Me262 Conspiracy (sorry)

dhfan
Ooops! You’re correct. (I’ve edited it now)

One interesting thing is that the centrifugal compressor had a long life in small turboprops – the PT6 f.ex.

There was also a question of priorities aswell as the amount of raw material available.Some of the metals needed for the high temperature areas of jet engines (Nickel,Tungsten etc) were already much in demand for the barrels of artillery pieces and the like,so not only was there very little of the stuff to go round,but it had to be shared between the various war industries.

Atc pal, I think you mean Eric Brown, not the bloke that sang Fire.

Never heard of the Germans stealing alloy specs, although that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. However, they had severe shortages of many materials towards the end of the war and I believe chromium was one of the worst. If they hadn’t got any, they couldn’t put it in. Suspect it was manganese, not magnesium too. Nickel is often used in high temperature alloys and I don’t think they’d got much of that either.

Bah, beaten to it!

Evnin all,
Early jet engines is a fascinating area I’m not really well qualified to comment on, however, sabotage aside, and v558’s point too, the Germans were running short of ALL strategic materials by the latter stages of the war, so even without the best efforts of the sabouters, they were in a technical hole.

Ironically the centrifugal flow engines the British and Americans were using was much simpler to make and run, though a dead end in longer term development terms; so the Germand should’ve had ‘British’ style engines and the British would’ve been better equipped to make decent axial flow ‘German’ style ones!

Whittle was certain that he could’ve had jet fighters in service in 1940 without the obstruction, stupidity etc of the those he needed support from – now there’s a thought. Equally, if Heinkel hadnt been detested by the RLM, the Germans would have had the He280 in service in 1943, possibly earlier (I think) – a very different war. Imagine raving about the hero of 1940, the Gloster ‘Reaper’ rather than that tired ol’ Spitfire saga…

And for Flood, master of the digression – ‘Sabotage’ actually means sticking the clog in – wacking your wooden footware (a ‘sabot’ into the machine… French, circa industrial revolution…)

Cheers

262 engine ‘s

im sure the engine problems of the 262 at first was the fact that the germans stole the wrong alloy paper work plans from the british was something to do with the magnieseum alloy we had invented and the german spies got the wrong ones they was not putting the right ammount of chrome in to the alloy .

May also explain the incredible short lifetimes of Jumo 004 engines (axial). 25 hours total and a full overhaul every 10 hours.

What was the life of early RR Derwents (centrifugal) in the Meteor?

When Eric! Brown ferried Arado Ar 234 from here to Farnborough after the war, German technicians (POW’s) serviced the aircraft. One of the engines blew up running up for take off. “One” had put nuts and bolts in the intake. The offender was soon ferreted out and taken off flight line duties.

I must say that sabotaging German military equipment was terribly risky. Respect – with a modern word!

Roy Nesbit (navigator Beauforts) told of lights shining towards them from blacked out France. “Morsing” V for victory. In Aer*plane many years ago one woman answered: “You really saw us!”

Originally posted by turbo_NZ
I also read that the forced workers used to urinate in the glue pots used for bonding German wooden aircraft together, in particular the He-162 Jet. It was believed that may have contributed to the prototype’s wing break-up in mid-air.

My Grandfather used to do that too. “We were forced to work for the people who fought those who came to liberate us, being not entirely productive helped us feel a bit better about it.” He was a forced labourer in Germany from the fall of 1944 onwards.

I’ve heard a story of a bomber crew making it back to base even though they had taken some direct hits from anti-aircraft shells which failed to go off. When they got back they located some of these unexploded shells and opened them up to find hand written notes inside saying “this is all we can do”.

Ive read about other instances of the same thing happening but with artilery shells. I think it was shindlers factory in checkaslovakia that prodused the shells.

Bograt,
If I recall correctly, it was the Me163 under restoration at Duxford a few years back by the Black 6 team.

I’ve heard a story of a bomber crew making it back to base even though they had taken some direct hits from anti-aircraft shells which failed to go off. When they got back they located some of these unexploded shells and opened them up to find hand written notes inside saying “this is all we can do”.

Shindlers List is worth watching for this sort of thing.

I read somewhere that during the restoration of a Luftwaffe machine that had been built by forced labour in France, a written message was found on a piece of structure..

“Ma coeur est en chomage”

translates as ‘My heart’s not in this’

A small protest compared with some, but direct action was not always possible.

the V2’s were sabotaged. The workers would urinate on the circuit boards which i think would corrode the boards over a time, thus being unoticable at first if they were inspected

I hope Dr Franz washed his hands afterwards:D

I also read that the forced workers used to urinate in the glue pots used for bonding German wooden aircraft together, in particular the He-162 Jet. It was believed that may have contributed to the prototype’s wing break-up in mid-air.

Wasn’t just confined to Me262 engines, all sorts ‘occupied’ production had attempts of sabotage.
It’s a known fact that the Belgian workforce at the FN plant were quite successful at sabotaging the production of the Browning Hi-Power pistol that the Germans wanted continued after the fall of Belguim in 1940. Even today it’s still advice that a unknown Nazi marked Hi-Power should be inspected by a gunsmith before attempting firing……:eek:

wasn’t it the V2 engines that were abotaged? seem to remember from TV prog?

Neil.