Bf109G-14 pressurisation gear cover

[tonyeh]

Hi,

While doing some research on the Bf109G-14, I saw that a lot of pics seem to show the aircraft with the extra blister on the starboard cowling bump that was used to cover the pressurisation gear. This extra bump made its appearance on the Bf109G-5, but seemed to carry over to the Bf109G-14 and some Bf109G-6's.





The question is does anyone one know which batch numbers of the Bf109G-14 carried the extra bump? Where they limited to aircraft that were made in one factory (Erla?), or where they on all Bf109G-14's for the entire production run.

It's proving difficult to find an answer.

[veltro]

I'll try to explain the matter in a quite prosaic way. The question originates with the fact that such cowling was foreseen for the G-5 pressurized series, as the bulge ad its small air intake were due to the phisical presence of an air compressor for the cockpit pressurization an the need to cool it.

Unfortunately, while the production of the G-5 was originally foreseen to be of a sizeable amount, it turned out to be much inferior number of aircraft, whereas the modified cowlings had already been separately built according to the original estimate.

This meant that there were at least hundreds of such "double-beule" starboard cowls available and since Germans hate waste, these were employed either on the late G-6s and on a sizeable amount of G-14s.

It is out of my knowledge the scheme of distribution of such cowls (if there was one, which was quite probable for the Germans) but the fact that such cowls were mounted on planes which had no use for the smaller "beule" and its air intake, is a matter of fact.