 109T was past it's sell-by date by then, and the Italian choice of the Re2001 was better than anything the Germans had.
Well, the Spitfire had similar limitations, but Seafire IIIs (essentially a hot-rodded navalised Spit V) proved capable Kamikaze- killers at the end of the war.
When work was resumed on /Graf Zeppelin/ in 1942, the 109T was recognised to be impractical and obsolete. Messerschmitt proposed a new design, a Gustav fuselage with a new wing carrying inward-retracting main gear and folding outboard panels. The designation was Me 155. The /Graf Zeppelin/ was abandoned before any metal was cut on the new fighter.
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The design was reworked a couple of times to fit different requirements and finally ended up with no recognisable Bf 109 heritage as the Bv 155.
true but i suspect the excellent training perfected by raf at that time and the lack of same for the ijn had much to do also. was there any job a spit 5 couldn't be modded for? never mind the ju88, the mkv was the all purpose ac of the war.
An easy mistake to make - those web sources I've been able to check (my geriatric machine's browser craps out every time I go near Wiki - maybe it's trying to tell me something...) are a bit vague, if not contradictory. Not particularly surprising, I used to know a guy some sources state as having been shot down and killed - TWICE! AFAIK, the ten T-0 prototypes were exactly what you said (E conversions with a hook and extended span), the 70 T-1s and T-2s were the original production batch. The extended span made them useful for short fields, and as high-altitude interceptors, hence the Norwegian deployment. The short-field capability meant some of the survivors went to Helgoland (a very small island) where they soldiered on until totally clapped out in 1944 - probably the last E variants in front- line service anywhere.
Heh, a little time with Google netted me a lead on some but 'CP-100' seems to have been a general title as I found at least 6 groups of A/C with the same number at 1/700. There were RN, Modern US, Modern Soviet, WWII USAAF fighters and Japanese WWII. The latter seem to be the more widely available models.
Nertz! All they have for German Attack aircraft are Arado 96 and 196 models. I thought the 96 was a trainer? OTOH, maybe as a communications plane? Hmmmmm....
willshak wrote in news:SPudnZhJuvgP6LTTnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@supernews.com:
Lower weight - no cooling system, piping, radiator, fluids, etc.
Storage of coolant at sea, 1 more item for the supply chain, plus radiator parts.
Water cooled aircraft much easier to get a complete kill with relatively minor damage - don't have to shoot up a flying surface or hole the engine to put it in the water, just one bullet in the coolant system anywhere.
Radial engines demonstrably could sustain considerable damage and get the pilot home, I've read of whole cylinders shot away and the bird still getting to the nest.
Aircraft survivability good for pilot morale.
All traded against aerodynamic superiority of inline engines. Just build bigger honking radials.
That's the way I understand it.
Think F4U or F6F vs P51.
Consider also that all USAAF bomber, attack and transport aircraft used radials. The Lanc used Merlins, but offhand any other (successful) Brit bombers go with water cooled inlines?
Of all the US types only the P-38, P-39, P-40 and P-51 and only the Mustang was REALLY successful as a dogfighter, the P-38 coming in second. I'm guessing that air cooled radials were just more developed and refined at the time, wasn't the Merlin and the US license built Packard-Merlins (and to a lesser extent the Allisons) and the German DB 600 series and the Junkers Jumos really the first really successful mass produced iterations of water cooled engines?
Mad Modeller wrote in news:bridnfEdBN1h6LfTnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@giganews.com:
I have a book 'round here somewhere that has the lineage of the 109s. Catapault gear, tailhook and longer span wings seem to be the major mods. May have been one of the reasons the Germans gave up, narrow track undercart not terribly stable, especially considering they had almost no carrier experience and realistically no real use for a CV anyway.
The Old Man wrote in news:6e7b4687-166a-4c3b-b7d4- snipped-for-privacy@e35g2000yqc.googlegroups.com:
Why not just go to 190s, then? Wide track landing gear, more rugged and a radial engine? IMO that was where they SHOULD have gone. The Stuka probably would have been as good as the Val or SBD, with the "R" type long range mods and carrier mods. Probably could have doubled as torpedoe carriers (wasn't there a mod for that anyway?) and saved somewhat on maintenance.
We all tend to forget how many versions of the Hispano-Suiza 12Ys were out there. Yaks ran on the Soviet-built versions and there were many of those built.
Convoy harassment comes to mind. The Ju 88s only got so far into the Atlantic and the Fw 200s couldn't carry a real significant offensive load. I was watching a show on the Military Channel today about the top ten fighters through history. There was a German WWII fighter pilot on talking about his favourite bird but he was happy to talk about the miseable experiences of landing
109s. The program went on to point out that 1/3 of all 109s were taken out in landing accidents. I wouldn't think they'd be any good at carrier landings. The pilots probably would have had a better chance of survivng a bailout near the ship. Yeah, I'd really rather have 190s.
Mad Modeller wrote in news:HY6dnelSHKyRKrLTnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@giganews.com:
Yeah but think about it. The Z Class destroyers were arguably good fleet escorts, maybe almost a Tribal, but what else would you have screened it with? Think Bismark or Graf Spee. With the weight of the RN Home Fleet and the US Atalntic Fleet in opposition? Once they got out of range of shore based aircraft?
For all the good a surface fleet did the Germans they should have saved the reichmarks and put it in subs. If they'd developed the Type XXI even 2 years earlier, that would have made a difference.
I would say the reason for that was that the 109s were in production at the time the GZ was being designed whilst the Fw 190 was still being developed.
I'll agree with you on that. The Stuka was actually more advanced than the Stringbag. I do believe there was a Stuka mod for torpedoes and an Fw 190 was also an experiment with fish. That would have left them holding a similar position to the Hornet today. That would have had the effect of cutting down on the necessary spares onboard storage also. I think things would have gone more logically IF there wasn't a gang of idiots led by a lunatic in charge of the government in the thirties and forties in Germany.
Actually both the Bf-109T and the Ju-87C saw action, not as carrier planes, but both existed. The Messerschmitts flew from landbases in Norway and the navalised Stuka during the polish campaign according to books I have read.
Claus Gustafsen
"The Old Man" skrev i meddelelsen news: snipped-for-privacy@e35g2000yqc.googlegroups.com...
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Okay, I'll go along with that. But the aircraft was never actually built, so I'm thinking that after a few accidents based on the 109s narrow track, it wouldn't be too long before Messerschmitt came up with a 109H approach. We're talking "what if" here....
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