Messerschmitt Me 163

The Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet ( Comet ) was the first (and the last) operational Avion-fusée of hunting. It required a long development and entered the war in a way very only limited in 1944.

Design

Before the beginning of the Second world war, Hellmuth Walter had started to try out the use of Hydrogen peroxide like fuel for various engines. This product was particularly well adapted to the propulsion of rockets since it ignited (actually, it only breaks up) while passing through a metal Catalyseur. That means that one could produce an engine with only one pump and a tube of ejection filled of a metal net with fine meshs.

The instability of the Combustion in the combustion chamber did not make it possible however to carry out sufficiently powerful solutions with large scales to propel a plane. Although a certain number of Missile S and devices of acceleration by auxiliary rocket engines were carried out according to this concept, any plane based on this principle was to be extremely light. In parallel, consumption while carburizing was so high that the aircraft was to have a reserve of big size.

It is there that Alexander Lippisch intervened. He had studied during years the principle of the Planeur S without tail thus with more massive wings, for which he proposed later to use the rocket engines of Walter. Without to have conceived the principle of it itself, its argumentation was that a plane with the squater and collected fuselage could offer a more important interior volume while having an aerodynamic trail comparable with that of a conventional fuselage. The combination of the engine of Walter and the sailplane of Lippisch of big size made it possible to Germany to carry out powerful a Fighter plan even if it had only one short range.

The studies started under the auspice of the German institute of research on sailplanes DFS ( Deutsche Forschungsanstalt für Segelflug ) then passed then to Messerschmitt.

Engagements

The operations started in 1944 with a unit created especially, the JG 400. As envisaged, the plane was simply untouchable and during a time the allied fighter pilots could not what make. As for the turrets of the bombers, they did not turn rather quickly to follow it. In fact the plane went up more quickly than the adversaries did not go down to intercept it. But its high speed posed the problem that there was no sufficiently fast really effective weapon to cut down the bomber before exceeding it: the pilot did not have time to aim!

Quickly, the allied pilots very noticed time court of the flight with the ignited engine. They waited simply and, as soon as the engine had died out, they attacked it. In addition, they identified the grounds from where it operated, and started to draw to him above after the landing. More planes were lost than it was not possible to train pilots, also a wide-area network of Me 163 could not it exist.

The improvements related to a cockpit allowing a better visibility and pressurized but the Soviet forces took the factory and the engineers were requisitioned for the research department MiG.

With the operational direction, Komet was a failure. More were lost in accidents with the landing that there were shot down bombers, only 16. But at the same time it was a design which opened a way towards the future and showed that the period of the hunters with propeller finished. Soon its role would be taken again by the ground-to-air missiles.

Alternatives

Me 163A

The first model 163A appeared to Me in 1941 but the engines were then not ready and tended to explode, also could it fly only like sailplane. However, between two mishaps, the performance was clearly untouchable and of the plans were established to install squadrons in Germany everywhere.

Five prototypes were built, followed by eight apparatuses of production.

Me 163B

However Walter had started to work on new a driving heat which added a fuel of Hydrazine hydrates and Méthanol, under the name C-Stoff , which burned with the exhaust rich in oxygen to add push. What resulted in slightly modified Me 163B from at the end of 1941. Again the engine appeared lack development and it would occur still two years before being able to pass to tests beta.

As good as was the performance, it was as obvious as the 163 was a plane rather not very practical. Based on a sailplane, the plane landed on a shoe placed under the fuselage. That could go for a slow aircraft but it was not the case with the 163. The landings were so hard that the pilot suffered from wounds to the back and that it was enough to very little to make it hood ( wooden horse ). In addition, if the pilot managed to be posed suitably, the plane remained motionless in the middle of the field while waiting to be towed. Another problem was the time of flight of only eight minutes to full power what made only one interceptor of it and anything else. Moreover, carburizing it used was extremely corrosive: it happened that following a brutal landing and of an escape of the tank in the cockpit, a pilot either dissolves alive…

Nevertheless the plane was incredible in vol. After takeoff starting from a releasable carriage, it reached 300 km/h in end of track from where it went up with an angle of 80º until the altitude of the bomber and even if need be reaching 12 000 m in less than three minutes. Arrived there, it accelerated with more than 800 km/h what no allied plane could hope for to equalize.

Two prototypes were followed by thirty planes of production armed with machine-guns of 20mm Mauser MG 151 and four hundreds with two guns MK 108 of 30 Misters Several specimens were equipped with the system of vertical shooting per electric eye Schräge Musik .

Me 163S

The 163S was to Me a version of drive under-motorized with a second cockpit for the instructor.

Me 163C

Me 163C was conceived to overcome the limitations of operating range of the preceding model. It had a new narrower fuselage and an engine with two combustion chambers, for takeoff and the rise, and another less powerful thus least greedy for the flight of cruising, but three specimens were only built.

Me 163D

The 163D was larger to Me than Me 163C. It was built by adding sections to the fuselage to have more autonomy. It also had a conventional three-wheeled train. Only one was built as prototype for the Messerschmitt Me 263 (famous Junkers Ju 248 when this company took the project).

Other characteristics

Reconstitution in the form of sailplane:

See too

List of the military aircrafts

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