Me 210 & 410 Hornisse @·AIRCRAFTUBE

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Messerschmitt Me 210 & Me 410 Hornisse

The Me 210 was a German heavy fighter and attack aircraft of World War II developed by Messerschmitt. The Me 210 was designed to replace the Bf 110 in heavy fighter role, design started before the opening of World War II. The first examples of the Me 210 were ready in 1939, but they proved to have poor flight characteristics. A large-scale operational testing programme throughout 1941 and early 1942 did not cure the aircraft's problems. The design eventually entered limited service in 1943, but was almost immediately replaced by its successor, the Messerschmitt Me 410. The Me 410 was a further development of the Me 210, renamed so as to avoid the 210's notoriety. The failure of the Me 210's development programme meant that the Luftwaffe was forced to continue fielding the outdated Bf 110, to mounting losses.

Messerschmitt designers had started working on an upgrade of the Bf 110 in 1937, before the production version of the 110 had even flown. In late 1938 the 110 was just entering service, and the RLM started looking ahead for its eventual replacement. Messerschmitt sent in their modified 110 design as the Me 210, and Arado responded with their all-new Arado Ar 240.

The Me 210 was a straightforward cleanup of the 110, and used many of the same parts. The main differences were a modified nose area that was much shorter and located over the center of gravity, and an all-new wing designed for higher cruise speeds. On paper the 210's performance was impressive. It could reach 620 km/h (or 385 mph) on two 1,332 hp, (or 993 kW) DB 601F engines, making it about 80 km/h (or 50 mph) faster than the Bf 110, and nearly as fast as single-engine fighters of the era.

The Me 210's main landing gear followed some of the design philosophies that had resulted from the main change in the earlier Ju 88's main gear design, where each main gear had a single gear strut that twisted through 90º during retraction, to bring the main gear wheel resting atop the lower end of the main strut when retracted rearwards into the wing. Unlike the Ju 88, however, the Me 210's main gear wheels were "inside" the main gear struts when fully extended, while the Ju 88's were "outside" the struts.

The Bf 110 carried its ordnance externally, on the wings and fuselage, but this created drag; the Me 210 avoided this problem by housing the bombs in an enclosed bomb bay, in the nose of the aircraft. The Me 210 could carry up to two 500 kg (or 2,200 lb) bombs. The Me 210 had dive brakes fitted on the tops of the wings, and a Stuvi 5B bomb sight in the nose, for shallow-angle dive bombing. In the fighter role the bomb bay was fitted with four 20 mm cannon.

For defense the Me 210's rear gunner was armed with two heavy-calibre 13 mm MG 131 machine guns. These were fitted into half-teardrop-shaped turrets mounted on each side of the aeroplane, and were remote-controlled from the gunner's position with a unique aiming setup, that had a rotating crossbar with a handgun-style grip and trigger at its center, directly underneath the crossbar. This unique aiming and control scheme rotated the crossbar axially, when the handgrip was elevated or depressed, to aim the guns vertically, and a sideways movement of the handgrip would pivot either one of the guns outwards from the fuselage for diagonal firing. The rear of the cockpit canopy was bulged out to allow the gunner to aim down and to the rear. The guns were electrically fired, and electrical contact breaker prevented the gunner from shooting off the Me 210's tailplane.

An order for 1,000 Me 210s was placed even before the prototype had flown. In time this would prove to be a mistake. The first prototype flew with DB 601B engines in September 1939, and was considered unsafe by test pilots. Stability was bad in turns, and it tended to "snake" even while flying level. At first the designers concentrated on the twin-rudder arrangement that had been taken from the 110, and replaced it with a new and much larger single vertical stabilizer. However this had almost no effect, and the plane continued to oscillate. The Me 210 also suffered from terrible stalls. With the nose up, or in a turn the stalls whipped into spins when the automatic leading-edge slats opened. The second prototype, Me 210 V2, was lost this way in September 1940, when the pilot could not get out of the resulting spin and had to jump. The chief test pilot commented that the Me 210 had "all the least desirable attributes an aeroplane could possess." It took 16 prototypes and 94 pre-production examples to try and resolve the many problems. Nevertheless, the RLM was desperate to replace the Bf 110's currently in service, and ordered full production in the spring of 1941.

The Hungarian authorities were however satisfied with the Me 210 in its current state, and purchased a production license for the type, as well as for its DB 605 engines. Several airframes were also purchased, to be completed in Hungarian factories for practice while the assembly lines were set up. Production started in the Dunai Repülőgépgyár Rt. (Danubian Aricraft Plant) as the Me 210C with the DB 605B engine, under an agreement where the Luftwaffe got two of every three produced.

In practice, the Hungarian Me 210C was so superior to the German Me 210A that it was planned to fold its design features into a new Me 210D model. However, this was eventually developed into the Messerschmitt Me 410.

Operational history

Deliveries to front-line units started in April 1942 and the plane proved to be even less popular with pilots. Production was stopped at the end of the month, by which time only 90 had been delivered. Another 320 partially-completed models were placed in storage. In its place the Bf 110 was put back into production. Although the Bf 110 was now equipped with the newer DB 605B engines and greater firepower, it was still an outdated design.

The Luftwaffe started receiving their Hungarian-built planes in April 1943, but the Hungarians didn't get their own until 1944; however, when they did enter service they were more than happy with them. Production ended in March 1944, when the factory switched over to produce the Messerschmitt Bf 109G version. By that time, a total of 267 Me 210C had been built, 108 of them had been given to the Luftwaffe. They operated mostly in Tunisia and Sardinia, but were quickly replaced by the Me 410.

Me 210 variants

  • Me 210A-0: Pre-production aircraft.
  • Me 210A-1: Single-seat twin-engined fighter-bomber, bomber-destroyer aircraft.
  • Me 210A-2: Single-seat twin-engined dive-bomber, bomber-destroyer aircraft.
  • Me 210C: Hungarian production version.

Operators

  • Luftwaffe: Received 90 German-built Me 210A and 108 Hungarian-built Me 210 Ca-1.
  • Royal Hungarian Air Force: Received 159 Hungarian-built Me 210C.
  • Imperial Japanese Army Air Service: One aircraft was bought in Germany for tests, delivered aboard of U-Boat.

Me 410 Hornisse

Design and development

Development of the Me 210 had been underway since 1939, but the aircraft proved extremely unstable and was never considered for full-scale production. Modifications to the layout produced the Me 210C and 210D, which proved somewhat superior. As studies progressed on the Me 210D, it was instead decided to introduce a "new" model, the Me 410.

The major change between the Me 210 and 410 was the introduction of the larger (at 44.5 litre, 2,715 in3 displacement) and more powerful Daimler-Benz DB 603A engines, which improved power to 1,750 PS (1,730 hp, 1,290 kW) compared to the 1,475 PS DB 605s used on the Me 210C. The engine performance increased the Me 410's maximum speed to 625 km/h (388 mph), greatly improved rate of climb, service ceiling, and most notably the cruise speed, which jumped to 579 km/h (360 mph). It also improved payload capability to the point where the aircraft could lift more war load than could fit into the bomb bay under the nose. To address this, shackles were added under the wings for four 50 kg (110 lb) bombs. The changes added an extra 680 kg (1,500 lb) to the Me 210 design, but the extra engine power more than made up for the difference.

The new version included a lengthened fuselage and new, automatic leading edge slats, both of which had been tested on Me 210s and were found to dramatically improve handling. The slats had originally been featured on the earliest Me 210 models, but had been removed on production models due to poor handling. When entering a sharp turn, the slats had a tendency to open, due in part to the turn causing a drop in air pressure at the leading edge of the wings, analogous to the low pressure activation the slats were designed for in a slow landing approach (this problem was first observed on the prototype Bf 109E), which added to the problems keeping the aircraft flying smoothly. However, when the problems with the general lateral instability were addressed, this was no longer a real problem. The wing panels of the earlier Me 210 had been designed with a planform geometry that placed the aerodynamic center in a rearwards direction in comparison to the earlier Bf 110, giving the outer sections of the wing's planform beyond each engine nacelle a slightly greater, 12.6º leading edge sweepback angle than the inner panels' 6.0º leading edge sweep angle. This resulted in unreasonable handling characteristics in flight for the original Me 210 design. The new Me 410's outer wing panels had their planform geometry revised to bring the aerodynamic center further forwards in comparison to the Me 210, thus making the leading edge sweepback of the outer panels identical to the inner wing panels with both having identical 5.5º sweepback angles, and improving in-flight handling.

Deliveries began in January 1943, two years later than the original plan had called for, and continued until September 1944, by which point a total of 1,160 of all versions had been produced by Messerschmitt Augsburg and Dornier München. When it arrived, it was liked by its crews, even though its improved performance was not enough to protect it from the swarms of high performance Allied fighters they faced.

Operational history

The Me 410 night bomber proved to be an elusive target for the RAF night fighters. The first unit to operate over the UK was V./KG 2, which lost its first Me 410 on the night of 13–14 July 1943 when it was shot down by a de Havilland Mosquito of No. 85 Squadron.

The Me 410 was also used as a bomber destroyer against the daylight bomber streams of the USAAF, upgraded through the available Umrüst-Bausätze factory conversion kits, all bearing a /U suffix, for the design. The Me 410 A-1/U2 was fitted with two additional 20 mm MG 151/20 cannons in the undernose weapons bay, while the A-1/U4 was equipped with a Bordkanone series 50 mm (2 in) BK 5 cannon instead. For breaking up the bomber formations, many Me 410s also had four underwing tubes firing converted 21 cm (8 in) Werfer-Granate 21 mortar rockets. Two Geschwader, Zerstörergeschwader 26 and 76, were thus equipped with the Me 410 by late 1943.

They were moderately successful against unescorted bombers, with a considerable number of kills against USAAF day bomber formations being achieved. Unfortunately for the Luftwaffe, the Me 410 was no match in a dogfight with the lighter Allied single-engine fighters such as the P-51 Mustang and Spitfire. In the spring of 1944, the Me 410 formations encountered swarms of Allied fighters protecting the bomber streams, usually flying far ahead of the combat box formations as an air supremacy move in clearing the skies of any Luftwaffe opposition, resulting in the Me 410's previous successes against escorted bombers now often being offset by their losses. An example of this on 6 March 1944 during an attack on Berlin by some 750 8th AF heavy bombers, saw 16 Me 410s shot down in return for eight B-17s and four P-51s (which were destroyed by Bf 109 and Fw 190 fighters escorting the Me 410s). The following month on 11 April, with 8th AF raids hitting Sorau, Rostock and Oschersleben, II.ZG 26's Me 410s accounted for a rare success, downing 10 B-17s without any losses. However, the unit's luck then ran out. During the course of the same raid, their second sortie was intercepted by P-51s that destroyed eight Me 410s and three Bf 110s. Sixteen crewmen were killed and three wounded.

From the summer of 1944, despite being Hitler's favourite bomber destroyer, the Me 410 units were taken from Defense of the Reich duties and production was phased out in favour of single-engine fighters with the Me 410s remaining in service flying on reconnaissance duties only. Some Me 410s were used with Junkers Ju 188s during the Battle of Normandy for high-altitude night reconnaissance missions.

Me-410 variants

The basic A-series aircraft were armed with two 7.92 mm (.312 in) MG 17 machine guns and two 20 mm MG 151/20 cannons in the nose and delivered as the Me 410 A-1 light bomber. The originally planned Me 410 A-2 heavy fighter was cancelled because the dual 30 mm (1.18 in) MK 103 cannon pack was not ready in time. The Me 410A featured a bomb bay for carrying air-to-ground ordnance or for the installation of additional air-to-air weaponry or other equipment. Initially, three Umrüst-Bausätze (factory conversion kits) were available, U1 contained a palette of cameras for the photo-reconnaissance role, U2 two 20 mm MG 151/20 cannon with 250 rpg for the heavy fighter use, and U4 used the 50 mm (2 in) Bordkanone series weapon, the BK-5 cannon with 21 rounds, to turn either an Me 410A or B-series aircraft into a dedicated bomber destroyer. The BK 5 cannon - derived from the Panzer III tank's main armament, the 50 mm (2 in) KwK 39 L/60 - allowed the Me 410s to shoot at their targets from over 914 m (1,000 yd), a distance at which the bombers' defensive armament, usually consisting of the "light-barrel", .50 calibre AN/M2 aviation version of the M2 Browning machine guns, was useless. Frequent problems with jamming and limited ammunition supply, together with the extra 540 kg (1,200 lb) weight of the large-calibre gun under the nose, made the other anti-bomber versions of Me 410, especially those with extra 20 mm MG 151/20s, much more useful. The dedicated reconnaissance version Me 410 A-3 received a deeper fuselage for additional cameras and fuel. The Me 410 A-3 entered service in small numbers in early 1944, and equipped three long-range reconnaissance Staffeln, known as Fernaufklärungsgruppen (one on the Western Front and the other two on the Eastern Front).

The Me 410B-series was largely the same as the A-series, but replaced the 7.92 mm (.312 in) MG 17 with 13 mm (.51 in) MG 131 machine gun. The originally planned 1,900 hp (1,400 kW) DB 603G engine was cancelled in early 1944, so all Me 410Bs used DB 603A or DB 603AA engines. The DB 603G would have increased the maximum speed to 630 km/h (392 mph), and cruising speed to 595 km/h (370 mph), although the weights increased once again. The versions were the same as with the A-series, the Me 410 B-1, and Me 410 B-3 filling the same roles as the earlier A-1, and A-3 versions, also with the options of using the same Umrüst-Bausätze factory conversion kits as the A-series aircraft used.

Several experimental models were also developed. The Me 410 B-5 added shackles under the fuselage to carry a torpedo, and removed the MG 131s in the nose to make room for the FuG 200 Hohentwiel 550 MHz UHF-band maritime patrol radar. The bomb bay was not used in this version in order to make room for a 650 L (170 US gal) fuel tank, and the rearward-firing remote turrets were replaced by another 700 L (180 US gal) fuel tank for long-range missions. The Me 410 B-6 was a similar anti-shipping conversion, but intended for the short-range coastal defense role only. For this mission, it did not use a torpedo, and was instead a simple modification of the B-1 with the FuG 200 radar. The Me 410 B-7/B-8 were updated B-3 reconnaissance models that were only built as prototypes.

The Me 410C was a high-altitude version drawn up in early 1944, with two new wing designs that increased span to 18.25 m (60 ft) or 20.45 m (67 ft). The larger wings allowed the gear to retract directly to the rear. A new universal engine mount would allow for the use of any of the DB 603JZ or BMW 801J turbocharged engines or the Jumo 213E two-stage mechanically supercharged engines, driving a new four-blade propeller with very wide blades. The BMW 801 radials were air-cooled and the DB 603 and Jumo 213 used an annular radiator, all housed as unitized Kraftei (power-egg) engine "modules" onto an airframe for ease of installation and field maintenance, so the normal under-wing radiators were removed. None were ever built, as Me 410 production was canceled before the engines matured.

The Me 410D was a simpler upgrade to the B-series to improve altitude performance, but not to the same degree as the C-series. It would be powered by the DB 603JZ engines, and had a revised forward fuselage to increase the field of view of the pilot and reduce drag. It also replaced portions of the outer wing panels with ones made of wood to conserve strategic materials. Several were built, but like many other attempts at wood construction by the German aviation industry late in World War II, the loss of the Goldschmitt Tego film factory in Wuppertal, in a Royal Air Force nighttime bombing raid, meant the acidic replacement adhesives available were too corrosive to the materials being bonded, and the wooden portions tended to fail.

Production was eventually cancelled to concentrate on Bf 109Gs in August 1944, after 1,160 Me 410s had been built, the month after the Jägernotprogramm had gone into effect.

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This text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License
Source : Article Messerschmitt Me 210 of Wikipedia ( authors )

Specifications (Me 210)

  • Crew : 2 (Pilot and gunner).
  • Length : 11.20 m (or 36 ft 8 in).
  • Height : 4.30 m (or 14 ft).
  • Wingspan : 16.40 m (or 53 ft 7 in).
  • Wing area : 36.2 m² (or 390 ft²).
  • Empty weight : 5,440 kg (or 12,000 lb).
  • Max takeoff weight : 8,100 kg (or 18,000 lb).
  • Maximum speed : 620 km/h (or 335 knots or 385 mph).
  • Combat radius : 2,400 km (or 1,300 nm or 1,500 mi).
  • Service ceiling : 7,000 m (or 23,000 ft).
  • Powerplant : Two Daimler-Benz DB 601F liquid-cooled inverted V12 engines.
  • Power : 1,332 hp (or 993 kW) each.
  • Armament : Two 20 mm (0.787 in) MG 151/20 canons, two 7.92 mm (or 0.31 in) MG 17 machine gun, two 13 mm (or 0.512 in) MG 131 machine gun (rear armament) and 1,000 kg (or 2,200 lb) of bombs.

Specifications (Me 410 A-1)

  • Crew : 2 (Pilot and gunner)
  • Length : 12.4 m (40 ft 8-3/16 in)
  • Height : 3.7 m (12 ft 2-5/8 in)
  • Wingspan : 16.39 m (53 ft 9-1/4 in)
  • Wing area : 36.20 m² (390 ft²)
  • Empty weight : 6,150 kg (13,558 lb)
  • Max. takeoff weight : 10,760 kg (23,721 lb)
  • Maximum speed : 624 km/h (388 mph)
  • Range : 2,300 km (1,400 mi)combat
  • Service ceiling : 10,000 m (32,800 ft)
  • Climb to 6,000 m (19,680 ft) : 10.7 min

  • Powerplant : Two Daimler-Benz DB 603A liquid-cooled V12 engine
  • Power : 1,750 PS (1,726 hp, 1,287 kW) each
  • Armament : Two 7.92 mm (.312 in) MG 17 machine guns with 1,000 rpg, firing forward, two 20 mm MG 151/20 cannons with 350 rpg, firing forward, two 13 mm (.51 in) MG 131 machine guns with 500 rpg, each firing rearward from FDSL 131/1B remote-operated turret, one per side. Bombs : up to 1,000 kg (2,204 lb) of disposable stores

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This text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License
Source : Article Messerschmitt Me 410 of Wikipedia ( authors )
Messerschmitt Me 210 & 410 Hornisse : Your comments on this subject
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    All comments are subject to moderation and will be published only if they comply with the basic rules of decorum, while remaining relevant to the purpose of this site.

    The third tab allows you to enter comments on the shown topic and is bilingual. Personal anecdotes, supplements and other information questions will take place here.

    The "Story" tab shows the explanatory texts. They are most often taken from Wikipedia, a site where we participate regularly.

    The "Data" tab is reserved for list of features and specifications.

    Right menus

    On a smartphone, the lack of space is growing and this menu is moved to the bottom of the page to give priority to videos and pictures.

    The top right icons are links to videos posted by third parties (on their own responsabilities) or by ourselves. The link below these icons will take you to the channel of the one who posted the video. Feel free to suggest other videos if you think they are of some interest (Use the BLOG button or the "Contact" link).