LW transport fleet - losses, operations, stock, production

[Jon G.]

The description applies to Ju-52/3mg5e and /3mg6e sub-marks.

[Urmel]

I think category 3) , above, is too loosely defined.

Some interesting info gleamed from Martin Pegg, Luftwaffe Transport Units vol. 1, p 82 tells us that in July 1942, the number of Ju-52s in the Mediterranean doubled from 150 to 300, and that efficiency also increased because, it is implied, only by the summer of 1942 was there sufficient storage in Crete itself for the Transportgruppens' daily fuel requirement, which is given as 360,000 litres of fuel a day.

As a very crude hack - assuming only Ju-52s and equivalents, assuming that all a/c had 2,400 litres of fuel capacity, and further assuming that every a/c would need a full tank of gas for each mission, that comes out as 150 missions a day, or a flight every other day for Crete-based Ju-52s, which is actually pretty good measured as a sustained performance. Ibid. DAK needs are given as 25 tons of equipment and 1,000 troops/day.

Don't forget that personnel transport was also carried out by other planes, including Italian.

Category 3) only refers to the initial lift in Sonnenblume, not the whole of the African campaign.

[phylo_roadking]

The description applies to Ju-52/3mg5e and /3mg6e sub-marks

That would be right ; Nowarra mentions that experiences in the West and Norway with the g3e and g4e resulted in considerable development work and the advent before the end of 1940 of the g5e, g6e...and the g7e.

(I presume all those Ju52s putting down in rather unsuitable locations in Holland without the fuel to abort to home was a rather impressive lesson for the LW.... )

[Jon G.]

Table of Transportverbände quarterly losses, taken from Martin Pegg's Luftwaffe Transport Units 1943-1945, p. 180.

[phylo_roadking]

Jon, what are the critera - is it total loss, or losses "on the day" I.E. later write-offs on inspection not taken into acount?

I'm asking because the Spring 1940 spike - which would cover BOTh Norway and Holland - is suspiciously small...

[Urmel]

What on earth happened in July-Sept 43????

@Phylo - I take it these are TWOs (total write-offs). Look at the April-Jun figure for 1941.

[Jon G.]

I have no idea what the criteria are. Pegg doesn't specify or go into details about his table. However, given that the summary is in a quarterly format, I would presume that it only includes total losses, and not initially lost but later repaired machines.

For example, many of the aircraft initially lost in The Netherlands were later repaired and put back into service.

[phylo_roadking]

would presume that it only includes total losses, and not initially lost but later repaired machines.

Only way that makes sense of that spike.

For example, many of the aircraft initially lost in The Netherlands were later repaired and put back into service.

From Zuylen's material some time ago - this process does seem to have been quite rapid for Holland; given that Fokker locally was contracted for a good aprt of the repairs.

But the article some time ago now in Flypast that discussed returns from Crete by barge etc. from Maleme, this was still going on by the end of 1941...

[Urmel]

I thought Zuylen said the last of the planes lost in Holland did not return to service until January 1941?

In any case, you would expect Maleme wrecks to take longer. The nearest capable repair station with free capacity is not quite Fokker in Amsterdam, but probably closer to Amsterdam than to Maleme.

[phylo_roadking]

Yes, the last of - but inspection and dismantling began within 3 weeks; in Crete, the FJ were still wandering round "pacifying" three weeks later

[Urmel]

But that's also a function of capacity. If they had been able to bring sufficient mechanics over, I am sure they could have pacified the area around Maleme at least to really get cracking.

[phylo_roadking]

But that's also a function of capacity.

...and ALSO transport capacity; in 1940 there was a convenient fleet of several thousand assembled barges to hand in Holland and Belgium...

Also - the type of damage at Maleme may have been different from Holland; there, as well as the damage from actually landing on the bumpy, rock-strewn gravel strip, they spent several days being merrily peppered by the Commonwealth artillery behond Hill 107...

[Jon G.]

I'm not particularly happy with the table myself but thought it would instigate useful debate.

...What on earth happened in July-Sept 43????

Umm... Kuban bridgehead evacuation, Kursk offensive, loss of Sicily and possibly associated losses of aircraft on the ground, and ditto for the Italian armistice and also the Aegean campaign in the autumn of 1943. However, none of that really answers why the 3rd quarter of 1943 apparently was the period of the entire war with the highest a/c transport losses.

There could be some spillover from one quarter and into the next due to the accounting format, but you'd think that all aircraft lost in Tunisia would have been accounted for by June at the latest.

FWIW, Ju-52 production peaked in 1943 with 887 units produced, or some 45% of transport aircraft lost that year.

[Urmel]

It could of course be that a lot of heavily damaged but deemed repairable Aunties were still on the Sicilian aerodromes, awaiting repair, when the Allies paid their visit?

[phylo_roadking]

loss of Sicily and possibly associated losses of aircraft on the ground,

These two came to mind; the LW likewise lost a lot of aircraft on the ground U/S for various reasons - damage, normal servicing etc. - as the British rolled over them after El Alamein.

and ditto for the Italian armistice

Would there be large losses as a result of this? Just lately - courtesy of the thread in the WI Section over Italian and other manufacturing - the Germans actually took on charge a lot of Italian materiel....so I can't see them loosing much of their own!

There could be some spillover from one quarter and into the next due to the accounting format

Jon, this is what I meant in my cack-handed way about the Crete losses in 1941; with the much longer process for getting them dismantled and back to Germany...reassembled aircraft coming back into service mightn't have shown up in that case for many months.

FWIW, Ju-52 production peaked in 1943 with 887 units produced, or some 45% of transport aircraft lost that year

Here's something I've wondered about for some time - but I as yet haven't found anything either way....what triggered to ordering process for more??? Did the RLM just order replacements by batch when required by major losses...or was ordering/construction of 52s a rolling process?

As in....did 1943 see peak production BECAUSE of the losses, or simply because Junkers had got their sh1t together and got the production rate up as mentioned before?