Topic: Captured German Aircraft Video

[IndyShark]

This is a very cool video. I love the Ju-290!

http://one.revver.com/watch/398690/flv/affiliate/114857

[MelbuFrahma]

That up close ME-262 was nice.. first ever jet plane.

[Panzergranate]

ER....check the facts, the ME262 was NOT the first jet aircraft, there was the Gloster-Whittle of 1938 and the Heinkel jet aircraft of the same year.

The ME262 was the first operational jet aircraft.

It was found to be hopeless as a fighter (if you read pilots' accounts of trying to combat other aitcraft) and that is why it was pushed into the ground attack role. The pilots claim that the plane was a poor gun platform and would shake baddly when firing at, say a B17 or B24. Hitting anything smaller than that was difficult and the inaccuracy of the quad 30mm. Cannons meant that the ME262 would have to close in closer than a normal fighter to have a fair chance of scoring a hit.

Another problem was that its twin engined design and high wing loading made it handle poorly on dogfights. Many were shot down by P51Ds and Hawker Tempests, the latter could outspeed the ME262 in a dive!! In fact Tempests chalked up the majority of ME262 kills during WW2, closely followed by P51D, Spitfire Mk.24. and P47s.

The Germans developed the Volks Fighter to better fill the role of the jet fighter. It managed the same speed with only a single engine, was more maneuverable and a better gun platform.

[AcePylut]

Pretty neat image of the Jap suicide bomb.  Okra or something like that.  Can't remember exactly, ott.

[MelbuFrahma]

ER....check the facts, the ME262 was NOT the first jet aircraft, there was the Gloster-Whittle of 1938 and the Heinkel jet aircraft of the same year.

The ME262 was the first operational jet aircraft.

It was found to be hopeless as a fighter (if you read pilots' accounts of trying to combat other aitcraft) and that is why it was pushed into the ground attack role. The pilots claim that the plane was a poor gun platform and would shake baddly when firing at, say a B17 or B24. Hitting anything smaller than that was difficult and the inaccuracy of the quad 30mm. Cannons meant that the ME262 would have to close in closer than a normal fighter to have a fair chance of scoring a hit.

Another problem was that its twin engined design and high wing loading made it handle poorly on dogfights. Many were shot down by P51Ds and Hawker Tempests, the latter could outspeed the ME262 in a dive!! In fact Tempests chalked up the majority of ME262 kills during WW2, closely followed by P51D, Spitfire Mk.24. and P47s.

The Germans developed the Volks Fighter to better fill the role of the jet fighter. It managed the same speed with only a single engine, was more maneuverable and a better gun platform.

ANd why wouldn't an Operational jet plane be the first?

would it so happen to be that the first one wasn't a success? It doesn't matter.

Your facts are interesting, but it still my comment was on the cool plane and it's technology breakthrough allowing the future of Air combat. Doesn't matter how the plane performed, it did not become any more undeadly when it was changed from  Air/air to Air/ground, in fact it became more deadly.


So i hope your post wasn't meant as a flame.

No worries though..
It'll all be ok in the Morning!

[Just plain old Punisher]

ER....check the facts, the ME262 was NOT the first jet aircraft, there was the Gloster-Whittle of 1938 and the Heinkel jet aircraft of the same year.

The ME262 was the first operational jet aircraft.

It was found to be hopeless as a fighter (if you read pilots' accounts of trying to combat other aitcraft) and that is why it was pushed into the ground attack role. The pilots claim that the plane was a poor gun platform and would shake baddly when firing at, say a B17 or B24. Hitting anything smaller than that was difficult and the inaccuracy of the quad 30mm. Cannons meant that the ME262 would have to close in closer than a normal fighter to have a fair chance of scoring a hit.

Another problem was that its twin engined design and high wing loading made it handle poorly on dogfights. Many were shot down by P51Ds and Hawker Tempests, the latter could outspeed the ME262 in a dive!! In fact Tempests chalked up the majority of ME262 kills during WW2, closely followed by P51D, Spitfire Mk.24. and P47s.

The Germans developed the Volks Fighter to better fill the role of the jet fighter. It managed the same speed with only a single engine, was more maneuverable and a better gun platform.

Not to mention the fact that the early jet engines were horribly unreliable.

[Panzergranate]

The Gloster Whittle and the Heinkel of 1938 didn't carry weapons and therefore were not operational (combat capable) jet aircraft.

The Heinkel could only use its engiines for 22 minutes before the turbine blade were worn out. The British Gloster Whittle took quite a few dozen hours of run time to wear out its turbine blades, due to superiour British metalurgy processes.
 
The ME262 became the frist operational jet aircraft and early ones had tradition tail wheel undercarriage.

An interesting fact was that if the an engine was hit by enemy fire, the turbine blades would break off and shred the fuselage, breaking the tail off of the aircraft. There are a few camera gun action shots of this happening.

Ironically, German's top scoring bomber ace flew an ME410 nicknamed "The Watering Can" by other pilots, because he had pesonally modified it to mount 6 x 30mm. long barrelled FlaK cannon, the two standard nose gins, two munted under the wings inboard of the engines and two mounted outboard of the engines. He was able to fire and hit B17s and B24s at up to 2 Kliometres with this bizare set up. Many pictures exist in books of this unique bomber interceptor, which clocked up around 70 kills.

By contrast, ME262s performed badly as bomber interceptors, despite numerous weapons modifications and layouts. They were also vulnerable to the more agile piston engined fighters in dogfights, so much so, that pilots were ordered NOT to engage the escorting fighters. The ME262 was also difficult to fly as special training was needed.

It is a shame that the Volksfighter, which entered service in 1945 to repkace the ME262 and even then in limited numbers, was overshadowed by the ME262. It is a forgootten aircraft from WW2, despite seeing combat duty right up until the very end. The Volksfighter could and did match piston engined fighters in dogfights.

Shortages of trained pilots meant that usually members of the Hitler Youth flew them. It had been specifically designed to be easy to fly for this purpose.

The ME262 does still go into the history books the first mass produced jet aircraft though.

[Dracho]

The ME-262 was to enter service as an air-to-air fighter in late 1942, early 1943.  Hitler personally ordered it redesigned to support bombs, which delayed its mass entry into the war until 1944, when it was far too late to be any sort of a factor in the air campaign.

The Me-262 was a superior fighter because, as was learned as early as late 1917, maneuverability in aerial combat is always trumped by speed.  Most gun camera films showing a P-51 shooting down an ME-262 were when the American pilots would stake out the airfields and then jump one of the jets as it slowed for landing. 

In aerial combat, the ME-262 had more than 100 mph on it's closest adversary.  The Gloster Meteor might have been a match for it, but the two never met in combat.  Interestingly, the Meteor entered service in July 1944 and remained in various Air Forces until the 1970's.

[Panzergranate]

My father served as an airframe fitter on Meteors and Vampires in both Iraq and Eygypt in 1950 to 1952. Iraq was still part of the British Empire back then, but Eygpt wasn't. The RAF in Eygpt was part of the Suez Canal protection scheme in place. Remember that the Korean War was in full effect and the Suez Canal was important to the UN as a supply route. It didn't help that there was an ill timed nationism feeling in Eygpt at the time.

He flew a few times in the back seat of a two seater meteor and also sat in the cockpit (to work the brakes) of an old ME110 fighter that needed to be pushed out of a hangar to be broken up for scrap.

The book "Battles With The Luftwaffe" has the truth about the ME262 from the chief Luftwaffe test pilot (and fighter ace) on the ME262. There was strong presure to stop using the ME262 for bomber interception, due to its unstability as a gunplatform. Pilot complained of just how inaccurate the quad 30mm. cannons were due to the shaking the aircraft endured unless flown at full speed.

The reason Hitler ordered its role changed to a fighter bomber wasn't on one of his whims, but because of clever manipulation of Hitler by certain officers, who's opinins Hitler trusted.

The Volks Fighter arrived too late into service and in too few numbers to be effective. It used one engine but outperformed the ME262 as a bomber intercepter.

Speed is only good for evasion in ariel combat.

In dogfighting, it is the reverse that is important. The Fokker Tri-plane struggled to make 100 MPH when allied fighters could already hit 130 MPH or more in level flight. The Spad 13 was the fastest fighter of WW1 at 138 MPH but could esily be shot down by the vastly slower but more maneuverable Fokker Tri-Plane.

Both the Spitfire and Hurricane were slower than the ME109E but were more maneuverable.

The Veitnam MIgs were more maneuverable than the US F4 Phantoms, which were far faster. The F4 Phantom's designers had made a huge mistake believing that speed was more important than maneuverability, as dogfighting was a thing of the past in the age of guided missiles. Didn't take long to figure out that was wrong!!

When I've played aircombat games, usually WW1 based (Red Baron 1, 2 and 3), I do tend to go for the less maneuverable but faster Spad 13, as when things go wrong or an enemy aircraft with  a fancy paint job shows up (a top ace), running away seems like a very good idea.

The Spad doesn't fall apart when thrown around the sky unlike Neuports, etc. thanks to its steel airframe.