Friday Update, April 13, 2012

[Fenrir]

Originally Posted by 41Sqn_Stormcrow

Brown's statement says clearly that he was not familiar with the type and expected a different behaviour.

Er,I think you have misinterpreted and I suggest you re-read. I can tell you that for all the hours that Bf-109G-2 Black 6 was in the air, Charlie Brown was behind the stick for more than half that time. He's familiar with the 109. This was his first test flight in the E. He said the almost complete lack of longitudinal stability at tail-off was familiar - i.e it was a charactersitic of the 109G and was also inherent in the E. What is different is that the E does things at lower speeds, which one can presume is from the lower weight of the E variant compared to the G.

Originally Posted by 41Sqn_Stormcrow

Of course this may indicate that rookie pilots may have had problems to handle this crate. But I really would like to recall that many spit pilots reported on a strong tendency of the spit to break away too during take-off.

Any WW2 era fighter is of 1000+HP on an airframe under 10 tonnes is gonna be a handful at full power and the low end of the speed range - the sheer physics of forces says so - the difference lies in the aerodynamic power of the control surfaces at these speeds to compensate or correct. Clearly the 109s are lacking. Sure the Spitfire could bite but it remained longitudinally controllable and had effective rudder down to walking speed. The fact the the 109 is 'almost completely unstable longitudinally at tail up' even with propellor driven airflow over the tail surfaces speaks volumes. Even in the air you have to work the rudder hard during maneouvres to keep co-ordinated (source: Me109 - One Summer Two Messerschmitts DVD).

Originally Posted by 41Sqn_Stormcrow

I do not contest that the take off of the 109 should not be left as it is (for reminder) but I really think that a 50% loss rate and even "only" 30% appears to me too high and probably a myth as I really cannot believe that the 109 remained the main stay of the German Air Force throughout the war with this kind of flaw.

When adequately trained and experienced flyers are allowed near the 109 it's a capable aeroplane - Erich Hartmann alone demonstrates this. However what this shows is that to get it off the ground and back on it again requires attention, a good experience of flying tail-wheel aircraft and of airmanship in general. These are things which a peacetime air force or one that is riding a cresting wave of victories can readily supply in the training syllabus. However, these are not characteristics I would associate with the backbone of the Luftwaffe by 1944. And the reason the 109 wasn't replaced by then is because no one in the 3rd Reich had the foresight to work on a successor back when it counted; they thought the war would be over and won by 1943!