Best Jet of WW2?

I disagree. Without the need to climb a rocket engine capable of sustaining 500 mph level flight above 20,000 feet would have been much much smaller. 10-15 minutes should have been possible. 10 minutes is enough time to travel over 40 miles and engage the enemy bombers.

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Lunatic

[Gnomey]

ME-262, a good jet powered fighter-bomber

[delcyros]

Okey, lets say it has an engine a little smaller, no HWK 509 A-1 (1700 kp thrust) but a HWK RII 203 (750 kp thrust, same fitted in Me-163 A). A normal equipped Me-163 B needs an average of 3 minutes and 19 seconds for a climb to 32000 ft. You could enlenghten it´s max flight time by dropping it in 20000 ft. altitude by a few minutes (max. flight time: 9 minutes and 40 seconds powered flight at 600 km/h if towed to 4000 m altitude in case of a RII 203 driven Me-163 AV-prototype). 10 minutes are possible . The Me-163 C should have a max flight time of 14 minutes (at 600 Km/h) or 19 minutes at 514 km/h. At full speed they only have around 8 minutes of powerd flight time. Max range is still 120 Km (around 75 miles) for Me-163 B and 130 Km (around 80 miles) for Me-163 C (dropped in altitude). I do not have datas for the Me-263 but it should be around the same, probably a little better. That is still too less for succesful interceptor operations. It only has one path to fire it´s MK-108, even a second is debatable. It needs a good tactician to lead the plane, it is even getting more complicated if more planes are operated in that way. And they have to return, so they cannot spent all fuel on the attack if they want to disappear safely. The carrier planes would surely soon be lost by some kind of fighter sweep or anything else. The soviets tried the same back in 1941 with an obsolete TB-3 bomber with two I-16 under the wings. Because of the losses they had to move on for I-16 bomber raids (instead of interceptions), making the hole procedure very questionable.

The fuel burned in that 3 minutes and 20 second climb to 32,000 feet would last more than 10 minutes in level flight.

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Originally Posted by Gnomey

ME-262, a good jet powered fighter-bomber

Great aircraft, very advanced and probably the best to have seen combat in WW2, but only for about 10 flight hours.

[cheddar cheese]

Im with Ar-234

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Originally Posted by cheddar cheese

Im with Ar-234

I love the 234 but she was unfortunatly not used very well.

[Erich]

the Ar 234 very much preferable in the bomber role than the 262. the 262 was a bomber killer nothing short. On the other hand the 262 was a lethal ground attack jet fitted with R4M's.

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

The problem with the 234 is that they did not use it in its inteded role and used it pretty much for armed reconnaisanse and ground attack. It should have been built in large numbers and used as a bomber.

[Erich]

Adler there were more bomber units using the Ar 234 than recon and only in the spring of 45 was this reversed and in so the Reon units only had as much as 4-5 jets on hand per staffel although they were recognized as online in the field gruppen

E

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Yeah I have gone back and checked it out what I have in my books and it says the same thing you have posted there.

[KraziKanuK]

Originally Posted by RG_Lunatic

Last night on THC there were two documentaries. "Secret weapons of the Allies" and "Secret weapons of the Soviets".

They showed that the Mig-15 did not derive from German jet technology, it was in the works in the early 40's and they already knew about swept wings. The Russians actually had quite a jet engine project going, they just lacked the necessary alloys to make a viable combat unit till after the war.

Likewise, they showed Northrop designs that used swept wings (mostly forward edge swept but rear edge not so much) as early as 1942. Lockheed's first jet design even had an afterburner designed into it! (but was never built, it was considered too complicated and the F-80 was designed to be easier to build).



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Lunatic

THC? OK

If the Soviets had such a jet engine program going why did their first jets use Jumo 004s and the Soviet version of it?

The Lockheed was the L1000 (or something like that) was it not? Very advanced a/c, with swept wings.


Don't forget the British jet engines. They were just as advanced or more than as anyone elses.

[red admiral]

The Reggiane RE.2007; 1.050kph swept wings and 4x20mm cannons.

The British axial and centrifugal flow jets were as capable as the German ones. Have a look at the Avro Lancastrian post-war.

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

The L-1000 from Lockheed was actually the engine that was used to power the L-133 aircraft that they were working on.

Development of the L-1000 began in 1940. It was to power Lockheed's L-133 project fighter, the design was of an advanced axial-flow type engine, when the contract for the US's first jet was awarded to Bell's XP 59, work on the L-1000 idled along until 1943 when the USAAF approved a low-priority development contract, with the engine now known as the XJ-37. However the engine was to pass though a number of companies, none of which managed to get it to work and in 1950 the J-37 was "killed off".
http://tanks45.tripod.com/Jets45/Lis...EnginesUSA.htm

And here is info on the L-133

Engine: 2x Lockheed L1000 J37 axial-flow turbojets
Wing Span: n/a
Length: n/a
Height: n/a
Weight: n/a
Maximum Speed: n/a
Ceiling: n/a
Range: n/a
Crew: 1
Armament: 4x 0.50'' machine guns
History:

The Lockheed company was the first in the USA to start work on a jet powered aircraft, the L-133 design started in 1939 as a number of "Paper Project" by engineers Clarence R "Kelly" Johnson and Hall J Hibbard. By 1940 preliminary work on a company financed jet fighter had been started, which progressed to several different versions on the drawing board. In the mean time Lockheed were working on a axial-flow turbojet of there own design L-1000, which was intended to power the culmination of the fighter project the Model L-133-02-01, this was a single seat, cannard design powered by two L-1000 engines. The design was noticed by the USAAF, but at the time they showed no great interested in the idea of a jet powered fighter and missed the opportunity of giving the USA a lead in this new technology. With out the support (and money) of the USAAF work on the L-133 fighter and it's engine the L-1000 came to a halt.

How ever when the USAAF suddenly began to show interest in the idea of a jet powered combat aircraft in 1942, spurred on by intelligence reports of the advances in jet propulsion by the Germans and British, the USAAF would turn the Lockheed for it's fist jet powered fighter the Lockheed P-80 "Shooting Star"
http://tanks45.tripod.com/Jets45/His...-L133/L133.htm

[KraziKanuK]

Adler, was not at home so could not look it up. Knew there was something weird about it.

Some British jet engines

Armstrong Whitworth

ASX
Designed in 1942 and built in 1943. The AWX was a 14 stage axial-flow engine making around 2,600 lb of thrust. Never used in any production aircraft, how ever it was developed into a turboprop engine delivering 3760 hp, known as the ASP and given the name "Python". This engine was fitted into the Westland "Wyvern"

Metropolitan-Vickers

F.2 "Beryl"
As far back as 1939, Metropolitan-Vickers, a Manchester firm that specialized in steam turbines, had been working on what would become the first British axial-flow turbojet engine. The company had been working on a turboprop design as early in as 1939 but this idea was proving overly complicated. By 1940 the success of the Whittle engines suggested a turbojet might be a better road to go down.. Work began in July 1940, on an axial-flow engine designed by Hayne Constantit at the RAE, with a nine-stage compressor, an annular combustion chamber, and a two-stage turbine, By November 1941, the F.2 was was producing 1,800 lb of thrust on the test bench, with flight tests beginning in the spring of 1943 with the engine fitted in to a Avro Lancaster and then into a modified Gloster Meteor DG204/G which had it's first flight on the 13/11/1943. The F.2 was refined into the operational "F.2/4", with a ten-stage compressor, single-stage turbine, with 3,230 lb of thrust. Fitted in the Sanders-Roe SRA.1.

from http://tanks45.tripod.com/Jets45/Jets45-Engines.htm

B Gunston's 'Aero Engine' book goes into more detail.