Which was the best night fighter?

[Marcel]

Well, the LW started doing these intruder missions back in 1941, using Ju88's. Unfortunately Hitler didn't like it and told the Nightfighter command to stop this. IMHO one of the greatest blunders of the war!
As far as I know, in Germany the nightfighters were controlled by a system called "Himmelbett". Although this was a nice system, it had some serious backdraws in that it could only controle one plane in one sector and this plane could also not been taken over by other sectors. So long range didn't do much good. I still think Mossies wouldn't have made a difference.

[marlin]

Did night fighter pilots rate speed and altitude as especially desirable in a night fighting aircraft ? Before he died I was fortunate to be able to work as unpaid secretary to Wing Commander John "Catseyes" Cunningham and he always rated other factors as being more more important. Chiefly amongst these I would rate good radar installation, effective weaponry, maneouvreability and crew comfort. A bloody good navigator/radar operator ( and he had one in Flt.Lt. Rawnsley ) also is of critical importance. Sure height and altitude cannot be ignored but, other than early in the war, most aircraft used as nightfighters had both of these factors in sufficiency.

[syscom3]

When you think about it, unless the nughtfighter can find its target at a long enough range to be able to maneuver for a shot, everything else becomes secondary.

The radar system and a good radar operator is the most important.

[Marcel]

Originally Posted by syscom3

When you think about it, unless the nughtfighter can find its target at a long enough range to be able to maneuver for a shot, everything else becomes secondary.

The radar system and a good radar operator is the most important.

Exactly, so that's why I think either mossie, Bf110, Blackwidow or Ju88, doesn't matter as long as the radar and the ground system is good.

[pbfoot]

Speed would be important since all attacks at night would be from astern so yo have to have spped to overtake

[Glider]

Originally Posted by pbfoot

Speed would be important since all attacks at night would be from astern so yo have to have spped to overtake

I agree with this. Its important to have sufficient speed or you will not catch the target, extreame speed would I have thought been more of a problem than a help.

In the books I have read on nightfighting overshooting the target has often been a problem.

[Marcel]

Originally Posted by pbfoot

Speed would be important since all attacks at night would be from astern so yo have to have spped to overtake

Okay, good point

[Soren]

The Ju-88 is the best night-fighter IMO.

[Marcel]

Originally Posted by Soren

The Ju-88 is the best night-fighter IMO.

Good choice but any explanation?

[Glider]

The Mossie is the best in MHO

[Soren]

The Ju-88 is the best IMO because of its high speed, excellent maneuverability & responsiveness for its size, high ceiling and excellent armament & detection equipment. Its either the Ju-88 or the Mossie, they're VERY close - the Ju-388J is better than both though, but it didn't go fully operational.

[syscom3]

Since the Lancs were flying below 20,000 ft, any comparisons between the Mosquito and JU88 should be done below this altitude.

It doesnt matter what the high altitude performance was for either if there wasn't allied bombers flying up there.

[brickhistory]

Sep 13th, 8pm Eastern, History Channel's "Dogfights" will feature a show on night fighters.

I, hopefully, will have a small bit in there about the Beau. Taped it back in July, have not seen any of it, so A) don't know how good/realistic the show will be or B) if I made it past the editing room floor.

[HoHun]

Hi Brickhistory,

>During my US Beau research, I came across many listings in the squadron's histories for UFOs, dubbed 'foo fighters.' Other Allied aircrew also saw weird/goofy things over Europe and most were thrown in the foo fighter category.

>Does anyone know of German reports of the topic? A search here didn't get any hits.

I never read anything about Foo Fighters from the German side at all. My working hypothesis is that the Allied crews were confused by the flare rounds apparently fired by the Flak units of Luftwaffe nightfighter bases at regular intervals and in regular patterns to help their pilots locate the bases.

In difficult lighting situations and with no reference for distance or size, the regular patterns flare rounds probably could look very strange to the Allied pilots who did not know what they were for.

Just think back how many of these Foo Fighter reports go something like: "We were patrolling in the vicinity of the Luftwaffe night fighter base at ..., when suddenly a string of bright, coloured disks appeared below us and came up to our altitude at a tremendous rate of climb."

That's just my personal impression of a possible "non-UFO" explanation, so be careful - I might be wrong I think a contemporary suspicion was that the Germans were operating some kind of rocket weapon against the night fighters, but I'd think we'd have confirmation of such a weapon from the Luftwaffe side today.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

[Erich]

Flak was firing scare-crow rounds.

also RAF crews swore they witnessed jet flyable He 219's as well as Me 163 Komets at night plus the Me 262 was supposed seen flyable and operable during late summer of 44 at night............nonsense but we have the reports anyway of all the above