'barrel bomb' ???

[TsrJoe]

DELETED POST (please remove from the thread)

 

[Just call me Ray]

I assume you mean the highlighted structure

 

[Grzesio]

The highlighted thing is a mainwheel.

Regards

Grzesio

 

[Avimimus]

I think the payload on the centre rack is what's being referred to

Is the aircraft a P?

 

[Just call me Ray]

I think that might actually be a rato unit, which were shaped like that.

 

[TomS]

I think that might actually be a rato unit, which were shaped like that.

I thought the same, but the RATO units used on the AR234 were smaller and mounted up very near the wing, as in the photo here:


(Photo credit: Michael Yew from Austin, Texas, USA, Creative Commons License)

 

[Lauge]

In various suspicious literature (think Friedrich Georg, Rob Arndt et al) the Barrel Bomb ("Fassbombe" in German) has been linked to every kind of Nazi secret last-days-of-the-war superweapon you care to name: nuclear, chemical, radiological, FAE, super-chemical, deep-freeze, etc..

To me, it always looked rather like a (air droppable ?) canister for supplies. And if you absolutely want it to be a weapon, my best bet would be an FAE or a firebomb (napalm or equivalent). This, I hasten to stress, is pure speculation on my part, however.

Regards & all,

Thomas L. Nielsen

 

[Orionblamblam]

It's the warp core.

 

[Grzesio]

Yes, it obviously resembles the Winter- or Sommerballon bomb, that was my first thought.

Regards

Grzesio

 

[zen]

Did they think about baggage pods back then?
Odd thing is it does look like a pressure vessel.....

 

[Orionblamblam]

Might just be a fuel tank. A bomb that tubby would likely tumble without stabilizing fins... so the designers didn't *care* if it tumbled. That means either a drop-tank, or a napalm bomb, or... ?

 

[zerstorer1946]

maybe it is a type of aerial mine? it would probably deploy a parachute of some kind out of the back?
i dont think it is a rato pod, as i doubt it would be mounted in the center of the arcraft like a bomb would. ???