Off topic, but where did you find your material for the Luftwaffe Secret Projects series? Mostly overlooked or mostly recently declassified?
Off topic, but where did you find your material for the Luftwaffe Secret Projects series? Mostly overlooked or mostly recently declassified?
In response to your query elsewhere Ed - 'mostly overlooked', or perhaps 'hidden within the dauntingly vast quantity of difficult to access captured German material which still survives today' might be a better way of putting it. Locating and extracting material that's actually useful and interesting is a very time consuming and expensive process - which perhaps explains why others might have been deterred from pursuing original research on unbuilt projects.
But even then the Luftwaffe Secret Projects series would have been impossible to make without the help and generosity of my friends and fellow researchers.
Off topic, but where did you find your material for the Luftwaffe Secret Projects series? Mostly overlooked or mostly recently declassified?
In response to your query elsewhere Ed - 'mostly overlooked', or perhaps 'hidden within the dauntingly vast quantity of difficult to access captured German material which still survives today' might be a better way of putting it. Locating and extracting material that's actually useful and interesting is a very time consuming and expensive process - which perhaps explains why others might have been deterred from pursuing original research on unbuilt projects.
But even then the Luftwaffe Secret Projects series would have been impossible to make without the help and generosity of my friends and fellow researchers.
Thank you for your reply. As I recall, Phil Butler made a similar comment regarding his book War Prizes where he said that it required going through many unproductive card files to get at the information he was looking for.
Much of the 'overlooked' stuff isn't on any card files, it's simply uncatalogued.
Off topic, but where did you find your material for the Luftwaffe Secret Projects series? Mostly overlooked or mostly recently declassified?
In response to your query elsewhere Ed - 'mostly overlooked', or perhaps 'hidden within the dauntingly vast quantity of difficult to access captured German material which still survives today' might be a better way of putting it. Locating and extracting material that's actually useful and interesting is a very time consuming and expensive process - which perhaps explains why others might have been deterred from pursuing original research on unbuilt projects.
But even then the Luftwaffe Secret Projects series would have been impossible to make without the help and generosity of my friends and fellow researchers.
Thank you for your reply. As I recall, Phil Butler made a similar comment regarding his book War Prizes where he said that it required going through many unproductive card files to get at the information he was looking for.
Card files - yes and not arranged in any way that would be useful to a researcher. Much of the 'overlooked' stuff isn't on any card files, it's simply uncatalogued.
Card files - yes and not arranged in any way that would be useful to a researcher. Much of the 'overlooked' stuff isn't on any card files, it's simply uncatalogued.
I find that hard to believe. Intelligence reports I've read indicate a massive filing operation for internal use. ... The military loves creating acronyms and if the right acronym is not known, the file cannot be found.
Off topic, but where did you find your material for the Luftwaffe Secret Projects series? Mostly overlooked or mostly recently declassified?
In response to your query elsewhere Ed - 'mostly overlooked', or perhaps 'hidden within the dauntingly vast quantity of difficult to access captured German material which still survives today' might be a better way of putting it. Locating and extracting material that's actually useful and interesting is a very time consuming and expensive process - which perhaps explains why others might have been deterred from pursuing original research on unbuilt projects.
But even then the Luftwaffe Secret Projects series would have been impossible to make without the help and generosity of my friends and fellow researchers.
Thank you for your reply. As I recall, Phil Butler made a similar comment regarding his book War Prizes where he said that it required going through many unproductive card files to get at the information he was looking for.
Card files - yes and not arranged in any way that would be useful to a researcher. Much of the 'overlooked' stuff isn't on any card files, it's simply uncatalogued.
I find that hard to believe.
The digital edition of Luftwaffe Secret Projects of the Third Reich is now available from Pocketmags: https://pocketmags.com/us/aviation-classics-magazine/luftwaffe-secret-projects-of-the-third-reich
It is listed on the Pocketmags site under Aviation Classics: https://pocketmags.com/aviation-classics-magazine/issues
Pocketmags is having one of their 99¢ back issue sales, so a number of the previous Luftwaffe Secret series back issues are available for 99¢ through sometime Monday.
The Pocketmags 99¢ Sale page: https://pocketmags.com/bankholiday
I find that hard to believe. Intelligence reports I've read indicate a massive filing operation for internal use. I have seen references to a color coding system, like see "buff card." I have also read descriptions by researchers over the difficulty of finding something "responsive to their request." The difficulty was over wording or with name spellings or even with persons with the same last name, and a request for a birth date to discover if Sam Smith number one is not Sam Smith number two. The military loves creating acronyms and if the right acronym is not known, the file cannot be found. Take B.I.O.S. and C.I.O.S. reports. Don't know what these initials stand for? Well, that's just too bad. There is also a relatively long list of Allied intelligence groups/teams that were let loose on occupied Europe. FIAT? Well, if you don't know, we can't help you. And the massive microfilming operation that was going on in Europe. I have made attempts to locate documents and have gotten no response or the equivalent of file not found. In fact, I have stumbled across more information as opposed to going with, what I thought, would be the more direct route.
Calum, where can we find those gems?you will find far more information in the unpublished BIOS report case-boxes, and the "trip reports", these were never catalogued properly and were never published
I find that hard to believe. Intelligence reports I've read indicate a massive filing operation for internal use. I have seen references to a color coding system, like see "buff card." I have also read descriptions by researchers over the difficulty of finding something "responsive to their request." The difficulty was over wording or with name spellings or even with persons with the same last name, and a request for a birth date to discover if Sam Smith number one is not Sam Smith number two. The military loves creating acronyms and if the right acronym is not known, the file cannot be found. Take B.I.O.S. and C.I.O.S. reports. Don't know what these initials stand for? Well, that's just too bad. There is also a relatively long list of Allied intelligence groups/teams that were let loose on occupied Europe. FIAT? Well, if you don't know, we can't help you. And the massive microfilming operation that was going on in Europe. I have made attempts to locate documents and have gotten no response or the equivalent of file not found. In fact, I have stumbled across more information as opposed to going with, what I thought, would be the more direct route.
Having spent five years doing archival research for my own book, which will be published by Dan (after I met him in one of said archives) - I can testify to the accuracy of his comments on that.
You may be interested to know (for example) that although BIOS reports were available to buy in the post office in the late 40`s for pennies, you will find far more information in the unpublished BIOS report case-boxes, and the "trip reports", these were never catalogued properly and were never published. The descision on which ones that happened to were down to the view of the intelligence staff in 1945/46/47/48 on what was most industrially relevant which in many cases does not match well with what people are interested in, in 2019.
This involves hours of sifting through what is mostly dross to find the odd gem.
Unfortunately, the only BAM close to here just closed, and the next nearest one is a 70-mile round-trip, on the other side of Atlanta. I'll wait for Barnes & Noble.....Try Books-A-Million.
such boxes are counted in linear feet. ... all of those documents were examined, sorted and classified, including those cleared for public release.
The digital edition of Luftwaffe Secret Projects of the Third Reich is now available from Pocketmags: https://pocketmags.com/us/aviation-classics-magazine/luftwaffe-secret-projects-of-the-third-reich
It is listed on the Pocketmags site under Aviation Classics: https://pocketmags.com/aviation-classics-magazine/issues
Pocketmags is having one of their 99¢ back issue sales, so a number of the previous Luftwaffe Secret series back issues are available for 99¢ through sometime Monday.
The Pocketmags 99¢ Sale page: https://pocketmags.com/bankholiday
I could've sworn that amazon had a kindle version listed last week. But I just checked and its no longer an option. But they now have a shipping date of the 28th for the paperback.
The digital edition of Luftwaffe Secret Projects of the Third Reich is now available from Pocketmags: https://pocketmags.com/us/aviation-classics-magazine/luftwaffe-secret-projects-of-the-third-reich
It is listed on the Pocketmags site under Aviation Classics: https://pocketmags.com/aviation-classics-magazine/issues
Pocketmags is having one of their 99¢ back issue sales, so a number of the previous Luftwaffe Secret series back issues are available for 99¢ through sometime Monday.
The Pocketmags 99¢ Sale page: https://pocketmags.com/bankholiday
I could've sworn that amazon had a kindle version listed last week. But I just checked and its no longer an option. But they now have a shipping date of the 28th for the paperback.
Sienar,
Beware of Kindle editions of photo heavy publications. Kindle's emphasis is on text for readers and they treat photos as extraneous. An early volume of Luftwaffe Secret Projects was available as a Kindle edition and it had the text and only a few of the pictures.
The digital editions from Pocketmags have everything included in the paper version.
Richard
I know of at least one Spitfire that had a DB601 engine installed in it, so the reverse being done wouldn't seem too strange.
Yes indeed. That machine has been on my modelling wish-list for a while (so many Spitfires, so little time!). I meant that the reverse was planned but not done, I thought that the Buchon example made that clear, but evidently not.No, he is talking about the spitfire that had a DB605 taken from a 110.
Finally got this. I haven't read everything yet but I did skim through. One thing stuck out immedietly
"There is no known instance during the entire course of the war of a project being run to determine the properties of a Rolls-Royce Merlin or Griffon, or any other Allied engine, when fitted to any German aircraft."
There was some correspondence between Messerschmitt and Daimler-Benz about fitting the Merlin engine to a 109 airframe. The main goal of this was to evaluate the relative effectiveness of the Spitfires radiator installation vs the 109. I have no idea why they felt an engine swap was necessary to do that and Willy proposed just swapping the radiators.
Maybe they were interested in the effects of a higher prop shaft too? Or just interested in the aerodynamics of an allied style inline engine cowling? Someone high up deciding that a like-for-like engine comparison could only be down through a swap?
Either way there isn't a lot about this that I've found. Just a few letters between Mess. and DB. - no drawings or anything neat like that. Regardless of that there are now two known instances of proposals for sticking allied engines on axis airframes. Hopefully in due time someone will find a proposal to stick an allison on a 190 or Mc202.
Will Messerschmitt by Frank Vann ISBN 1852604395
There are some inaccuracies in the book but as it has a reproduction of the letter I'd say that part of the book is likely correct. I can't say what source is listed for it though as I don't have the book with me right now.
That last line sounds like DB was trying to prove something to someone.
Is this going to be available in electronic book format?