Bomber A contenders

[Artie Bob]

Jemiba,

This was not a scholarly issue, my post simply answers the quote where you, not Peter Achs, implied that I might not be able to read or properly understand German with absolutely no information on my qualifications. I would like you to confirm whether or not you have read either of my books, since it was you who raised questions about their accuracy or whether you are repeating someone else's comments. If you have read my books and agree with Peter, I have no quarrel. If you have not read my books, then your posts are the sort of bullshit that in my opinion does not need to be posted on the forum.

Artie Bob

 

[dan_inbox]

then your posts are the sort of bullshit that in my opinion does not need to be posted on the forum.

Hmmm.... "the sort of bullshit that does not need to be posted" here...
Booo.

 

[Jemiba]

- "It was indeed that question, that made me perk my eyebrows, ..." refers to Peter Achs comment, that
said "non-Germans cannot produce good books about Luftwaffe aircraft"
"to perk one's eyebrows" to me was a term to express scepticism, here clearly related to that statement.

To keep it short:
I held your book in the hand once and browsed through it at a modellers fair. Though not exactly my field
of interest, I was pleased by its large format photos, detailed drawings and especially the colour profiles. What
lessened my fascination were the comments by two purchasers, who grumbled about errors already known
from much older publications and actually pointed me directly to some of them.
Had a discussion with a friend a bit later (IIRC it was about a solid nose version), and some of those errors
seemed conceivable, using our limited stock of books and following some discussions in the internet. And yes,
after that, without further research I willingly jumped on the bandwagon of Peter Achs review, probably too
quickly, I very much apologise for that.

No publication will be free of errors, the more in-depth, the more inevitable, that errors occur, but that
won't degrade the big picture, of course . Beg your pardon, that it could be understood this way, have
edited my post from September 2013.

 

[newsdeskdan]

I have both of the Medcalf Ju 88 books, which aren't really meant to deliver detail on Bomber A. Has Peter Achs ever actually written about it himself, beyond magazine articles and a small mention in the Fw 191 book?

 

[Wurger]

Gentlemen, taking apart divisions and some misunderstandings from both sides, natural at a forum of this high nature, you should concentrate in what bond us, which are aircraft projects. Jens`s insights are very important to ascertain doubtful sources, introduce new projects and hypothetical layouts. William`s book (vol.I) is one I cherish as the most complete covering the devolopment of the Ju88, and all of us would be most happy to see more from his archive (additional images of the Ju 85 mockup?). Please continue your most useful contributions as amicable peers in the best forum ever.

Jens told me that Peter Achs is working on its stillborn book on the Junkers Ju 88, and he`s far from completion. Meanwhile, William`s book is the best there is. The "hot potato" is now in Achs`s hands.

 

[KJ_Lesnick]

I was talking to a somebody about this online: Since the last post was over 3 years ago, I'm curious if anything new came out either in terms of information/books?

 

[hesham]

Hi,

in 1936,the Air Ministry asked for long range bomber with three crew
and capacity 5000 km range and could carry 500 kg bomb-load,and
ready to test in 1938,the tenders were, Junkers,Blohm & Voss,Heinkel,
Henschel and Messerschmitt,Heinkel responded with P.1041 or He.177,
what was the other contenders ?.

 

[Wurger]

See our own thread:

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/bomber-a-contenders.4795/

Topics merged, thanks for the clue !

 

[newsdeskdan]

The He 177 and Ju 85 were the two finalists (see attached). The original competitors, presented with the specification at the first Fernbomber (later to become known as 'Bomber A') meeting on June 3, 1936, were Junkers, Hamburger Flugzeugbau (Blohm & Voss), BFW (Messerschmitt), Henschel and EHF (Heinkel).
We know how the He 177 and Ju 85 eventually turned out (although the indications are that both designs looked radically different when first pitched and went through numerous different iterations before their eventual forms were fixed upon) but we don't know for certain what the Henschel and BFW designs were. Henschel is pretty much a complete unknown. It could be argued that the Me 261 was BFW's design but I'm not so sure. I would guess that whatever was pitched for Fernbomber bore only a passing resemblance at best to what became the 261.
That leaves the HFB design. The Blohm & Voss project list makes interesting reading on this point. P 29 seems to have been an airliner project but with some experimentation concerning the use of four engines to drive just two propellers (a key feature of the Fernbomber spec). Nine different variants of P 29 were drawn up before an unnumbered project appears between P 29 and P 30 described as 'Bomber', powered by '2 Doppeltriebwerke 4 Jumo 207'. P 30, P 31 and P 32 are blank, then we get P 33 which is specifically described as 'Fernbomber' with '2 Jumo 206'. So perhaps the HFB 'Bomber A' design was the unnumbered design following on from P 29-9 and/or P 33.

 

[GTX]

Interesting - I always thought of the Ju85 as simply a variant of the Ju88 rather than a counterpart to the He177 - see following for example.

Junkers Ju85

hugojunkers.bplaced.net

 

[Artie Bob]

In an earlier post on this topic, I referenced the document that Dan has posted above, identifying the Ju 85 as a "Bomber A". There are a number of Ju 85 cockpit mockup photos on the NASM microfilms and these were apparently made from the originals when they were at Wright Field and those should now be in Germany (There was one lone Leitz Binder from JFM leftover at Wright-Patterson that I saw many years ago, the rest may be at BAMA?). BUT, I have never seen what appears to be drawings of JFM origin for the Ju 85. Perhaps Dan has had better success. Thus, my feeling is we really have little knowledge of how the "Bomber A" version might have been configured as there were versions of the design that differed in many respects. If the information still exists, it is probably not in the US archives,. For an aircraft to have had an "8" Nummer assigned, there surely would have been a considerable amount of documentation prepared, including correspondence, calculations, drawings and a Baubeschreibung. There is a good chance these would have survived the war as I do not believe the JFM archives were affected by bombing and a large amount of the material came to the USA. However, my guess is only a fraction of that material was cataloged and microfilmed, based on many years of working with those indexes and films. I have a little evidence that most of that is at BAMA. The other distinct possibility is much of the JFM documentation still remained at Dessau when that area was given over to the USSR and the fate of that is problematical. There was a JFM memory group active a while back, perhaps knowlege of this subject was known to some of it's members.

Best Regards

Artie Bob

 

[hesham]

If we suggest that Focke Wulf was involved,maybe by this one ?,

Focke-Wulf Langstreckenbomber 1936

An unnamed design study abut long-range bombers from Focke-Wulf, dated 1936. Original document in German. http://www.farposst.ru/2011/03/11/Betrachtungen___252_ber_die_Entwicklungsm__246_glichkeiten_eines_Langstreckenbombers___Teil_1.html...

www.secretprojects.co.uk

 

[Wurger]

Dan, could the Henschel tender be the 1936 four engined bomber in Nikolaus's report?

 

[newsdeskdan]

Interesting - I always thought of the Ju85 as simply a variant of the Ju88 rather than a counterpart to the He177 - see following for example.

Junkers Ju85

hugojunkers.bplaced.net

There appears to be no firm basis for the idea that the Ju 88 and Ju 85 were largely the same aircraft. However, we really have too little evidence to be certain. We can be reasonably sure that something called the Ju 85 was a contender for Bomber A against the He 177. And as Artie Bob says, photos exist showing several different He 177-like heavily glazed crew cabins for the 85 (I have all these photos btw).
But perhaps there was an earlier Ju 85 which was simply a variant of the Ju 88? Projects were usually numbered sequentially, so you would expect the Ju 85 to have been designed earlier than the 86, 87 and 88, rather than after them all. It is at least possible that the Ju 85 was a form of Ju 88 which, when abandoned, gave its number to the new Bomber A design. Junkers did move the number of the original Ju 287 ground-attack aircraft from 1943 on to the jet bomber of 1944.

Dan, could the Henschel tender be the 1936 four engined bomber in Nikolaus's report?

Yes you're right I'd forgotten! According to Nicolaus, that design (for which we don't know the designation) was supposed to have four Jumo 210s - the ones closest to the fuselage sunk into the wings and driving their propellers via drive shafts and the outer wing engines on the wing leading edge. Range was 4000km and bomb load was 3000kg. It was to have a 4-5 man crew, full-vision cockpit, remote-controlled twin-turrets in the ventral, dorsal and tail positions, and large protected fuel tanks that could be exchanged for bomb magazines.
Evidently an order was actually placed for this and a full mockup was built. But after von Richthofen left, Udet terminated the project because 'the tactical assumptions are nonsense' even though these were the same assumptions behind the He 177.
Of course, we only really have Nicolaus's word for any of this!

 

[hesham]

From, [Motorbuch Verlag] Die Ju 88 und ihre Folgemuster,

Junkers Ju-85A & Ju-85B.

 

[Vahe Demirjian]

But perhaps there was an earlier Ju 85 which was simply a variant of the Ju 88? Projects were usually numbered sequentially, so you would expect the Ju 85 to have been designed earlier than the 86, 87 and 88, rather than after them all. It is at least possible that the Ju 85 was a form of Ju 88 which, when abandoned, gave its number to the new Bomber A design. Junkers did move the number of the original Ju 287 ground-attack aircraft from 1943 on to the jet bomber of 1944.

The book Junkers Ju 88, Volume 1: From Schnellbomber to Multi-Mission Warplane (from Classic Publishing) notes that the initial Ju 85 design, designated EF 56 by Junkers, was submitted for the 1934 Kampzerstörer competition that was won by the Messerschmitt Bf 110. Therefore, it's almost certain that the Ju 85A design for the Kampzerstörer contest was reworked into a long-range bomber project for the Fernbomber contest after losing to the Bf 110 because the initial Ju 85 proposal was designed prior to the Ju 88, since the Schnellbomber contest that was won by the Ju 88 was initiated a year after the Kampzerstörer requirement was announced.

That said, given that your bookazine Luftwaffe: Secret Bombers of the Third Reich on page 9 lists Messerschmitt as one of the competitors for the Fernbomber contest (won by the Heinkel He 177), did you see any reason to consider it probable that the Messerschmitt Bf 165 project was submitted by Messerschmitt for the Fernbomber requirement? Does your forthcoming book Secret Projects of the Luftwaffe, Volume 2: Bombers 1939-1945 include details on the bomber designs submitted for the Fernbomber competition, since you rightly noted that the Ju 85 was Junkers' submission for this requirement?

 

[newsdeskdan]

But perhaps there was an earlier Ju 85 which was simply a variant of the Ju 88? Projects were usually numbered sequentially, so you would expect the Ju 85 to have been designed earlier than the 86, 87 and 88, rather than after them all. It is at least possible that the Ju 85 was a form of Ju 88 which, when abandoned, gave its number to the new Bomber A design. Junkers did move the number of the original Ju 287 ground-attack aircraft from 1943 on to the jet bomber of 1944.

The book Junkers Ju 88, Volume 1: From Schnellbomber to Multi-Mission Warplane (from Classic Publishing) notes that the initial Ju 85 design, designated EF 56 by Junkers, was submitted for the 1934 Kampzerstörer competition that was won by the Messerschmitt Bf 110. Therefore, it's almost certain that the Ju 85A design for the Kampzerstörer contest was reworked into a long-range bomber project for the Fernbomber contest after losing to the Bf 110 because the initial Ju 85 proposal was designed prior to the Ju 88, since the Schnellbomber contest that was won by the Ju 88 was initiated a year after the Kampzerstörer requirement was announced.

That said, given that your bookazine Luftwaffe: Secret Bombers of the Third Reich on page 9 lists Messerschmitt as one of the competitors for the Fernbomber contest (won by the Heinkel He 177), did you see any reason to consider it probable that the Messerschmitt Bf 165 project was submitted by Messerschmitt for the Fernbomber requirement? Does your forthcoming book Secret Projects of the Luftwaffe, Volume 2: Bombers 1939-1945 include details on the bomber designs submitted for the Fernbomber competition, since you rightly noted that the Ju 85 was Junkers' submission for this requirement?

You're better off asking forum member Artie Bob, who wrote that book.
What I can tell you is that the competition was called 'Flugzeugzerstoerer', not 'Kampfzerstoerer'. The specification, LC 2546/34 g.Kdos., was drawn up in June 1934 and issued to industry in July 1934. We don't know exactly which projects were tendered at this stage. As of February 1, 1935, there were three competitors - Bf 110, Fw 57 and Hs 124. The Hs 124 mock-up had been inspected in November 1934, the Bf 110 mock-up in February 1935 and the Fw 57 mock-up was due to be inspected in March 1935.
As you will be aware, the Hs 124 and Fw 57 were not particularly excellent aircraft but they actually appear to have fitted the specification, as issued, more closely than the Bf 110 did. It's not impossible that Junkers - a bomber and transport manufacturing specialist - submitted a design for Flugzeugzerstoerer, essentially a fighter competition, but if that were the case I find it difficult to believe that it wouldn't have even reached the mock-up stage when so many other designs with questionable features were being built as full prototypes at this time.
If it had reached the mock-up stage, it would have appeared on the RLM planning document I have, dated February 1, 1935, which shows the status of all competiting projects.

 

[Pioneer]

Great find and fantastic information!!

Sorry I didn't dee this a few years earlier

Regards
Pioneer