Me 262 a waste of resources?

[T. A. Gardner]

"Sonderkommando Elbe" was not the first use of ramming (rammstoss in German). When the Germans attacked the Russians, ramming by Russian aircraft also occurred (taran in Russian).

One problem for the Me 262 was a lack of high temperature metals for the engines. The lower temperature metals meant the engines had a life of 22 hours before needing replacement. There was also the issue of micro-fracture in the turbine blades. This was solved through making them hollow and giving them a ceramic coating.

The coating was more like aluminum metal flame spray than a ceramic coating. That's not an exact analogy, but close enough. I've read about the process used, but can't recall the name of it in German to go find it again.

 

[edwest4]

F. J. Hartwig, B. W. Shelfin, and R. J. Jones, Preliminary investigation of a gas turbine with Sillimanite ceramic rotor blades. Natl. Advisory Comm. Aeronaut. Tech. Note No. 1399 (1947).

 

[T. A. Gardner]

F. J. Hartwig, B. W. Shelfin, and R. J. Jones, Preliminary investigation of a gas turbine with Sillimanite ceramic rotor blades. Natl. Advisory Comm. Aeronaut. Tech. Note No. 1399 (1947).

I'm not saying it could have been done, but the process I read about that was in use on the Jumo 004 was more like an aluminum flame spray using powdered metal.

 

[HoHun]

Hi T. A.,

This is the real rub here. The Me 262 was evolutionary, not revolutionary. It didn't change the dynamic of the air war but rather was simply a faster fighter plane that was going to be harder to counter.

For the record, does that mean you've stealthily given up on defending the untenable "self-defeating" label now?

With regard to the new label ... here's what Eric Brown had to say about German technology (28:24 min):

View: https://youtu.be/8sK0mZnBx94?t=1722


"I have flown almost all the World War TWo aircraft, and I rank it the most formidable aircraft of World War Two".

I don't understand why people some 80 years after the war still feel an emotional need to denigrate "enemy" equipment when that is completely at odds with the historic record of the respect these systems earned among their opponents.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

 

[Hood]

With regard to the "bad day", it's not suprising to see KG(J) 54 involved there - as Hajo Hermann in "Bewegtes Leben" points out, these were crewed mostly by bomber pilots who weren't trained as fighter pilots, and thought of attacking the US bombers in the way they had flown their bombers to attack surface ships. The deeper background of this was the opposition of the fighter pilot to Goering, which lead to a dominance of the bomber arm within the Luftwaffe, as guys like Peltz and Hermann were seen as politically more reliable than fighter pilots like Galland or Steinhoff (see Steinhoff, "In letzter Stunde").

Fair enough but III/JG7 were there too, so its not like all of them were bomber pilots. That does sound like an odd tactics, surely the Luftwaffe had fighter affiliation training for its bomber crews so that they knew what tactics fighters used against bombers and how to defend accordingly? Then they should have been able to apply that knowledge in reverse.

With regard to "Sonderkommando Elbe", I'm not sure it's a good idea to use this as a bench mark.

I wasn't using it as a bench mark as such other than an example of where the Me 262s were meant to tackle the fighter escort to allow piston fighters to close on the bombers. It didn't go well for either formation.

I believe there were a total of two YP-80A's in Italy, so they probably wouldn't have done much to calm down the Allies even had they been sent to England! The Meteor in 1944 had quite a few issues with regard to handling and performance that probably made it less than ideal to fight a Me 262.

(See http://www.wwiiaircraftperformance.org/meteor/Meteor-CFE.pdf ... "The Meteor has an instability in yaw ("snaking"), which makes it unsuitable as a gun platform at operational speeds.")

Yes only two YP-80As this side of the pond. In many respects the P-80 was too late to make any contribution to the war. Yes the Meteor was not perfect (none of the early jets on either side were), the Meteor 4 prototype flew the day before VE Day, so again too late for much input into the war. But there was no urgency to press it into combat as a counter to the 262 or lifting the prohibition over flying over enemy-held territory. But again, fighter affiliation exercises with the USAAF in 1944 had led to the formulation of anti-jet tactics, including placing the fighter screen 5,000 ft above the bombers in an attempt to intercept the jets early in the dive. At this time clearly the Allied thinking was that jets would go for the bombers and not the fighters.

As far as the Me 262, the Americans viewed it as a big enough threat that they were compelled to attempt to build their own jet fighter. The Bell P-59 Airacomet was a failure. It was later used only for training. And this was emblematic of the American response to the appearance of significant new weapons fielded by the Germans. The American jet engine was based on the Whittle design, yet their engineers could not match the performance of the Me 262. A fact lost on critics.

The timings don't bare that out. The XP-59 programme began in January 1942 (the prototype flew just 10 months later which is quite impressive), so some 7 months before the 262 flew under jet power. 'Hap' Arnold had been shown Whittle's jet in April 1941 (the same month the piston-powered 262 V1 prototype flew) and by September had arranged examples of the engines and a production licence before the time the US had even entered the war. Hap knew the future was jets, the Tizard Mission offered jets to the US on a plate and they took it. No matter what the Germans developed, the Allies would have jet fighters. But the fact that the UK and USA had jet engines in 1941 still took until 1945-46 before viable jet fighters appeared would show that making the most of the technology was not easy. It's easy for critics to say "oh the RAF should have had Whittle fighters in 1941" or "the Luftwaffe should have had 262s in service in 1943" but actually things take time to develop well. Messerschmitt probably did a good job to get as far ahead as they did with the 163 and 262 at the same time. Given that most clean-sheet piston-engined projects begun in 1942 didn't result in in-service hardware before late 1945 or 1946 shows that the lead time is always the clincher to getting an aircraft into service - remember that the 262 programme began in 1939 so had a 2-year lead on Allied efforts which is why it came into service about a year sooner.
I would agree that the P-59A was a flop. But then Bell probably wasn't the best choice but their piston XP-59 had been cancelled in late 1941 so they had capacity. They wouldn't necessarily be the first choice as they had no real fighter pedigree and the P-39 and P-63 were lacklustre fighters. Same with Gloster, they had been biplane fighter specialists thrust into the jet age as they a good designer and spare capacity.
The RLM kept the jets to their two biggest manufacturers in the early days, Heinkel and Messerscmitt and arguably were wise to do so.

 

[HoHun]

Hi Hood,

Fair enough but III/JG7 were there too, so its not like all of them were bomber pilots. That does sound like an odd tactics, surely the Luftwaffe had fighter affiliation training for its bomber crews so that they knew what tactics fighters used against bombers and how to defend accordingly? Then they should have been able to apply that knowledge in reverse.

Considering that the Luftwaffe hadn't operate in the kind of large, escorted, formations (and in daylight) as typical for the USAAF, I suppose there wasn't much actual knowledge left. Hermann mentions that the bomber pilots weren't interested in manoevring combat, and even if one just wants to evade the escorts, I'd say manoevring was an important skill. Anecdotally, there's an account by Hartmann in Toliver/Constable's "Holt Hartmann vom Himmel" which describes Hartmann flying with an ex-bomber pilot as a wingman. That didn't turn out well, as despite all the tips he had been given before the sortie, the ex-bomber pilot tried to evade a pursuing Russian fighter in a wide, perfectly coordinated turn, which the Russian had no difficulty in following. Different ideas of what "turning hard" really means, I guess.

I wasn't using it as a bench mark as such other than an example of where the Me 262s were meant to tackle the fighter escort to allow piston fighters to close on the bombers. It didn't go well for either formation.

Ah, I see. According to Hajo Hermann, the pilots of the Sonderkommando Elbe were actually selected from the ranks of insufficiently trained pilots, as it was expected that the willingness to sacrifice their lives and their determination to bring down a bomber would make up for their lack of training. I would first have to read up on the specific action though to be able to comment in more detail. Do you happen to have a recommendation for a good source on that? Clearly, relying on Hermann alone is not going to give a full picture

But there was no urgency to press it into combat as a counter to the 262 or lifting the prohibition over flying over enemy-held territory.

I guess this is the kind of development you can't really press, anyway. The production rates of British jet engines were still fairly low, probably because they were still developing new and improved variants. Considering that it was clear that the war was coming to an end, it probably was a good call not to try something that could easily have backfired. I think the optimists expected the war would be over by christmas in 1944 - that was probably more realistic than the optimists in German who expected it to continue through 1946! ;-)

It's easy to say "oh the RAF should have had Whittle fighters in 1941" or "the Luftwaffe should have had 262s in service in 1943" but actually things take time to develop well. Messerschmitt probably did a good job to get as far ahead as they did with the 163 and 262 at the same time. Given that most clean-sheet piston-engined projects begun in 1942 didn't result in in-service hardware before late 1945 or 1946 shows that the lead time is always the clincher to getting an aircraft into service.

I totally agree. The difficulty of getting complex weapons systems into service is often understimated, and aero-engines are certainly among the really tough nuts to crack. I don't believe that any of the nations developing jet engines could have done much to get results significantly earlier than they did, either.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

 

[T. A. Gardner]

Hi T. A.,



For the record, does that mean you've stealthily given up on defending the untenable "self-defeating" label now?

With regard to the new label ... here's what Eric Brown had to say about German technology (28:24 min):

View: https://youtu.be/8sK0mZnBx94?t=1722


"I have flown almost all the World War TWo aircraft, and I rank it the most formidable aircraft of World War Two".

I don't understand why people some 80 years after the war still feel an emotional need to denigrate "enemy" equipment when that is completely at odds with the historic record of the respect these systems earned among their opponents.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

Nope. It was the "most formidable" only until some other plane was put into production that was more formidable. In 1940 there was a "most formidable." In 1941, there was a "most formidable..."

That platitude is an irrelevancy to the Me 262 being a logistical nightmare with a very high accident rate.

 

[edwest4]

Nope. It was the "most formidable" only until some other plane was put into production that was more formidable. In 1940 there was a "most formidable." In 1941, there was a "most formidable..."

That platitude is an irrelevancy to the Me 262 being a logistical nightmare with a very high accident rate.

You are emotional and not prone to doing actual research. I think you have a need to denigrate "enemy" equipment.

 

[HoHun]

Hi T. A.,

In 1940 there was a "most formidable." In 1941, there was a "most formidable..."

Sorry, it's entirely childish to pretend you don't know how a superlative works.

Eric Brown's superlative was, "I rank it the most formidable aircraft of World War Two". His words, not mine. Greatly accomplished pilot too, you should look him up one day when you feel like doing research for a change.

That platitude is an irrelevancy to the Me 262 being a logistical nightmare with a very high accident rate.

Oh, platitudes are bad now? You're cracking me up, you haven't posted anything but platitudes so far! :-D

And coming from Eric Brown, it's not a platitude at all, but a summary. If you're interested in the details, his book "Wings of the Luftwaffe" has a chapter on the Me 262 ... all the stuff that lead to his verdict, "the most formidable aircraft of WW2".

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)