Need ID of this Bf110 with 10 victory tabs
 

Hello,

Can anyone ID this Bf110, which seller describes as a nightfighter with W.Nr. 2638 and the code ??+FM. It carries 10 victory tabs.

http://www.ebay.de/itm/Foto-Me-110-N...item43b35deb00

This is probably outside the limits of the EoE Project (31.12.40), but I want to be sure before I ignore it.

Who can help ID this plane?

Regards,

Larry Hickey
EoE Project Coordinator

Re: Need ID of this Bf110 with 10 victory tabs
 

2638 find 2 times in our Database:

24.09.1940 4./ZG76 "Bruchlandung infolge Jägerbeschuß" Abbevile -Drucat damage 10%
Pilot not given WOp Uffz. Kühn, Otto WIA

02.10.1941 22./So.St.(GS) near Orscha "Absturz infolge Flakbeschuß" damage 100%
Fw. Marks.- KIA Uffz. Hellmuth, Wilhelm DOW

both times no markings.

khorat
Michael Balss

Re: Need ID of this Bf110 with 10 victory tabs
 

Hi.

Markings fit 4./ZG 76

Individual aircraft letter White F - (1., 4., 7. etc Staffel before Gruppe expansions)

Staffel letter M = 4. Staffel

My first bet would be that this is a 4./ZG 76 aircraft from the autumn 1940 - as indicated by the September 1940 incident also.

Regards,
Andreas B

Re: Need ID of this Bf110 with 10 victory tabs
 

Larry,

this seems to be the aircraft of Oblt. Walter Borchers, who had achieved his 10th victory an 11.Sep.40. All other pilots of 4./ZG 76 were less successfull until that date.

Re: Need ID of this Bf110 with 10 victory tabs
 

Hello,

The W.Nr. and the "FM" of the code are not in dispute, but what bothers me about this image is the absence of any shark's mouth design on the nose. I suppose that this could be a newly assigned a/c that in the heat of operations during the Battle of Britain had not yet had this applied.

I have another series of photos of a fairly badly crashed M8+FM, WNr.3129, a C-2 that I think crashed near Zisserheim Germany on 12.5.40, Lt. Otto Krause killed. There would have probably have had to have been another replacement lost between then and this a/c to explain the absence of a shark's mouth nose on this a/c. WNr. 2638 was manufactured clear back in Nov., 1939, so I'm wondering how this gets to be a newly assigned a/c to a top ace of the time in Sept., 1940.

Anybody have any opinion about all this?

Regards,

Larry Hickey
EoE Project Coordinator

Re: Need ID of this Bf110 with 10 victory tabs
 

Larry,
Any number of reasons. More a/c than pilots? Clapped out engines (Rudolf Franke & Wilhelm Schaefer had interesting tales to tell about that!), so not used until absolutely necessary. C-4s on charge, so C-2s not used unless as a last resort?

Perhaps not so much newly assigned, as re-assigned.