BF 109 K4

Hi F-4B,

thanks that was a fast answer. So iam richer of informations belonging the K-4. And what i like there are the BNrs.

Great.

S!

Hi F-4B,

 

thanks that was a fast answer. So iam richer of informations belonging the K-4. And what i like there are the BNrs.

Great.

 

S!

No problem; Wolowski's book is an excellent source of information on all of the late model 109s (G-5 and G-6/AS, G-14, G-10 and K-4) - the profiles alone should provide lots of information for those who will want to develop new skins for their rides.

No problem; Wolowski's book is an excellent source of information on all of the late model 109s (G-5 and G-6/AS, G-14, G-10 and K-4)

I would seriously doubt that being an "excellent source" given that they have a wrong number (1200) onthe total production K-4 - the real number was in the order of 1600-1700.

Janda and Poruba's books are far more reccommendable on G-10 and K-4 IMO, its fresh, extensive and original research. Prien - Rodeike's 109F-K also, and on the plus side, it also covers all mid-late war 109s in good detail.

I would seriously doubt that being an "excellent source" given that they have a wrong number (1200) onthe total production K-4 - the real number was in the order of 1600-1700.

 

Janda and Poruba's books are far more reccommendable on G-10 and K-4 IMO, its fresh, extensive and original research. Prien - Rodeike's 109F-K also, and on the plus side, it also covers all mid-late war 109s in good detail.

Gotta agreed here about JaPo books, also some color choices in Wolowski's book profiles are questionable at least. Still, it's good book and contains many nice profiles too.

I would seriously doubt that being an "excellent source" given that they have a wrong number (1200) onthe total production K-4 - the real number was in the order of 1600-1700.

 

Janda and Poruba's books are far more reccommendable on G-10 and K-4 IMO, its fresh, extensive and original research. Prien - Rodeike's 109F-K also, and on the plus side, it also covers all mid-late war 109s in good detail.

I agree that JaPo (Janda and Poruba) books are an excellent source, so its interesting to note that their Messerschmitt Bf 109K page 83 says "Real number of 109Ks produced in all variants...estimated at least 1200 machines" which is presumably where Wolowski's book got its information from. In addition JaPo states that 109 production ended in late March 1945:

Why diss Wolowski when he repeats information from the same source Kurfurst recommends so highly?

The only source of information which says 1,600-1,700 K-4s might have been built is Prien and Rodeike (1996) who state "...534 were delivered by November 1944 and it may be assumed another 1,200 machines had been built by the end of the war" (which implies late April to early May):

In other words the figure of 1,600-1,700 is an assumption, not a proven fact.

Compounding the confusion, Radinger & Otto in Messerschmitt Bf 109F-K: Development, Testing, Production (2000) show that 856 K-4s were built by the end of 1944, after which confirmed numbers are not available:

Is there any substantive evidence that Radinger & Otto, or Wolowski and JaPo are wrong and Prien and Rodeike are right?

How is it possible to state definitively that 1600 -1700 K-4s were built when none of the best available published sources agree?

A person on the 12 O'Clock board researched K-4 neubau production. He came up with a number of 1242.

Sept 15

Oct 293

Nov 221

Dec 325

Jan 338

Feb 23+3

Mar 16+8

Not sure what the last 2 entries mean.

1944 neubau production comes to 854.

I will argue about FMs and other silly topics pertaining to "realism," but diving into the murky waters of 1944-45 German aircraft production data is one vice I do not have.

:D

A person on the 12 O'Clock board researched K-4 neabau production. He came up with a number of 1242.

 

Sept 15

Oct 293

Nov 221

Dec 325

Jan 338

Feb 23+3

Mar 16+8

 

Not sure what the last 2 entries mean.

 

1944 neabau production comes to 854.

Neabau? Guess you mean "Neubau"?

I've just ordered Peter Schmoll's Nest of Eagles http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nest-Eagles-Messerschmitt-Production-Flight-testing/dp/1906537127 which concentrates on Messerschmitt Regensburg's production and flight testing 1936-'45. Should be an interesting read. :book:

Is there any substantive evidence that Radinger & Otto, or Wolowski and JaPo are wrong and Prien and Rodeike are right?

 

How is it possible to state definitively that 1600 -1700 K-4s were built when none of the best available published sources agree?

Because subsequent research found the exact number accepted by BAL (LWs quality control /acceptence group), do no need for assumption. Priens work preceeded that reasearch and was probably not available, but the various numbers given by authors up to November/December 1944 match up with these.

Even Jochen Prien himself participated in that thread.

Dear ArtieBob,

 

you are right - when we put together the Bf 109 F - K some 12 or more years ago we had only fragments of the C-Amts Listen at our disposal which helped a great deal but also left some questions unanswered.

See this thread, it has all the numbers.

http://forum.12oclockhigh.net/showthread.php?t=2462&page=2

"There are two sources for this data, C-AMT Monatsmeldung and the Gen .Qu.(6 Abt.III C) Flugzeugverteilung for various months from Jan 44 to Mar 45. The data as far as I can tell represents neubau Flugzeug accepted by the Luftwaffe (which would mean after flight test acceptance by BAL). "

This gives the following numbers for Mtt Regensburg:

[TABLE]Date Fact Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Total

K 4 Mttr 15 293 221 325 338 233 168 1593[/TABLE]

Note that Milosh's 1945 numbers appearantly have a typo for the 1945 months (the "+" sign).

So 1593 K-4s were accepted until the end of March 1945, probably a finite or close to finite number as most factories were overrun in April 1945, inc. Erla.

There may be a slight variation between built/accepted numbers, as BAL did not necessarily accept all produced planes if it did not live up to specs within tolerance, though in practice they usually did in the end, if corrections were made to the product.

JaPo also has a fate-list for many 109K, this goes as far as WNr. 335 215, so pretty much the very end of the known/allocated 1910 K-4 Werknummers for Regensburg (sans Erla, which may have built a couple in April).

So I diss Wolowski because he is clearly wrong - the book seems to be based entirely on secondary sources (ie. synthetizing the already published JaPo and Prien books), and no or very little primary research was done. Such approach is always prone to errors.

Out of curiosity it is perhaps worth to mention that the original K-2 (MG 151 armament) was skipped, and apparently they have decided to produce the hybrid G-10 instead, as the G-10s were allocated the serial numbers originally meant for the K-2s.

@Lord Pyro,

Neubau means "new production" or literally, "new build". It meant planes that were built from scratch ie. were totally new and not conversions/rebuilds ("Umbau") of older planes to new standards, for example an old G-6 rebuilt as a G-14.

As seen in the attachment, production essentially switched to high altitude 109s in the automn of 1944 (G10, K-4, /AS types). Note that data for early /AS conversions from early 1944 are missing, since most of those were Umbau.

Excellent, we have unpublished information from private research, on an eight year old thread in a private website to give us all the required information, which suggests that about 1,600, but not 1,700, K-4s were built:

the documents used are "C-AMT Monatsmeldung and the Gen .Qu.(6 Abt.III C) Flugzeugverteilung" http://forum.12oclockhigh.net/showpost.php?p=11709&postcount=11 , noting that none of them have been reproduced on any dedicated 109 websites, nor has the information as yet been repeated in books: those who do not know about this one thread will have no idea where the information might have come from. It is encouraging that John Beaman, who is a credible researcher and author, has confirmed the documents and that Jochen Prien would like to update the F-K illustrated study, although still tied up with the JFV work.

It'll be interesting to see what primary source documents the author of Nest of Eagles has used - hopefully he will have consulted the same documents and came up with the same or similar numbers.

"noting that none of them have been reproduced on any dedicated 109 websites"

These would be?

I am not that an expert on different aircraft. But isn't p-51D a bit outclassed by 109k? P51D is powered by 1700s hp engine while weighting for 3+tons empty but 109k has 1800s hp engine and weigh only 2+ tons. In terms of raw max speed, rate of climb and turn performance, I'd bet 109k is above p51D. However, due to different variants, I am not sure about p51D20na, 25na and 30na performance. Do they have a bit better engine? packwood-9 instead of -7 on early D models?

As always it depends on the pilots. In terms of raw enginepower the mustang would not be able to rival either the Kurfürst 4 nor the Dora 9 or TA 152. But there are so many factors involved...

8th AF P-51s were using 150 fuel which put out ~2000hp.

Now I know someone will chime in about the 1.98ata K-4s but there was only a penny pocket number of these a/c and only showed up in the last few weeks of the war in Europe.

"noting that none of them have been reproduced on any dedicated 109 websites"

These would be?

There's this one: http://109lair.hobbyvista.com/index1024.htm

or this: http://www.messerschmitt-bf109.de/

this: http://www.virtualpilots.fi/feature/articles/109myths/

another one: http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/LRG/bf109.html

one more: http://kurfurst.org/

there's even a facebook site: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Messerschmitt-Bf-109/31014345089

There's this one: http://109lair.hobbyvista.com/index1024.htm

or this: http://www.messerschmitt-bf109.de/

this: http://www.virtualpilots.fi/feature/articles/109myths/

another one: http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/LRG/bf109.html

one more: http://kurfurst.org/

there's even a facebook site: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Messerschmitt-Bf-109/31014345089

With the exception of possibly Kurfurst's site, none of the sites listed give any production figures for any version of the 109. The 109lair site hasn't been updated for six years. Curious as to why, other than K's site, you think they have any credibility concerning production figures or the 109 for that matter? Also why. if these 12OCH figures had been listed by these sites you'd think they'd become more credible?

With the exception of possibly Kurfurst's site, none of the sites listed give any production figures for any version of the 109. The 109lair site hasn't been updated for six years.

My point was, and still is: the only place in which those particular production figures for the Bf 109K-4 can be found is on one eight year old thread on a members only website, otherwise they are unavailable on any normal internet search, which includes various websites dedicated to the 109.

Curious as to why, other than K's site, you think they have any credibility concerning production figures or the 109 for that matter? Also why. if these 12OCH figures had been listed by these sites you'd think they'd become more credible?

Not that I implied anywhere that listing the 12OHC figures would have either increased or diminished the credibility of 109 websites...

So I diss Wolowski because he is clearly wrong - the book seems to be based entirely on secondary sources (ie. synthetizing the already published JaPo and Prien books), and no or very little primary research was done. Such approach is always prone to errors.

Grumbling about using Wolowski, based on that argument, is a nonsense, because, looking at JaPo's Messerschmitt Bf 109K sources the only primary source materials used were 109K-4 and DB 605 handbooks, otherwise their work was also based entirely on secondary sources (ie; Hitchcock, Prien & Rodieke and John Beaman, etc) with little or no primary research:

as ArtieBob said http://forum.12oclockhigh.net/showpost.php?p=11709&postcount=11

"Kurfurst-I frankly don’t care what the Japo 109K book says, where did they get their information?...I have simply tabulated data from two primary sources."

New info from Peter Schmoll's Nest of Eagles http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nest-Eagles-Messerschmitt-Production-Flight-testing/dp/1906537127

K-4s built 1944 = 857 then

Jan '45 = 338

Feb '45 = 233

Sub Tot= 1,428 Plus

Mar '45 = 204 109s including G-14/AS W.Nrs = 787453 - 787524 built Cham 3/45 = 71 = 133 K-4s

Apr '45 penciled note stating 50 additional 109s built, probably all K-4:

Total = 1,428 plus 183 = 1,611

(pages 77 & 159)

Known 109K-4 W.Nrs (page 175); cf the ones from Wolowski which are the same as in Prien & Rodeike:

330105 - 330491

330917

331325 - 331510

332247 - 332998

333876 - 333995

334060 - 334263

335170 - 335210

For now these numbers are as definitive as they're likely to get, meaning the research by ArtieBob was almost spot on. :thumbup:

Schmoll's book is well worth having and was originally printed in German in 2002 as Messerschmitt-Giganten und der Fliegerhorst Regensburg-Obertraubling 1936-1945

followed in 2004 by

Die Messerschmitt-Werke im Zweiten-Weltkrieg

both published by MZ Buchverlag GmbH. Regensburg.

What about the ones built in a tunnel factory in Czechoslavakia?

What about the ones built in a tunnel factory in Czechoslavakia?

Any idea of how many were built? I take it you have properly documented info, so why not add it to the discussion? If you can, thanks - I look forward to seeing another piece of the puzzle being put in place. :thumbup:

I am still trying to figure out what "built Cham 3/45 = 71 = 133 K-4s" means. It appears to be Mr. Webb's own conclusion on the number built, not Schmoll's and it is of course at odds with the numbers reported by C-Amt/Gen .Qu.(6 Abt.III C) Flugzeugverteilung at the time (168) for March 1945. The other figures reported by Schmoll agree with the numbers put forwards by ArtieBoB perfectly.

It may be a case though that the difference is caused by not accounting for the Erla production (obviously, as the numbers presented are for Regensburg only).

Well at least we can surely put now "Wolowski's 1200" to rest, though I do wonder where that came from - probably a transcription error from Prien/Rodeike, which sometimes happen with tertiary sources synthetizing secondary sources, but not having access to the primary sources themselves, as in case of Janda/Poruba, Prien/Rodeike etc.

In addition to the production lists:

Schmoll also made some interesting observations about the production difficulties being experienced by late 1944:

I think an understanding should be garnered, that for any given subject the end result derived from the internet returns as inconclusive...

god forbid that there's someone on the internet who is wrong :music_whistling: