He-162 vs Meteor MK-III

[FLYBOYJ]

Originally Posted by delcyros

I also think that the Meteor, while a large target to hit, can take a good deal of punishment, esspeccially because fuel tanks hits -unlike the P-80- would rarely result in destruction of the airframe.

You know I've got to disagree with the assessment of the P-80s fuel tank. I don't care if it got hit in the fuel tank, wing, or tail, chances are if one the the HE-162s cannon shells hit the P-80 it was not a good thing....

Case in point 5 years later in Korea. Out gunned and totally out classed the only combat the P-80 (F-80) saw was in Korea. About 15 P-80s were lost to Mig-15s, the P-80 destroyed about 9 MiG-15s. There were never any reports of those P-80s exploding or turning into massive fireballs no different than any other aircraft being hit by a 37mm. Even in the ground support role, if the fuel tank was that detrimental to its survivability, there would of been massive stories of how the P-80 was a death trap, and from I read the opposite seems to be the norm as the F-80 flew more operational sorties than any other aircraft deployed in Korea. Pilots who flew it in the ground support role loved it! Bottom line, If a HE-162 achieved a few hits on any aircraft, P-80, Meteor, etc., they were done, If the HE-162 was hit in the same manner, the result would be the same....

http://www.acig.org/artman/publish/cat_index_20.shtml

[carpenoctem1689]

Yeah, no question the Hee-162 would be easy to take down with a few hits. Thats why its small, fast, and manouverable, so it doesnt get hit. The Meteor, unless flown by an excellent fighter pilot, or against completely inferior adversaris (very very likely scenario considering it was intended to be piloted by hitler youth with glider training only, or sent straight into combat) the Meteor wouldnt stand too much a chance, especially if the -162 would have been a later model armed with the Mk-108 30mm cannon with minenschlusse rounds.

[Jabberwocky]

The He 162 suffered many of the drawbacks of the Meteor at high speed, as well as others based around its light, wooden construction.

There was a marked tendency for lateral instability and snaking at high speeds, traced to the incidence of the wing dihedral. The A2 version had enlarged span tail surfaces in an attempt to alleviate this. They plane also suffered from yaw instability, which was partially corrected by fitting those characteristic downward angled wing extensions.

The A1 and A2 variants were both too lightly constructed to allow a Mk 108 cannon to be used in the nose. There were problems with the recoil and vibration from the cannon. A proposed A3 variant would of had a reinforced nose section to deal with this, but the CoG issues probably would of been interesting. They might have had to balast the plane, much like they did with the Meteor Mk. III.


I'd give the advanatage to the He-162, mostly because its anywhere from 10-50 mph faster depending on altitude. It's maximum R.o.C seems to be only about 200 feet/ minute better than the Meteor Mk III though and I have no data to compare in the turn, but i'd assume the He-162 is better; higher wingloading, but much better powerloading and aerodynamics. Roll would favour the He 162, but mostly because the alierons were wired heavy in the Meteor.

From an operation standpoint, the Meteor Mk III is a better plane. It's more reliable and has better range and endurance. Its also more heavily armed.

The Meteor F. 4 is proably better than the He 162, but that is a different kettle of fish, and 6 months further down the track. Still, it would provide a much more challenging cmparison. Similarly, the Vampire Mk I might also make an interesting "compare and contrast" piece.

[carpenoctem1689]

Undoubtedly the He-162 did have some draw backs, one of them being the two Mg151/20 used in the subsuquent aircraft produced after the a few built with the MK-108. The -162 had a metal fuesalgue. Also it was as manouverable as the pilot was comfortable. If they had more experience they could have been more confident and pushed the aircraft more, but they didnt like the weak tail structure, because you could only stay stable and not shear it off with 3/4 rudder applied smoothly. Hitler youth and fighter pilots from a -109 wouldnt know how to handle it right, and it would be a flame out, breake up death trap. But if someone had proper conversion training, in an aircraft with an engine, not a glider, it could have been an exceptional aircraft to fight against.

[delcyros]

Ummm,

Flyboy, right we have discussed the P-80 issue, but in Korea, the F-84, F-86 and even the Mig-15 was designed in the same manner (fuel tanks in front of the engine), so they indeed have shown little differences. The enforced structure around the tanks couldn´t prevent a 20mm hit from holing. If fuel goes out it will - narly automaticly- inflame by the engine. Bad thing. The He-162, Me-262 and Meteor are designed otherwise. I also think that the Meteor- while outclassed by the Mig´s did perform very well in the ground attack role in Korea.

It should be noted that the He-162 isn´t a wooden plane. Most of the fuselage and the rudders are of Dural, the wingtips made of Pantal, some parts even made of steel, the wings (without rudders), the nosecap, the gearcoverings and a small section behind the canopy are made of wood.
The wooden wings have a small area and a tiny spanwidth, that´s why they are capable to high G-forces (I suspect, but I am not sure, that the He-162 has a higher destruction limit than the Meteor MK III).
Actually it is the same basic construction which we see in the Me-109K and Me-163. Nobody ever wanted these planes bad because they are wooden/Dural composites. Check the construction manual for these details. It cannot be denied that the M1-M13 prototypes had problems with bad glues, even later some serial planes had shown bad quality due to lack of a proper glue agent or simply bad working.

The heavy recoil forces of twin 30mm MK108 were unsuited for the A-1/A-2, the bow section would need structural reeinforcements. I don´t think the plane would need some kind of ballast, because the guns were placed almost at the CoG and the CoG could widely differ from 19.0% to 26.0% according to the operating manual (page 3). Generally I suspect that the 20mm MG151 are the better weaponry for this fighter because the rounds allow a higher effective shooting range than the low muzzle 30 mm rounds.

The rudder forces were limited to 3/4 at high speeds only (500+mp/h), it indeed had the problem of a very light stick. The roll rates of the He-162 are even superior to the Fw-190 at all but very low speeds, esspeccially at high speeds.
The low speed turnrate would probably go to the Meteor because of it´s lower wingload.
The Meteor -III operating over Germany in early 45 carried a white camouflage in order to prevent them from beeing shot down by allied forces mixing it up with a Me-262. This undoubtly would result in a problem if seen by a He-162 (big and white target).
There is little proof that the pilots of JG-1 were rookies. Indeed the only pilots to fly the He-162 were veterans but with little training for the jet engine. On the other side the BMW-003 is easier to operate than was the Jumo-004, it simply wasn´t that sensitive throttle changings and flame outs.
According to the thrust to weight ratio, the acceleration of Meteor-III and He-162 don´t differ much: 0.29 vs. 0.28 (at 100%) or 0.32 (at 115%).At half fuel load, the He-162 is somehow superior in acceleration.

[FLYBOYJ]

Originally Posted by delcyros

Ummm,

Flyboy, right we have discussed the P-80 issue, but in Korea, the F-84, F-86 and even the Mig-15 was designed in the same manner (fuel tanks in front of the engine), so they indeed have shown little differences. The enforced structure around the tanks couldn´t prevent a 20mm hit from holing. If fuel goes out it will - narly automaticly- inflame by the engine. Bad thing. The He-162, Me-262 and Meteor are designed otherwise. I also think that the Meteor- while outclassed by the Mig´s did perform very well in the ground attack role in Korea.

The fuel tank in the F-80 is in a bay above the air intake. I remember this installation distinctly in my time working on T-33s. The tank is self sealing, but I recognize that this isn't going to stop any cannon shell. With that in mind, a round would have to puncture the tank, penetrate the air intake compartment in such a way that fuel could be ingested into the engine. I think the aircraft would be long destroyed in this scenario unless small arms fire were involved, and even then the damage would have to be in an exact spot. In Korea the P-80 was committed to a more hazardous role and was shot at by every Russian built firearm deployed into the area including heavy AA. If anything, the F-80 proved to be reliable and rugged and because of the Centrifugal flow compressor there was a smaller "critical" engine area to sustain damage, a positive characteristic of a centrifugal flow turbine engine.

I remain, the "Turtle Back" fuel tank design found on the F-80, Mig-15, and even F-84, presented no more hazard than locating it on the belly, you will always have a vulnerable area where the golden BB could penetrate. The area to penetrate was small and I doubt even the best fighter pilot could purposely place a cannon round in that exact location, and even if it was done, a lot of other things would go wrong before the damaged fuel tank allowed fuel to be ingested into the engine. If the installation of the fuel tank in that location was that hazardous, we would have pilot reports of these aircraft lighting up like a Roman candle anytime they were hit....

[carpenoctem1689]

Very true. And fact is, i dont think i ever head of an F-80 going down in a fiery wreck from anything less than very severe damage, from deffinatly more than one or two hits. They were rugged, and the margin for error to hit that precise spot was very, very limited.

[delcyros]

Nothing I would disagree with, Flyboy.
There were initially problems with the fuel caps and the air intake in the P-80 program but in the end they have been mastered. And I am going to underline that a radial engine is somehow less sensitive to damage than was an axial one but 20mm are anyhow a serious thread.
Wouldn´t You like to compare He-162 with the P-80? A much closer pairing, I think.

[FLYBOYJ]

Originally Posted by delcyros

Nothing I would disagree with, Flyboy.
There were initially problems with the fuel caps and the air intake in the P-80 program but in the end they have been mastered. And I am going to underline that a radial engine is somehow less sensitive to damage than was an axial one but 20mm are anyhow a serious thread.
Wouldn´t You like to compare He-162 with the P-80? A much closer pairing, I think.

I agree. Didn't we have that going on another thread?

The -162 to the Meteor; I think the only thing the Meteor had going for it was reliability and maybe range. I knew a guy who had a later NF version, he told me it was a very stable aircraft to fly....

[delcyros]

Yep.
+ for Metor-III:
reliable jet engine
better weaponry, more rounds
better range and endurance
better service seiling
lower take off/landing speed
(probably) better low speed handling

- for Meteor-III
top speed
crit Mach figures
roll rate
heavy stick forces
high speed handling
target size
numbers deployed
initial climb

Can anyone submit the speed figures of Meteor -III depending on altitude?

[Tommy Enfield]

The Meteor III was a further development of the MkI, a proven design with some operational record (including like 13 V-1s shot down) so I'd go for the British plane, providing that it is early 1945.

The problem with the He-162 is that it was a very advanced [although easy to build] design and needed more time to reach maturity. Besides that, an engine obstructing your six o'clock view is not good news at all.

[delcyros]

Neither the Heinkel engineerers nor the RLM was fully statisfied with the solution to carry an engine directly behind the canopy.
This solution was made because it allows very easy maintenance and engine replacements (the BMW-003 E was in the end more reliable than the Jumo was but this was unknown at the time of it´s construction)
Wind tunnel testings proved that there is only little additional drag compared to a fuselage mounted jet engine and more importantly, it allows the fuel tanks to be set in the fuselage. In case of damagings, the fuel wouldn´t ignite on the engine, that´s surely a plus. However, there are reports that a canopy failure will cause a 5-8% reduced top speed and that´s pretty much.
The Heinkel company also featured the first ejection seats on serial planes (He-219, He-280, He-162), providing a better chance of survivability for the pilot.
The visibility tor the six was reduced but not by that much (compare it with Me-163, Bf-109K), the overall visibility was better than in a Me-262 because of the blown canopy.
I don´t rate the Meteor-III equal, maybe it can win 3-4 out of 10 engagements under normal circumstances, worst having that a low crit Mach figure. It´s good to have a soft low speed handling, but these jet´s aren´t build for low speed engagements.
And while the Meteor I made some shots on V-1, the He-162 had shown capable in dogfights. Records confirm at least 10 air to air engagements and a few more are probable. If the 6 claims of He-162 kills turns out to be reliable is unclear so far.

[FLYBOYJ]

I know that Lockheed was developing an ejection seat as early as 1944 - the He-162 had components copied on later seats that ultimately went into the F-80C.

Had a thought! Imagine constructing an He-162 from composite material (Kevlar and graphite) ?!?

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

I always thought that the He-162
was a pretty looking plane but as stated by others I would not want the engine behind my cockpit like that. Just a bad feeling comes to my mind.

Below is an ejection seat from a He-162. It is on display at the Deutsches Museum in Munchen, Germany. The parachute was stored in the seat pan and was cartridge fired giving it the name 'Schleudersitz Heinkel-Kartusche'.

[delcyros]

These early ejection seats truly had their shortcomings: Of 7 He-162 ejections, two ended fatal because the canopy wasn´t released. Another ejection of a british technician directly after VE-day in Leck was also fatal, because he ejected at zero alt/speed (this had to be invented later).
Technically it was the right way, of the examples in US hands there has been quite an intensive testing, which ended that the cardridge for F-80 uses had to be more powerful but otherwise it was ok.
A modified He-162 ejection seat went into serial production in the SU.