B-29s over Germany

[Erich]

sounds like the P-61 crew sucked big-time !

yes R4M's and a successor would of been developed had the war continued. The TA 152H was enough to take out the B-29. R4M's were first used on ops March 18, 45 with III./JG 7. What a horror story it was for the B-17 formations as they thought that half of the 18 plus losses were due to 8.8cm Flak. Many fortress crews did not even know what hit them. Soon after this date I./JG 7 was equipped and later JV 44 with R4M useage against the 9th AF B-26's

 

[Udet]

I really fail to see why is it the B-29 would have surpassed the performance record of the B-17 or B-24 in Europe.

Because it was faster than the two heavies the USAAF deployed in the ETO? Because it flew higher?

Any bomber formation of the allies flying unescorted in 1943-44 and getting intercepted by German fighters is doomed. The B-29 does not have anything that would make it an exception to that rule.

The features of the B-29 are frequently presented in real grandiose terms:

(i) "It flew very high" (the Germans had planes who could be there to greet the B-29);

(ii) "It was faster than the B-24 and B-17 (certainly not faster than any German fighter plane of 1944-45 -do not compare it with the German jets for it´d be overkill);

(iii) "It had a central fire control system" (sounds somewhat exaggerated when one knows of the era, how effective such a system really was? i´ve been told by people fond of the PTO that the actual performance of the system was "nothing impressive" and that problems were not rare),

(iv) "It had a pressurized cabin" (great when used against a nation that has neither Flak nor air force, or when going through a pleasure flight in skies where no war is being fought; wait for the first 2cm or 3cm shell of a Sturmböck to hit and let´s see what happens when the air escapes from the bomber).

Erich could be of help here: if i recall correctly the Germans had at least two AA guns which had a maximun effective ceiling that would have put the B-29 within comfortable reach right?

The 10.5-cm Flak 38 and the 12.8-cm Flak 40.

Still i believe the B-29 made a fine bomber; "super-bomber"? I do not think so.

I do not believe nor see arguments sound enough that might prove the B-29 would have fared in a much superior fashion if compared with the two other heavies.

If the results of strategic bombing in Europe were in fact to be surpassed by having B-29s instead of the other two models, then marginal is the first word coming into mind.

Cheers!

 

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

I think it would have been better for 3 reasons, the amount of payload would have been increased, overall it was a better bomber (why not use the better bomber), and the threat that it posed with the A-Bomb.

 

[Soundbreaker Welch?]

The B-29 was the best bomber of them all, but a 262 could still stick it. Of course in just a little while a Gloster might take 'em down. But then its not the B-29's toughness which won the day.

 

[Glider]

Udet
Taking your points
If the B29 flies higher then the flak is less effective reducing your losses.
If the B29 flies faster you reduce the time over the danger area, reducing your losses. It also makes it more difficult to intercept, reducing your losses.
If the 29 is better defended then you again reduce your losses.
I don't think anyone said that they could fly unescorted, they needed escorting over Japan whose air defences were nowhere near as effective as the Germans.
For the above reasons I believe there can be no doubt that the B29 would have been far more effective than the B17/B24 and I haven't mentioned the most obvious reason, the range payload capabilities of the B29 were way ahead of either the B17 or B24

 

[the lancaster kicks ass]

But then its not the B-29's toughness which won the day.

it wasn't even the B-29 that won the day, it was the weapon used, not the means of delivery that won the day..........

and remember the B-29 was not an easy plane to produce, you may be right in saying losses would be lower, but could the losses be sustained? they would be up against some exceptionally formidable german fighters, and it can be assumed that if the war continues to the point where the B-29 is being used over the ETO then the war's gone on longer than it did, the Germans are doing something right, and have already fought off the B-17/B-24 onslaught, so they wouldn't be facing 1945's weaker airforce, would production of the B-17 and B-24 be stopped dead in order to produce the B-29? no, of course not, the other planes were still needed, the kind of large scale production of the B-29 that would be needed over Europe would be a stretch of even the USA's powers..........

 

[plan_D]

The Luftwaffe was falling in effectiveness from 1943 to the wars end. If Germany had managed to hold on longer than they did, how many planes were going to be grounded from lack of fuel? How many skilled pilots would have already been killed by Allied escorts?

The fact of the matter is, the B-29 carried a heavier payload further and faster. It's time over the danger zone was less, it's own defensive power was increased and it's height was increased. Reducing the German air defences considerably, then while escorted by the P-51 it was going to be so much more effective than the B-17 or B-24. The cruising speeds of both the B-29 and P-51 were higher than that of the B-17 or B-24 and flying higher ... both of those things would reduce the interception time, it's not hard to understand.

 

[FLYBOYJ]

The B-29 was harder to build but by 1945 Boeing spooled up it's Wichita plant and Bell was building B-29s in Marietta Georgia, the difficulty of a larger and more complex aircraft was being overcome and by mid 1945 and there was still plenty of resources to supply thousands of B-29s where ever they were needed, and again it was planned to get the B-24 and B-17 out of service and replace them with the B-32. Convair was planning the same production methodology with the B-32 as they did with the B-24.

If anything by late 1945 and early 1946 I think the production capacity of the US would of INCREASED....

 

[syscom3]

At the peak of production (July 1945), the four B29 plants were cranking out about 375 B29's per month. And consider that was reflective of production planning knowing that they would not be used in the ETO.

It is quite conceivable that another two or three plants could have been brough on line if planned.

 

[Twitch]

I must be on drugs or have too much WW 2 stuff floating around my head. Erich- I was thinking of the X-4 wire guided missile that was just reaching units at the end not the R4M.

 

[Erich]

yes the wire guided X-4's were being field tested not on ops just .......... yet.

A similiar wire guided air to ship bomb had been tested on ops with KG 40 and KG 100 with limited success in 1944

 

[Udet]

Erich, did you see my questions regarding the German AA guns which had the sufficient ceiling to hit whatever thing flew the higher altitudes during the war?

 

[Erich]

Udet yes the 105 and 128mms could reach without problem especially the latter .. . . . .

 

[Udet]

Glider, hello;

Taking your points is that I can tell the following:

(a) I brought the Flak issue to the discussion table in order to attempt illustrating that the "pressurized bomber" feature will be useless once the first enemy shell hits. Think of a single shell fired from a MK 108 in the nose of a Me 262.

Note I did not suggest a single Flak shell hitting a B-29 flying at 40,000 ft will have as a result the destruction of the bomber. However, you bet one single shell of the 12.8 cm Flak 40 gun will put an immediate end to the pressurized feature of the bomber.

Still, depending on where the shell of that particular Flak gun would hit and it could certainly bring a B-29 down as well.

(b) Agreed that if you are faster then time spent over the combat area can certainly get shortened.

However, how does that change the fact there can be German fighters waiting a formation of B-29s, after having scrambled due to Radar system reports?

(c) The B-29 was better defended Glider? How come? Because of the "central fire control system"? As commented, where is the evidence such a sophisticated system was better than the job carried out by the frenzied gunners on board B-17s and B-24s?

Erich, thanks for the response; after all i was recalling it right.

Cheers!

 

[Glider]

Udet, going with the flow
a) I totally agree that one hit from almost anything would break the pressurisation of the B29, and I wouldn't mind betting that one hit from a 128 will destroy any heavy bomber in the vast majority of cases. Also I do not deny that these guns can reach the altitudes in question, I never have denied it. However, the higher you are the safer you are as accuracy decreases with height and its more difficult to set the fuses. This was one of the reasons why Lancasters were preferred over Halifax's and Lancaster II's for that matter.

b) There is of course nothing to stop the Germans waiting for the bombers at altitude after being warned by radar reports. That said though, it will take longer for the fighters to gain that altitude, giving the escorts more time to intercept them, also at altitude the defending fighters were less effective. 190's would struggle at that altitude and the 109's would have to go with their built in weapons as the extra weight of external guns would cause difficulty at altitude. Me262's would have a huge advantage but were very limited in their operational numbers, plus of course the few 152's. The US could and would have provided considerable numbers of escorts and their fighters were very effective at altitude.
This plus the fact that the B29 would spend less time in the danger zone would result in fewer casualties.

c) Better Defence
The B17G had three turrets plus the rear position and of course the hand operated weapons. The Hand operated guns were largely ineffective giving eight effective weapons. Note the rear position had limited arc of fire so it could be argued that this should be reduced but I am ignoring that.

The B24 had four turrets including the rear and a couple of hand held guns, again giving eight effective weapons.

The B29 had five turrets giving an effective defensive armament of twelve weapons. I am ignoring the 20mm in the rear as it was often taken out or it tended to jam.

So we start off with a 50% increase in the firepower. It was better defended.

Then we look at the other improvements. As to evidence that the modernised fire control system was better than the traditonal system I frankly have no idea, and don't pretend to. I do however think it unlikely that it was worse than the traditional turret so we still have a 50% increase.

My personal view is that it probably was more effective because all armed bombers went for some form of central guidence, even the radar guided turrets in some Lancasters was a centrally controled. In the B29 it also gave flexibility as one gunner could control more than one turret if the situation demanded it.
So to sum up at worst it was a 50% increase in firepower and at best it was a lot better, but it was still an increase.

Even if you disagree with all the above and say it was no better than the B17/B24. The B29 still carried a hell of a lot more bombs a longer distance and therefore, was more effective than either of the others.

 

[maxs75]

Do You know if some 15th Air Force groups were selected to get B-29 instead of B-17/24? If so, which ones?

Max

 

[Marshall_Stack]

Great discussion. Thanks for all the responses to this thread.

I thought I read (a long time ago) that an Air Force observer flew in a B-17 over Europe to determine if the B-29 was suitable for the European theater and determined that it was too tough. Again, I don't have anything to back this up so this can be taken with a grain of salt.

I asked a museum curator why the B-29s weren't used in the Europe theater. He said that it was too late to be deployed in that theater. I don't believe this since B-29s were bombing Japan from China in 1944.

The other reason I heard (and believe) is that the B-29s were desperately needed in the Pacific where the range needed for operations were greater and that the B-17s / B-24s were getting the job done in Europe.

 

[syscom3]

Recently I asked the members of the B29 web site about sudden depressurization of the B29. They told me that no B29's that they know of were destroyed by this event. The B29 was designed with catastrophic depressurization in mind and the structure built for its effect.

This question was answered by both aircrews and ground personnel.

Now of course any type of heavy flak hitting the aircraft is going to create a large of ammount of damage, probably with the expectation of catastophic structural failure. But if B29 is outside of the flak detonation blast overpressure zone, and only the fragments hit the structure, then the probability of structural failure due to depressurization is "nil".

 

[Udet]

Mr. syscom3, good morning. How´s coffee?

Note I did not bring the depressurization issue of the B-29 to affirm the sole event of losing cabin pressure should -per se- end in the destruction of the bomber (although it could happen).

What I meant is any enemy shell, whether from Flak or fighter, smashing the structure of the B-29 will put an immediate end to such feature; sure B-29 crews knew their procedure in the event of depressurization but that´s not being dicussed here.

My idea was to suggest that other than mere crew comfort issues, the pressurization feature, as presented on the "B-29 happy feature list" is completely useless once the enemy came out and sank his teeth into it.

Cheers!

 

[DaveB.inVa]

Just a couple quick notes, Im sorta running late and wont be able to write much.

It was standard proceedure with the B-29 to be unpressurized when in any combat area. This is seen in both WWII and Korea.

The CFC system was not perfect but it was pretty good. Ill have to dig around but I know a guy who was involved in its development and he can attest that for an inexperienced or average gunner the CFC was better. He compared it to ABS systems in cars. An awesome driver can out brake an ABS system, but an ABS system can make most crappy or horrible drivers have pretty good braking.

I do also believe it would handle the Me 262. It did fairly well with MiG's in Korea. Im not certain what limits are for the system though... again Ill have to do some research.