Warbird Information Exchange

For an article I'm doing for Aviation History magazine, I'm interested in hearing the opinions of knowledgeable WIXers re "Hitler's Stealth Fighter," the Ho 229 flying wing.

This airplane is revered, on the one hand, by enthusiasts of Luftwaffe Wonder Weapons, who hold it to be the world's first stealth aircraft and the direct progenitor of the Northrop-Grumman B-2. (And yes, I have seen the Nat Geo/Northrop "documentary.")

On the other hand, I have to wonder how much of the fuss is fantasy. As you can tell from what little I'm written, I'm a doubter, but I'd be interested in hearing from people with different opinions.

I've been a 229 fan for many years and never heard that stealth angle until that National Geographic documentary.

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There was a great BBC documentary made in the 80's about stealth.( probably still have it on VHS)
Bill Sweetman did a few minutes on the 229, & if I remember correctly the glue that was used on the aircraft was found to be radar reflective??
If true or not, I have no idea.

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When I was young "sex was safe & flying was dangerous".

The Horton Brothers were working on flying-wing designs long before they - or anybody for that matter - knew anything about practical uses for RADAR. They were committed to flying-wing aircraft, for reasons not at all related to RADAR. To state many years after the fact a major purpose of the design was stealth, is truly fantasy. The absence of verftical surfaces may well have reduced the RADAR signatures, but that was a happy consequence - likely not even noticed until after the war - and not something factored into the original design process. I also seriously doubt that the glues - accidently or on purpose - were able to absorb or otherwise retard RADAR reflection.

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Kevin McCartney

The NASM conservation work has included lab analysis of the glues and wooden layers, and they did not find any charcoal or magic stealth additives. So yes, after the fact fantasy by the NatGeo. TV show.

The same discussion on the Flypast Forum points out that after the effort to build the Ho-229 mock-up NatGeo compared the radar signature using earlier radar equipment that was very obsolete by 1945.

Also worth mentioning is that the Japanese were actually experimenting with radar absorbing coatings by 1943, not the Hortens.

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"They done it, they done it, damned if they ain't flew." December 17, 1903

One of the key running features of ASW in the Atlantic was the Germans running one generation behind in radar technology. By the time they worked out an early warning antenna for decimetric radar (Naxos), the allies have moved on to centimetric wavelengths.
Had the German high command really understood the potential of radar and countermeasures, it's more likely that they would have send concerted strikes against the Chain Home stations, which were left lightly defended solely so they would nto draw attention to themselves.

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Lest Hero-worship raise it's head and cloud our vision, remember that World War II was fought and won by the same sort of twenty-something punks we wouldn't let our daughters date.

Luckily for the allies, the German Luftwaffe was top heavy with WW I veterans that didn't understand advanced concepts. They understood dive bombing as it pertained to successes in the Spanish War but that's about it. The Horten's didn't have the correct last name. Messerschmitt built fighters, Heinkel built bombers, Dornier built flying boats, Klemm built trainers, got it? The Horten Brothers were severely underfunded, too young and simply didn't have the political connections for proper funding or the ability to generate interest. They were too far ahead of everyone else at the time. Kind of like people are still trying to prove some of Einstein's ideas and theories.
All this to say, go look at the Horten gliders on display at the Smithsonian. The sweep of the wing, the shape, and the airfoil have hundreds of tweaks and changes in shape. When the Hortens designed the flying wing concept, they made mathematical calculations for every square inch of each design. Weight, strength, balance, friction, and how each area of the wing reacts with the other parts. Watch a Hawk or other large bird fly. Every part of their wing is flexing and doing something different in flight. Yes the Hortens were concerned about the radar signature of the aircraft.
`German fighter pilot Gunther Bloemertz talks about radar in his book "Heaven Next Stop." They totally knew where their FW-190's would be picked up by British radar, they knew they were compromised trying to fly fighter missions at night and were sitting ducks to the Allied night fighters that had radar. The German war machine was in a state of chaos. panic , and confusion. The Hortens being visionaries tried to use the available materials and have the lowest radar signature. Also, the reasons the engines were buried in the wings, were more for weight and balance and center of thrust requirements. I bet the Horten jet was burning maybe 800 gph / 5400 lbs. hr. The weight and balance of the aircraft was changing at a rate of about 91 lbs per minute.
The Germans found out quite quickly that to survive the Allied onslaught they were going to have to fly higher, faster, stealthier, and at night to survive the numerical and technological disadvantages.

The design is pretty cool but I tend to agree that the Horten's had a great concept but doubt they anything more than an inkling of something bigger. It is so very tempting to impose our modern understanding and ideas on things that happened 70+ years ago. In the absence of clear fact / proof I doubt that the 'stealth' factor was much of a consideration. If you think about what a nutter Hitler was, had the Hortens told him they could make a airplane virtually disappear from the Allies, I tend to think he would have stopped production of everything just to funnel the $$ and resources into the invisible plane

My .02

Tom P.

Wendovertom said



I am not sure that the flying wing concept is all that good - neat, yes, but is this better than conventional design? For the original Northrop B-35/B-49 flying wings, putting everything in wings with no fuselage meant a much thicker wing. This meant more rather than less drag, and the flying wings were much slower than the B-36, which easily beat the competition. Flying wings may or may not be better stealth - I personally doubt that the B-2 is better at stealth than the F-117, even if you do factor in the differences of size/mass. Whether the Horton was faster or more maneuverable that a P-51 or Me-262 was never well determined, at least to my knowledge.

A fuselage thick enough to hold fuel, avionics, bombs and crew and with a tail at the end has proven to be a pretty efficient design, and one that the flying wing is hard-pressed to beat. The incoming B-3 will apparently be a flying wing, but I think the competition was a close one, perhaps influenced by the military not being able to afford to give all its business to Boeing.

hold it, let me get my asbestos underwear on...

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Kevin McCartney

All good points Kevin - I personally love the XB-70 and have been lucky enough to spend a short amount of time in a BUFF so truthfully I am an old school fan.

Since the B-3 was brought up - I want to chortle to myself when I read that they are going to build more than 100 of the new bombers - it just seems really hard to believe the funding will remain there for that many planes. My kids will have the opportunity to fly a B-52 before they retire the plane and replace it with the B-3.

Anyway - the 229 is an interesting design!

Tom P.

You should really check out NASM's page on the aircraft. They even have a dedicated page for the debate over whether it really was stealthy or not.

IMHO, they seem to be very skeptical of both the stealth claims and the National Geographic documentary as well. They make this, frankly hilarious, note about the documentary's accuracy:

So, despite what the documentary implies, the Ho 229 is not stored next to the Ark of the Covenant.

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wentovertom said



Tom, about that I think there is no argument at all. !

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Kevin McCartney

Do they have the outer wing panels for the 229? And if not, does anyone know if they will try to build a set to make the display look more complete?

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According to the history, a pair of wings were found approximately 75 miles from the Gotha factory and presumably they were a fit. The plane was unfinished when captured and I would also be interested in the story of how more assembly work was completed either in Germany by the remaining Gotha workers or elsewhere.

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"They done it, they done it, damned if they ain't flew." December 17, 1903

As I understand it, the NASM will not be doing a "restoration"of the Ho 229. They will be doing conservation, trying to stabilize the rotting structure, clean it up some, and make it useful and meaningful to future historians. Nobody intends to turn it into a nice new Ho 229. I don't know if they're even considering structure that doesn't at this point exist, and I don't think they do have the outer wings, though I could well be wrong.