Heinkel 177

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brustcan
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Heinkel 177

#1

Post by brustcan » 30 Jul 2005, 00:44

So much has been written in the History Forum on the Heinkel 177 that I wish to clarify some of the misconceptions that continue to come up on the forum:
THE IDEA: Heinkel received an order from the RLM in 1938 for a four engined bomber, with the main requirement being, a speed of at least 335mph, able to complete a 4,160mile round trip, carrying a 2,200lb bomb load. Work began on the prototype, when the RLM asked that the bomber be able to make diving attacks at an angle of 60 degrees. This involved structural strengthening adding much weight to the basic design.
To reduce drag, two pairs of "double engines" each drove a single large propeller.(the use of double engines had been successfully used by Heinkel in the He-119 aircraft).
THE PROTOTYPES: First flew on Nov. 19, 1939 (V 1) overheated. Six of the eight prototypes crashed. Pre-production started Nov. 1941(A-0's), with 35 being written off. Service delivery started March 1942 (A-1's) up to Sept. 1942 of the 130 produced, the Luffwaffe Quartermaster General received 33 for squadron service, with only two still operational. source:
Kenneth Munson; German Aircraft of WWII, Verner Baumbach; Life & Death of the Lufwaffe. Early October 1942, Major Scheele (KG 50) refused to take responsibility of sending He 177's out on operations. source David Irving; Rise and Fall of the Luftwaffe.
MODIFICATIONS: To save the aircraft, Heinkel's original technical director and chief of development was brought back in November 1942(Heinrich Hertel had left in March of 1939) He was given full powers to correct development, and flight trials led to 170 improvements, and 1,395 structual modifications. source Joachim Dressel & Manfred Griehl; Bombers of the Luftwaffe, Eric Brown; Wings of the Luftwaffe. Problems that never were overcome right until the end of production: values fouled after a maximum six hours running time, requiring a major overhaul. The big propellers rotated in opposite directions causing handling problems, and the idler wheels used to reverse the rotation suffered from vibration,causing crankshaft failure.Herbert Mason Jr.; Rise of the Luftwaffe,David Donald, Warplanes of the Luftwaffe.
COMBAT: KGr. 2 used He 177's to fly supplies into Stalingrad. 19 supply missions were flown, 5 lost in mid-air engine fires, casualty rate was 26%
Verner Bambach, David Irving, Herbert Mason Jr.The bulk of the production of He 177's(approx 700 aircraft) were used on the Eastern Front by KG50 & KG4, with the main operational base being Prowehren, East Prussia. KG 40 operated from Chateaudun, France, in a maritime role.In the West there were never significant numbers, and it was not until Jan 21, 1944 that 35 were operational. In the "Steinbock" attacks against England, on Feb 13, 1944 KG 40 and KG 100 set out for England 14 taxied out, 13 took off, eight returned with overheated and burning engines, four reached London, with three making it back. The Raids ended March 2, 1943. source: Eric Brown, David Donald. In the maritime anti-shipping role, the tactical range was severly limited, because of the high weight. The prototype weight was 52,735lbs, the A-5 model ws 61,531lbs or 15% greater. To keep with the design weight, reduction in fuel was made. View of the Flieger Führer Atlantic on actual experience of the usefullness of the He-177, said that the range does not extend beyond the area of the Bay of Biscay.
Kenneth Muson, Werner Baumbach, Jochim Dressel, Manfred Griehl. Engines had a voracious appetites, a 1,500 mile combat radius requried six tons of gasoline. Ted Mayer;Last of the Luftwaffe. Of the 1,146 that were bulit, 565 were the improved A 5's. Since majority of the Diamler Benz engines went to fighter production, in 1943 there was a shortage of 200 engines. More and more He 177's were left with out engines and in the end simply scrapped. source: Joachim Dressel, Manfred Griehl.
FINAL WORD: the resources wasted in creating the He 177 were desperately needed elswhere. The Luftwaffe wasted much of its limited resources attempting to fix an airplane with far too many faults. Ted Mayer
Last of the Luftwaffe. by the time it was considered fit for operational service, there was no real requirement for it, being deadlier to it's crews.
Eric Brown; wings of the Luftwaffe.
Cheers everyone! brustcan

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#2

Post by Andreas » 30 Jul 2005, 01:51

Thanks for this Brustcan, looks like a good overview to me.

All the best

Andreas


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Warager
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#3

Post by Warager » 30 Jul 2005, 02:23

thanks for the information brustcan i like specially the final words
yes it was true the Luftwaffe wasted many resources but they needed a
long range bomber and the HE-177 was the best they could do

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#4

Post by Huck » 30 Jul 2005, 02:41

We had this discussion three times in a row, but if you want to do it again, I have nothing against it.
Maybe this weekend I will reply.

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#5

Post by Roddoss72 » 01 Aug 2005, 08:03

Warager, Messerschmitt came up with the Amerika bomber in 1942, it was designed to bomb America either as a round trip on a light bomb load or deliver a one way trip with the maximum bomb load on Amerikan cities and ditch and the crew recovered by U-Boat, also Messerschmitt believed that based in the Ukraine and Byelorussia the Amerika Bomber was within range of the eastern Urals, right in the Soviet Industrial heartland and that Heinkel pestered Goering for years to allow the He-177 to be redesigned in to a four seperate engined bomber, and also the redesigning of the undercarriage, but Goering forbade the redevelopment of the He-177, essentially the He-177 could have been a war winner if used in conjunction with the Me-264

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#6

Post by Andreas » 01 Aug 2005, 09:03

Roddoss72 wrote:essentially the He-177 could have been a war winner if used in conjunction with the Me-264
Don't you think you are exaggerating a bit there? The Allies with their very large air forces and thousands of strategic bombers still needed to invade Germany by land to defeat her - how would the presence of some bombers with not enough fuel suddenly won Germany the war?

All the best

Andreas

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#7

Post by Kurfürst » 01 Aug 2005, 17:28

It`s stinking of bias, bits of information selected out no matter where and how silly (opposite rotating props causing handling problems - oh yeah it was typical feature of multiengined aircraft, cancelling out torque and actually making handling easier..), and only the bad part.

How about this... of all Allied bombers, only the twice as big B-29 Superfortress could claim superior performance - which itself was plagued by mechanical troubles. It`s speed, range and bombload was unmatched by the others, and it could claim a very effective defense armament with cannons, with features like remote controlled turrets etc. From what pilot`s told about it, it had good, benevolent flight characteristics. Yes it had it`s share of technical troubles, which are quite exaggrevated and sadly not much supported by either the aircraft loss lists or operational data...

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#8

Post by Lkefct » 01 Aug 2005, 17:57

If they ever had Ural bombers, a huge percentage of the sorties would be used making navigational data, and photo recon missions to support the bombing. THere is little detailed information about the interior of Russia, and not nearly what a formation of bombers would need to find svoiet facotires. It would be like finding a needle in a haystack to find targets in the interior of soviet russa.

I have always thought the Amerika bomber thing was a nice fantasy. I know it is technically possible, but what possible military effect would dropping a couple of tons of bombs on NY accomplish? To carry enough bombs it would take a huge fleet of planes, all flying one way. And these planes are massive and expensive. You don't want to throw them away on one wya missions. If there was a real use for the Germans for a heavy 4 engined plane, sending them over the atlantic with guided bombs to hunt convoys would be the way to go. An amerika bomber with 4 guided bombs could then orbit and shadow a convoy to vector in other 4 engine aircraft and Uboats. Even a shorter ranged He 177 with 4 engines could play a useful part in carrying guided bombs out into the atlantic.

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#9

Post by Roddoss72 » 02 Aug 2005, 06:07

I know this getting away from the subject but that is what the Amerika bomber was designed for either a round trip with light bomb load, or a one way trip with heavy bomb load (it was thought it would be used incase the Germans had the A-Bomb), Goering never had the foresight to use the bomber to bomb east of the Urals, the Amerika bomber was designed to fly at high alitudes 30,000 ft and above, it had two presserized cabins it was also refferred as the German B-29, also Heinkel wanted to redevelop the He-177, they wanted to eventually decouple the four engines and to have them in seperate nacelles also to convert it to a twin fin, remove the dive bomber additions, but once again Goering forbade Heinkel to do what they thought was nessacary (sic) to make the He-177 a strategic long range bomber, as i said before those that made the important decisions could not get out of the entrenched idea of short/medium range tactical bombing to supprt the troops, instead of long range strategic bombing to inflict heavy damage to the arms production factories in the eastern Urals, the Luftwaffe did have the aircraft and the men that could do the job, but not the leadership to allow them to do so.

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#10

Post by Andreas » 02 Aug 2005, 11:14

Please stick to discussing the technical aspects of the He 177 in this thread. If you want to go into how the LW could have won it, do so in the current thread on the topic in the LW forum.

http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... 83&start=0

Thank you.

Andreas

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#11

Post by Andreas » 02 Aug 2005, 11:17

Kurfürst wrote:It`s stinking of bias, bits of information selected out no matter where and how silly (opposite rotating props causing handling problems - oh yeah it was typical feature of multiengined aircraft, cancelling out torque and actually making handling easier..), and only the bad part.

How about this... of all Allied bombers, only the twice as big B-29 Superfortress could claim superior performance - which itself was plagued by mechanical troubles. It`s speed, range and bombload was unmatched by the others, and it could claim a very effective defense armament with cannons, with features like remote controlled turrets etc. From what pilot`s told about it, it had good, benevolent flight characteristics. Yes it had it`s share of technical troubles, which are quite exaggrevated and sadly not much supported by either the aircraft loss lists or operational data...
Kurfürst - bring some sources, or refrain from posting. The initial post is showing you how to do it. If you have an issue with the content of it, you are welcome to counter it by arguments supported by sources. Not by ranting and insults.

Thank you.

Andreas

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#12

Post by Huck » 25 Aug 2005, 03:47

brustcan wrote:So much has been written in the History Forum on the Heinkel-177 that I wish to clarify some of the misconceptions that continue to come up on the forum:
THE IDEA: Heinkel received an order from the RLM in 1938 for a four engined bomber, with the main requirement being, a speed of at least 335mph, able to complete a 4,160mile round trip, carrying a 2,200lb bomb load. Work began on the prototype, when the RLM asked that the bomber be able to make diving attacks at an angle of 60 degrees. This involved structural strengthening adding much weight to the basic design.
To reduce drag, two pairs of "double engines" each drove a single large propeller.(the use of double engines had been successfully used by Heinkel in the He-119 aircraft).
Correct to some degree. But the added weight was not so important as pairing the engines in a nacelle close to the fuselage, required significantly less wing strengthening than a standard 4 engine configuration.
brustcan wrote:THE PROTOTYPES: First flew on Nov. 19, 1939(V1)overheated. Six of the eight prototypes crashed.
From the first 8 P-80 prototypes (in the order of serial numbers) 5 crashed. Other planes suffered from major problems even after they entered in service: most of the P-47B sent for evaluation crashed in a couple of months (more than 40), then this type of P-47 was retired from operational service. Should we consider P-47 a faulty aircraft because of this? I don't think so. Most of the aircrafts developed during the war suffered from a lot of problems and delays during development.
brustcan wrote:Pre-production started Nov. 1941(A-0's), with 35 being written off.
This is complete nonsense. Out of 35 preproduction He-177, 2 were lost to enemy, 6 were lost in various accidents, 14 were converted to A-1 and 8 were sent to bomber schools. The service period was from 06.42 when first 3 were delivered to I./KG50 to 08.44 when the last one was lost (IV./KG100). Most of the preproduction aircraft survived for more than 2 years in service which is exceptional for a long range bomber, in Feb '44 there were 12 A-0 in service (almost 50% of A-0 produced), as many as A-5 were in service at that date. (see the table at the end of this post)
brustcan wrote:Service delivery started March 1942(A-1's)up to Sept. 1942 of the 130 produced, the Luffwaffe Quartermaster General received 33 for squadron service, with only two still operational. source:
Kenneth Munson; German Aircraft of WWII, Verner Baumbach; Life & Death of the Lufwaffe. Early October 1942, Major Scheele(KG50) refused to take responsibility of sending He-177's out on operations. source David Irving; Rise and Fall of the Luftwaffe.
A few planes were sent into evaluation despite the opposition of the manufacturer, on direct orders from Milch. The planes were not ready, in fact they were sent there to be used as transports, as not all the equipment was fitted to the planes. The engine problems were not solved either at that time, in early 1943 a special commity worked around the clock to fix the issues. After that He-177 was as safe as any other Luftwaffe bomber. Another thing: until autumn of 1943 He-177 was in service trials not in actual service. Many groups received small numbers of He-177 to start combat training with the plane. It wasn't until late 1943 that some of those groups became fully equipped with He-177.
brustcan wrote:MODIFICATIONS: To save the aircraft, Heinkel's original technical director and chief of development was brought back in November 1942(Heinrich Hertel had left in March of 1939) He was given full powers to correct development, and flight trials led to 170 improvements, and 1,395 structual modifications. source Joachim Dressel & Manfred Griehl; Bombers of the Luftwaffe, Eric Brown; Wings of the Luftwaffe.
Yes, He-177 was developed in a longer period than expected. This was used by Heinkel's political enemies, like Milch. In retrospect, the delays in the development of such complex bomber are not at all surprising. Most of the advanced bombers developed during the war were not delivered on schedule.
brustcan wrote:Problems that never were overcome right until the end of production: values fouled after a maximum six hours running time, requiring a major overhaul. The big propellers rotated in opposite directions causing handling problems, and the idler wheels used to reverse the rotation suffered from vibration,causing crankshaft failure.Herbert Mason Jr.; Rise of the Luftwaffe,David Donald, Warplanes of the Luftwaffe.
If this is indeed what the author said then David Donald is probably a pseudonym for Donald Duck. Props that rotate in opposite directions do not cause handling problems, they cure handling problems (by countering the torque). And service stats show beyond doubt that He-177 was not more prone to accidents than any other Luftwaffe bomber. Look on Michael Holm's site for KG40 and KG100 He-177 stats (those are the only KGs that used He-177 extensivelly into combat), and compare the figures with those of other Luftwaffe bombers.

During the war ~140 He-177 were lost due to enemy action (40 unserviceable He-177 were captured and/or destroyed in June '44 in France) and ~130 He-177 were lost in various accidents. This is actually a good loss rate for a ww2 bomber. You can compare it with B-29 loss rate, B-29 and He-177 sharing many elements (from design complexity and engine problems to comparable capabilities, operations and loss rate): in slightly more than 1 year of service B-29 groups lost 700 planes from the 2000 delivered. From the 631 lost only 128 were lost due to enemy action, the rest of them being accidents, mostly engine related. The loss rate in accidents was significantly worse for B-29 than for He-177. That crews loved He-177 is another proof of its reliability. No mentally sane pilot would like to fly an unreliable aircraft, particularly if he has to fly over ocean, as He-177 did in the majority of its missions.
brustcan wrote:COMBAT: KGr2 used He-177's to fly supplies into Stalingrad. 19 supply missions were flown, 5 lost in mid-air engine fires, casualty rate was 26% Verner Bambach, David Irving, Herbert Mason Jr.
This was already discussed above, He-177 was in 1942 an unfinished plane forced into combat by irresponsible Milch. For the whole duration of 1942 newly appointed Milch took such such disastruous decisions. Horrifying weather at Stalingrad at the end of 1942 also took its toll. Now that you mentioned this, much more controversial was the sending in service of Me 210A which had bad stability problems, instead of waiting to modify it to Me 210C standard, which was already finalised by then. Needless to say that the contract specified that Me 210 was to enter production before the end of flight testing in order to speed up delivery, and the defects noticed afterwards were to be corrected directly on the production line. Milch prevented this to happen.
brustcan wrote:The bulk of the production of He-177's(approx 700 aircraft) were used on the Eastern Front by KG50 & KG4, with the main operational base being Prowehren, East Prussia.


Another completely incorrect representation of He-177 operations. I./KG50 was the first unit to receive He-177, the preproduction version. The unit was involved in He-177 flight tests. In december 1942 about 20 planes were sent to Stalingrad but their serviceability was poor, as the development of the plane was not finished. They stayed there for one month, losing 3 planes to enemy action and 5 planes in accidents (remember the harsh Stalingrad winter). The rest of the planes were sent back. Erg./KG50 averaged 5 He-177 in tests each month, at the beginning of 1943, but they were at home in Germany (Brandenburg-Briest). Within I./KG4 situation was the same, about 5 He-177 were in tests with the unit each month, in first half of 1943. They were based at Lechfeld, in Germany. IV./KG4 had He-177 for just a month. Ocassionaly larger number of He-177 transited those units, in their way towards other units. I./KG50, Erg./KG50, I./KG4, IV./KG4 were not involved on Eastern Front during this period when they tested He-177 (first half of 1943).
brustcan wrote:KG40 operated from Chateaudun, France, in a maritime role.In the West there were never significant numbers, and it was not until Jan 21, 1944 that 35 were operational.
Not only that their involvment was significant on Western Front, but save a few missions by KG1 in late spring 1944 on Eastern Front, all actual service of He-177 was on Western Front. KG40 and KG100 were the true He-177 operators, and used the plane in antishipping role, with the exception of a short period during Steinbock raids.
brustcan wrote:In the "Steinbock" attacks against England, on Feb 13, 1944 KG40 and KG100 set out for England 14 taxied out, 13 took off, eight returned with overheated and burning engines, four reached London, with three making it back. The Raids ended March 2, 1943. source: Eric Brown, David Donald.
They returned with burning engines?? WOW!! that was some plane. Incredible how authors like to invent such spicy "details", compromising their credibility in the process. Engine overheating is something completely different, every bomber pilot had to be careful when taking off fully loaded. In this particular case there were circumstances that favored such an ending. I./KG100 was in the process of moving to France, 3./KG100 began to move from Lechfeld to Chateaudun 3 weeks prior this raid, 2./KG100 started to move just the week before. The maintenance facilities required to operate He-177 were still to come, prior this move only one He-177 squad operated from Chateaudun.

In plus all the He-177 that 2. and 3./KG100 had were new builds, not yet flown in combat. The standard procedure for new engines required that first flights had to be made only at low power, so the planes had to be lightly loaded, which most likely weren't. Also, because the planes were newbuilts, a period had to pass before all the manufacturing glitches were to be solved (this was true for any ww2 plane, especially for heavy bombers). In fact the planes were are talking about were flown from Germany in that raid, because they could not move to France the week before. It's hardly surprising that they didn't flew well on the first mission and most aborted it.

In general bombers had much stricter safety requirements than fighters, which translated in many aborted missions. For example in average USAAF fighters had 1 inefective sortie in 15-20 sorties flown, USAAF bombers on the other hand had 1 aborted sortie in 5 flown, and some even 1 in 3! When one bomber had problems all its squad mates had to check for the same problems, because they could be affected by the same maitenance deficiencies common to the squad. There are many such instances. I can give you an example from B-29 missions against Japan:

92 plane leave India
79 reach China
75 dispatched for mission
68 leave China
47 reach the target
1 single bomb managed to fall somewhere near the target

brustcan wrote:In the maritime anti-shipping role, the tactical range was severly limited, because of the high weight. The prototype weight was 52,735lbs, the A-5 model ws 61,531lbs or 15% greater. To keep with the design weight, reduction in fuel was made. View of the Flieger Fuhrer Atlantic on actual experience of the usefullness of the He-177, said that the range does not extend beyond the area of the Bay of Biscay. Kenneth Muson, Werner Baumbach, Jochim Dressel, Manfred Griehl.
That report is talking about He-177A-1, which used the lower power and slightly less fuel efficient DB606 (A1: 10400l fuel + 4000kg bombs payload for 3200km range). From that point on He-177A3 entered service - it had the more powerful DB610 and could take on board 10 tons of fuel and 3 tons of bombs for a range of 3000+ miles (at max take off load).
brustcan wrote:Engines had a voracious appetites, a 1,500 mile combat radius requried six tons of gasoline. Ted Mayer;Last of the Luftwaffe.
This author has no idea what he is talking about. 6 tons of fuel for 3000 miles range would have been excellent for a plane of He-177 size and engine power. In fact He-177 consumed more than that, about 10 tons of fuel for that distance (with 3 tons of bombs). Still, its performance was unparalled, there was no other ww2 bomber that could carry that much at such a fast speed on a such a large distance. In part this was because DB 605 was a world beater in terms of fuel efficiency.
brustcan wrote:Of the 1,146 that were bulit, 565 were the improved A-5's. Since majority of the Diamler Benz engines went to fighter production, in 1943 there was a shortage of 200 engines. More and more He-177's were left with out engines and in the end simply scrapped. source: Joachim Dressel, Manfred Griehl.
From 1943 on there was never a shortage of DB 605. In fact DB 605 and Jumo 211 were the only engines that were in abundent supply. All other major production engines, BMW 801, Jumo 213 and DB 603 were in rather short supply. Any bomber that used any of these last 3 engines had to be able to use at least 2 of them, in order to prevent engine shortages. For keeping a steady supply of engines for Fw-190, engineers had to adopt the same policy. Me 109 on the other hand never had to look for alternatives.

Besides, the last He-177 produced were left without engines because He-177 was out of service months before it went out of production. Why supply engines for a plane that was not in service? Germany could not afford this luxury at the end of war. Nevertheless, the fact that He-177 was kept in production despite that it was out of service, proves how interested was Luftwaffe in having the plane. It just could not afford it in service at that point.
brustcan wrote:FINAL WORD: the resources wasted in creating the He-177 were desperately needed elswhere. The Luftwaffe wasted much of its limited resources attempting to fix an airplane with far too many faults. Ted Mayer
Last of the Luftwaffe. by the time it was considered fit for operational service, there was no real requirement for it, being deadlier to it's crews. Eric Brown; wings of the Luftwaffe.
What resources is he talking about? RLM inspectors visiting Heinkel facilities always noted how slow was the progress on He-177, in both design and production. When asked by RLM high officials, Heinkel openly answered that the development will be faster the moment it will be properly funded, and until then He-177 was on low priority.

The faults were fixed by mid 1943, when it started the service. That was no requirement for it, is not really true, it was used for long range antishipping mission from the beginning. It would have been used for precision deep strikes into USSR if time would have allowed it (they just started those missions in mid 1944, but stopped them soon after because of the situation of both fronts).

Crews loved the plane. In service it proved as reliable as any other Luftwaffe bomber. Its handling was said to have been excellent. It was fast and well defended. In terms of payload vs range it was surpassed only by B-29, though slightly. In terms of bombing precion it was years ahead of anything the Allies had. It proved what it can do in antishipping missions, where on average from 3 guided bombs lauched 1 hit the target.
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#13

Post by Andreas » 25 Aug 2005, 23:05

Huck

You are always talking about a range of 3,000 miles for the He 177. In Soenke Neitzel's 'Der Einsatz der deutschen Luftwaffe ueber dem Atlantik und der Nordsee 1939 - 45' is a graph showing the Eindringtiefe (penetration depth - which I believe would equal combat radius in English) of 1,500 km (938m), in combat mode, dated spring 1944.

Operating from Cognac, Bordeaux, or Mont de MarsanThis is insufficient to interdict either convoys going through Gibraltar, or coming in through the northern approach to the Irish Sea without risking hitting fighter cover from Northern Ireland.

Which version of the He 177 does this refer to? How can there be such a massive difference between two versions if as you say later versions had a payload range of 3,000 miles?

The graph is based on BA/MA RL 8/187k, RL 36/119.

Other Eindringtiefen according to this are:

FW 200 (combat) 1,500km
FW 200 (long range recce) 1,750/2,200km
Bv 222 2,400km
Ju 290 2,400km

Planned:
Ju 390 4,500km
Me 264 5,000km

However, there is a statement in the text saying that the Eindringtiefe was set to 1,200km (750m) in November 1943, and following an attack against MKS30 at 1,400km was raised to 1,900km (1,188m). Still far below 3,000.

This attack was flown with 25 He 177 A-3 of II./KG40 carrying Hs 293. 20 reached the target and dropped their bombs. The situation above the target was bad for an attack with 6/10 low cloud cover and heavy AA. 11 of the Hs 293 failed for technical reasons (28%). One freighter was sunk (Marsa 4,404BRT), one damaged (Delius, 6,055BRT) for a 5% hitrate of those launched (both Hs 293 from the same plane). A further 3 Hs 293 hit close without causing damage. Three He 177 were lost (12% of those sortied), one to a Beaufighter, one due to lack of fuel, one for unknown reasons 50km from Bordeaux, and one crashlanded for 45% damage. 4 more were damaged by AA. The returning crews claimed to have sunk two ships with 18,000BRT (reality one with 4,404 - 309% overclaim) and damaged three with 15,000BRT (reality one with 6,055 - 148% overclaim). Based on Archiv Heinkel and KTB Skl, KTB BDU, and ObdL Fuest.Ia documents.

Your statement on 1/3 of those glide bombs that were launched hit is failing to tell the whole story.
JonS wrote:Andreas,
the quote bears closer scrutiny.

1) missiles/gliders sortied: 500
2) missiles/gliders dropped: 319 (63.8% of those sortied)
3) missiles/gliders dropped that worked correctly: 215 (43% of those sortied, or 67% of those dropped)
4) missiles/gliders dropped that worked correctly that hit a target: 106 (21.2% of those sortied, or 33.2% of those dropped, or 49.3% of those that worked correctly)

Ships sunk or damaged: 79
Aircraft lost: 48

Missiles/gliders per sinking/damage: 6.3
Sinking/damage per a/c lost: 1.6

From 2) it is clear that 181 missiles/gliders either returned to base for some reason, or were lost when the parent a/c was lost.
From 3) it is clear that 104 missiles/gliders dropped failed to work correctly, possibly due to jamming or screening.
From 4) it is clear that 109 missiles/gliders that were dropped and worked correctly still missed their target.

Two issues with the numbers are that:
1) it includes both Fritz X and the Hs.293, so reasonable conclusions can be made about the the program, but not so strongly about either weapon in isolation.
2) being a German wartime doc it makes no consideration of successful countermeasures. The numbers of missiles/gliders that failed due to countermeasures are buried in those that weren't dropped, those that were dropped but didn't work properly, and those that worked correctly but still missed the target. All we can really say is that the counter measures were successful somewhere between 0% and 78.8%* of the time.

Regards
JonS

* 100 - 21.2 = 78.8
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... &start=150

Thanks.

Andreas

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#14

Post by Erich » 25 Aug 2005, 23:15

Andreas as a side note can you please tell me if the book you have quoted from covers any of FAGr 5's Ju 290 missions ?

many thanks

Erich ~

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#15

Post by Andreas » 29 Aug 2005, 08:48

Huck wrote: In terms of payload vs range it was surpassed only by B-29, though slightly.
Like many of your other claims, I am having some trouble with this one. I just checked the distance from Guam to Tokyo (1,563m). If we assume that this is the furthest the B-29 could fly in combat (A heroic assumption in favour of the He-177; Tinian and Saipan are pretty much the same distance BTW), it is still far ahead (1/3rd to be precise) of what the He-177 could achieve, even if we go with the 1,900km Eindringtiefe which is the furthest I have come across so far.

I have no idea what the payload of the B-29 at this range was, but since the He-177 could really not come close to the combat range of the B-29 anyway, a comparison of range/payload would be flawed and pretty useless anyway, since the B-29 could conduct missions that the He-177 could not even dream of.

Your selection of an example mission of B-29 from China is a nice bit of googling (this is the point where I remind you to state your sources), but it would have enhanced your credibility if you had mentioned the supply and environmental problems that the B-29 was suffering from in India and China and that (according to the same website).

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