Bf/Me 109's ...

[Mark Allen M]

Per several requests for "Luftwaffe" types. Most of these images came from the same original source but unfortunately the text is in German or with little or no information. Sorry to omit commentary to these photos as it would take a long time to locate them and find discriptions, and yes I too find photo descriptions to be valuable and informative. I try my best tho. As usual please feel free to add what you know or can find. Quality of many is a bit poor as well.
Sources, Bundesarchiv website. Library of Congress, USAF archives.

Part 1 of 5

[Mark Allen M]

Part 2

[Mark Allen M]

Part 3

[Mark Allen M]

Part 4

[Mark Allen M]

Part 5

[CDF]

Part 5

Bf 109 E-3 wr 1190 4./JG 26

[Noha307]

"Roundel?"
"Nah. We'll just paint a huge GD American flag on 'er."

That looks like a scene from a movie.

That almost reminds me of Malta.

[CDF]

That almost reminds me of Malta.

Stalingrad actually

[CDF]

double post

Last edited by CDF on Fri Nov 30, 2012 4:43 am, edited 1 time in total.

[CDF]

Heinz Knoke's mount JG11

Author of this book

[JDK]

All the captured examples are well covered in the excellent War Prizes: An Illustrated Survey of German, Italian and Japanese Aircraft Brought to Allied Countries During and After the Second World War by Phil Butler. A vital resource for this era of aviation and the first step of many current warbirds.

http://www.amazon.com/War-Prizes-Illust ... pd_sim_b_4

Regards,

[John Dupre]

Post war Finnish Air Force. Finland was the last operator of the Daimler engined Bf 109. They retired the last of them in 1954 or 55. I think at the close of the war they had 80 or so in service but were limited to 60 combat aircraft afterwards.

[Bomberboy]

Blimey,
What a collection.
That's a lot of really good images there, thanks for sharing them.

[pjpahs]

Great photos, didn't know that the 109 had leading edge slats. The photos show them as does wiki .

[JDK]

Great photos, didn't know that the 109 had leading edge slats.

Critical element in the design. Willi used them in the Bf 108 first, which was, in many ways a technology test for what was used in the 109. The slat enabled a high speed wing with a better (unstalled) manoeuvring turning radius that would be the case without the aerodynamically actuated slats.

So the 109 was able to have greater manoeuvrability out of a smaller, faster higher-load wing than would otherwise be the case. Many allied accounts on the 109 in the early days tried to make much of the potential asymmetric opening or other problems, and while the 109's performance was 'different' to a wing without slats, it doesn't seem to have ever been an issue from the Luftwaffe point of view - I suspect most allied critiques were classic 'not invented here; therefore must be inferior'.

There's a famous Bundesarchiv photo of hands on the slat somewhere, as a metaphor for 'man and machine'.

EDIT: here;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leading_edge_slats

Regards,