[INM@RLM]

PART #4 of 7: DISTINGUISHING CHARACERISTICS OF THE Fw 200 C-5
Without a Flugzeugmuster Kennblatt for the C-5, or at very least the Ladeplan for the C-5, we cannot be completely sure what distinguished the Fw 200 C-5 sub-type. However, the defensive armament for both the C-5 and the C-5/U1 are set out in the ‘Baumuster-Übersicht Fw 200 C, Stand vom 20.II.1943’ and there the short description given for the C-5 is: Verstärkte Bewaffnung i. C.- u. Fensterstand = Reinforced armament in the C-Stand and Window positions. This is an unambiguous indication that the major changes all related to the aircraft's defensive armament. There is also good confirmatory photographic and operational evidence available to set alongside this. Taking these together, the picture they provide of the Fw 200 C-5 although it might still be incomplete in the fine detail, does I believe capture all of the key points.

Collecting together what we do know that is beyond reasonable doubt, the C-5 was a C-4 fitted with an improved D-Stand and Rumpfwanne nose in which - for the very first time in the operational evolution of the Fw 200 - a Lotfe D bombsight was fitted as STANDARD equipment. (So this did not happen in 1941 [fantasy] but only in 1943 [reality].) This version of the Lotfe enabled horizontal bombing of merchant shipping from medium-altitude with a degree of accuracy.
Armament in the lens-mount of the D-Stand where the bombsight was fitted, was also substantially upgraded. Instead of a MG 15 mounted excentrically in the plexiglas lens at the front of the mount, a MG 131 was mounted in the centre of the lens and this type of mounting was accompanied by a very distinctive external rectangular sheet-metal conduit running backwards beneath the D-Stand to a slanted aperture on the port side of the protruding bombsight fairing. This external channel running on the underside of the D-Stand guided ejected shell cases safely to one side of and away from the bombsight housing. The combination of prominent underside bombsight fairing, prominent underside channel for ejected cartridge cases and the centrally-mounted MG 131 are the key characteristics of the Fw 200 C-5 as well as of the subsequent C-6, C-8 sub-types and of the C-5/FK conversions.
In German documentation, the new D-Stand mount is described as MG 131 with L 151/1 (800 Schuß) (Linsen-lafette = lens mount). The FoWu document 'Focke Wulf Fw 200 F Fernaufklärer mit erhöhter Reichweite, 11 Mai 1943', confirms on Blatt 8 that this D-Stand installation was first introduced for the C-5, describing it as "wie bei C-5 angenommen" = "as adopted for the C-5".
All indications are that the fuel arrangements in the C-5 were exactly the same as those for the C-4, with a 540-litre self-sealing fuel tank (Voll geschützt) fitted as standard equipment in the forward bomb bay of the under-fuselage gondola (Rumpfwanne or Bodenwanne to the Luftwaffe). The main fuselage and wing tanks were all configured exactly as standardized at the start of C-series production.
The pattern aircraft (Musterflugzeug) for the C-5 subtype was Fw 200 C-4, W.Nr. 0114. This may be the aircraft pictured in the photo at p.201(mid lft) of Goss Classic, with a very short external conduit fitted below the D-Stand (forward gun position of the under-fuselage gondola).

The close-up reference photo for this new design of D-Stand is a superb Bundesarchiv photograph which has been reproduced in many different places, including: Ries: Bild 3 p.115(top); Salgado p.96(top) & Scutts p.89(btm). [In Ries: Bild 3 this was mis-captioned as "MG 131 in der Linsenlafette des A-Standes einer FW 200C-3/U2 beim KG 40." [This should have read: D-Stand not A-Stand and Fw 200 C-5 or later not Fw 200 C-3/U2]. Surprisingly however, this photo was not included in any of the three Goss publications on the Fw 200. Perhaps its significance was not appreciated? Most conveniently, the photograph also includes the beginnings of the W.Nr. painted on the fuselage underside just ahead of the D-Stand, conclusively confirming that this particular aircraft carried a 02?? Sequence Werk-Nummer.

The other changes documented in the Baumuster-Übersicht as definitely only first introduced with the Fw 200 C-5 were:
Armament in the C-Stand was upgraded from a KL15 (Kegel-lafette = conical mount) with MG 15 to the KL15 WL 131 with MG 131 and a single belt of 500 rounds.
Armament in the two F-Stände (Fensterstände = window positions in the fuselage waist, links u. rechts) was now upgraded from MG 15s to an MG 131 in a SL 15 (Schwenklafette = swivelling mount) each side, with a single belt of 500 Schuß.

We also know from the weight comparisons presented at Blatt 8 of 'Focke Wulf Fw 200 F Fernaufklärer mit erhöhter Reichweite, 11 Mai 1943', that an additional 32 kg of armour was fitted to the Fw 200 C-5, total armour increasing from 200 kg in the C-4 to 252 kg for the C-5. Previously the Fensterstände had been entirely unprotected. These now received 36 kg of armour plate, offset by a 5.1 kg saving in the C-Stand armouring and an even smaller adjustment in the B-Stand.
To offset the weight and the CG effect of armouring the Fensterstände and replacing MG 15s by MG 131s in all the rear gun positions we can deduce that the tailwheel retraction mechanism was now deleted. If the tailwheel is hanging down on a Condor in flight then this was definitely built as a C-5 (or later) sub-type. (For now this is an INM HYPOTHESIS – no documentary evidence yet.)
[As an aside, this is a very public demonstration of the painful choices that now had to be made to extend the service life of the Condor given the continuing absence of the Hertel Horror He 177. When RLM Delivery Plan, LP 22E, effective from 01-Oct-42, was put together production of the Fw 200 patrol bomber was to end in Dec-43. The Fw 200 would remain in production at the same rate of 6 per month but phasing in from Nov-43 all of these would now be delivered as transports. In the same period He 177 production was building up to a rate of 120 per month, and would run forward at that level beginning in Jan-44. See BA-MAL RL 3/1009 How things changed …]

Probably also characteristic of the Fw 200 C-5 was that aircraft of this and subsequent sub-types were all factory-fitted with the FuG 200 Hohentweil air-to-surface vessel search radar.

An excellent reference photo for the Fw 200 C-5 sub-type is the Bundesarchiv photo of W.Nr. 0218 (reference BA 482-2874-3A). This also has been widely reproduced, including: Ries: Bild 4 p.82(btm), Nowarra p.126(btm), Salgado p.95(btm), Goss Osprey p.57(btm) & Goss Classic p.223(top). In the 12OCH Errata for Sea Eagles this was identified as a Fw 200 C-6, but truth to tell, you cannot actually make this identification for sure since the HD 151 of the C-5's A-Stand is externally indistinguishable (or almost so) from the HD 151/1 of the C-6's A-Stand, whilst the B-Stand is not visible in this photo. (For the B-Stand, the C-6 was fitted with a MG 131 in a rotating DL 15 turret, whilst the C-5 retained the open D30 Drehkranz, ring mount with MG 131 that had been first introduced with the C-3/U4.) Although W.Nr. 0218 was reported lost 100% as a C-6 that was not until 14-Aug-44 when the aircraft was assigned to 8./KG 40. Since no C-6 variants are reported entering service with III./KG 40 until May-44 (well after Fw 200 deliveries had ended) and all these C-6 examples came from repair (bar one transfer from an unknown unit) the probability is that when photographed as an aircraft of the III. Gruppe Stab, W.Nr. 0218 was actually configured in the form in which it had been delivered. That is, it was in fact a Fw 200 C-5.

If there actually was to be a way of distinguishing between the HD 151 and HD 151/1 turrets then this would probably come down to whether there was a hatch in the left side of the turret plexiglas. In the HD 151 this provided the essential access for loading the 500-round ammo belt into the left side of the MG 151/20 cannon. This could only be done on the ground and of course only a single belt of ammo was carried. In the HD 151/1, a second, reserve belt was also carried and the ammunition feed into the cannon was from the right to enable the gunner to load a new belt during flight. Hence with the HD 151/1 turret there did not need to be such a flap on the left side of the turret and this may have been deleted. (For now no photographs or manuals have been traced that will either prove or disprove this statement. There was another flap at the rear of the turret allowing the cannon to be withdrawn for maintenance and this may well have provided all the other access necessary in the HD 151/1.) If it was indeed the case that there was no flap on the left of the HD 151/1 transparency, then the turret in this reference photo of W.Nr. 0218 is very definitely an HD 151, since the left-side flap is clearly visible. That would definitively identify W.Nr. 0218 at this point as a Fw 200 C-5.