Dornier do17 E/F M/P over England, Nose glazing ID

Once again, Thanks for all the suggestions here. I will try to clear a couple of things up . . .

It is definitely two plastic layers, each about 2-3mm thick, they look to have been bonded with a resin of some sort

The ‘possible wire and plate’ seen at the 2 o’clock position is in fact a modern paper ID label with string – there were no wires that i remember

It was found in the middle of a field when crops were being harvested by hand – there are a few crash sites near by but it doesn’t belong to any of the aircraft that are known to have crashed locally. There was lots of aerial combat over this area in early to mid WW2 – i have many eyewitnesses that confirm this

Nearest German crashes are (South) He111 and Ju88 at Bishops Stortford. (North) Ju88 at Ashwell and Dornier 217 at Orwell (from which i have a BMW engine) it doesn’t match any of them.

It could easily have dropped from an aircraft that continued on it’s way without it – happened everyday in wartime!

I could list all the aircraft that i know it didn’t come from – But i suspect it would take a few pages!

I’m not grabbing at straws to make it Luftwaffe, I simply couldn’t find a match for this thing on any of the contemporary allied aircraft that i looked at, British or US.

When i started checking Luftwaffe aircraft i saw a couple of potential matches in the noses of the earlier Do17s. I know very little about Luftwaffe aircraft so i figured the best option would be to appeal to help from the masses! I’ve seen some good suggestions, not all Luftwaffe –

aeronut suggested Wellington MKV. I have to confess that i had never even seen one until i looked it up yesterday but it does have a similar bubble for the cockpit area. I was unable to find and really decent pics online to look further into it.

CeBro – As far as i am aware the B-29s didn’t make it over here until after the war, though i believe they were based locally at Bassingbourn with B-50s so not an impossibility. Its the dates that trouble me there.

I’m intrigued by the suggestion that it could be some sort of radome or nightfighter related device. I hadn’t thought of that, which is exactly why these forums are a great place to throw ideas around!

I am seeing a Chap tomorrow who lives a few doors up from the lady that owns it (i believe her mother found it). I’m going to see if i can get access to the thing, possibly even borrow it for a week or two and do some proper research.

I just can’t let it go on being a mystery and i feel that if i don’t make the effort to try and solve it now, perhaps nobody ever will! I’m not bothered if it is Luftwaffe, RAF, or US, or even if its post war and somebody got their stories mixed up (though i have no reason to think this the case)! The main thing is to know for sure and to put a label with the thing correctly identifying it.

Any further suggestions will be gratefully received and i will do my best to get some more solid info up on size, shape, construction etc, as soon as i can!

Joeslacks

Clutching at straws is part of the fun..!

There must be some reason behind it being originally identified as Do17 though- or at broadest I suppose “a German aircraft”, whether it’s correct or not. From joeslacks description it’s obviously not directly from a crash site: I wonder what crashes occurred in the slightly wider area.

Like pogno – I was wondering if it is actually symmetrical: could just be the angle, but the curve seems shallower on the left of the photo. I would imagine the dark material is probably dirt from it’s greenhouse years. The “wire” too looks like something horticultural: I was also wondering if the lower layer of plastic visible in the larger broken area is actually some sort of later patch – though the damage does look consistent with the upper layer.

Isn’t the lower aircraft as Do 215, going by the engines?

I’m not convinced that the dome is the right shape for a searchlight lens, and that we seem to be grabbing at straws to try and make it Luftwaffe when the actual likelihood appears negligible. Not that I’ve any better idea.

One further thought on the Do17… some of the Z’s were converted into nightfighters with a solid nose containing some sort of infra-red searchlight affair in the nose… as below.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]244164[/ATTACH]

If it were something like that, might that possible explain why it’s doubled skinned? I really don’t know a lot about it – so could be miles off the mark. I think the German intruder units were operating over the UK by 1941 though?

There was a different one as well, the Do 17 Z-10 “Kauz II” nightfighter. IMHO the nose of the one in your pic and the one on the pic below might both fit. Maybe someone knows if the nose glass in front of the infrared device might / should have been two layers?? It now depends on the diameter….

[ATTACH=CONFIG]244170[/ATTACH]

Michael

It is intriguing as to what this dome is. From the picture I have a number of questions.

1. Is it symmetrical, not really sure from the image.
2. Is it made from what appears to be two thin layers. How thick are the layers.
3. What is the black stuff, is it earth or some sort of filler that has turned black near the breaks and still opaque in the remainder.
4. Is that a small metal plate and a wire in the two o’clock position.

Could it be an early form of radome, made from plastic/perspex to allow the passage of radar waves.
If it was designed to be strong enough to withstand cabin pressure one of the layers would need to be fairly strong, this doesnt appear to be that strong.
Would a 1940’s radome be double skinned?

Richard

The diameter should narrow things down a bit. There should be part numbers somewhere on it too. The method of attachment (brackets, etc) should also narrow it down as well.

Maybe it is just an astrodome which fell off an overflying aircraft?

Anon.

Recovered during WW2 and possibly from a pressurised aircraft. Could it be from a Wellington MkV?

One further thought on the Do17… some of the Z’s were converted into nightfighters with a solid nose containing some sort of infra-red searchlight affair in the nose… as below.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]244164[/ATTACH]

If it were something like that, might that possible explain why it’s doubled skinned? I really don’t know a lot about it – so could be miles off the mark. I think the German intruder units were operating over the UK by 1941 though?

As it looks to be double glazed I again would suggest a pressurized aircraft, the sighting bubble as used on the B29 springs to mind.
Cees

Thanks again for all the input here. I’m not so convinced on the idea of it being Dornier, The nearest match seems to be Dorniers that apparently wern’t flying over England. It doesn’t appear to have the straight edges seen on the M/P variant. Any other contenders? I looked at so many ww2 Aircraft but very few have a one piece Dome like this. I can confirm that it was found in a field during early WW2 and it came from an Aircraft of some description.
I do remember it being quite a shallow depth considering the diameter which is why it looked odd to me and intrigued me . The picture doesn’t show too well and it was a few years ago since i’ve seen it.

I reckon the only way to take this further is if i go and measure the thing properly and take some decent photographs! Unless anybody recognizes this one piece type Dome from any other aircraft that would have been operating over North Hertfordshire/Essex border during WW2? I’m running out of clues!

If I am not mistaken if there aren’t the flat sections on the edge on the perspex dome then a Do17 source can be pretty much ruled out as the earlier Es and F’s wouldn’t have been flown over England.

If there are, its great find.

However, the dome does to me having another look, seem to be too deep to be Do17 nose glazing.

A P-variant over the UK certainly happened, as it was the Luftwaffe’s dedicated PR aircraft of the time. The M was the equivalent bomber, considered obsolescent and farmed out to Bulgaria, Romania. The E (bomber) and F (PR) variants would only be in training establishments by the outbreak of war. Unless someone knows differently, of course, but they’d have been considered very vulnerable.

IMHO the perspex in the pics is much flatter en probably has a larger circumference.
Could be lens distortion though.
Cees

I think the P also had straight edges at the bottom… see attached image from the same site mentioned above

[ATTACH=CONFIG]244117[/ATTACH]

It seems it was possible to remove the nose glazing . . .

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Thanks for the response so far. I was thinking along the same lines as Mahone/Supermarine305. Canberra nose is more pointed and besides, it’s way out of the dates given. The Pre – Z series Dornier was the nearest looking nose glazing that i have managed to find so far. This Pic is apparently a Do17E, you can see that the nose piece is round all the way to the bottom, no flat parts. I havent found a decent pic of an M or P yet to compare. Does anybody know if they double skinned those noses?

>> It also would appear to have a (black?) beading of some sort running around the outside – similar to the relic in my first pic

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Early Dornier D017s such as the E/F/M and P series looked fairly similar and had entirely different front sections to the more familiar Z series.
And that perspex dome does look to be of similar shape. But that is all I can say on it.

I think some P series were used on Recon flights over the Uk early in the war too (?).

[ATTACH=CONFIG]244105[/ATTACH]

[st]But looking closely there are some straight edges at the bottom where the nose fits into the chin glazing. I can’t see that on the artifact above.[/st]

Edit: Looks to me like those straight edges weren’t on the E (and presumably F) series.

Edit: Bah, ninja’d.

Lots of early Do17’s do have a similar looking roundy-bit at the extreme nose…

[ATTACH=CONFIG]244106[/ATTACH]

From here… lots more images too…

http://www.network54.com/Forum/394728/message/1341795814/The+Dornier+Do+17+%93Bacalao%94+in+Spanish+skies+part+1

[ATTACH=CONFIG]244107[/ATTACH]

Looks double glazed, pressure cabin (Canberra perhaps) ?
Cees

Not Dornier 17 as that had like a glasshouse nose