He-219 ”Uhu”s found at the end of the war

[INM@RLM]

Re my post #37 and the words "So the reality of what happened at EHFW with the A-2 bore almost no resemblance to what had been planned. Rather people were now making it up as they went along, grabbing whatever was available in terms of resources and sub-assemblies already built (or mostly built) and using those to the best effect still possible."

Having slept on it, these two sentences needs a little rebalancing and tighter phrasing. So, first, it is more accurate then to say "almost no resemblance to what had been planned by the RLM's GL/C Amt."

This was a time of steep transition, and it was now that the Jägerstab that was in the driving seat, their reach steadily expanding through the summer of 1944, culminating in the formation of the Rüstungsstab on 01-Aug-44.

So there was actual official force behind the continuation of He 219 production at Schwechat but that impetus came from the competing authority of the up-and-coming Jägerstab.

A couple of the short-term projections created by the Jägerstab survive in the RLM 1435 papers. The latest of these is dated 19-Jul-44 (so just a few days after LP 226/2 was issued showing that all He 219 A-2 production was now to come from Rostock). The Jägerstab document shows this for expected He 219 deliveries from Wien-Schwechat:

Jul-44 Soll/Plan = 4 real = 4 [Last of the He 219 A-0 deliveries from Wien]
Aug-44 Soll = Nil real column left blank [Actual Wien deliveries were indeed Nil in Aug-44]
Sep-44 Soll = 5 real column left blank [Actual Wien deliveries were 5 A-2s in Sep-44]
Oct-44 Soll = 5 real column left blank [Actual Wien deliveries were 3 A-2s in Oct-44 followed by the final 3 A-2s in November.]

Since the document is dated in July the real abbreviation here clearly indicates realistisch = realistic expected outturn (rather than reality, meaning actual).

So He 219 production at Wien was deliberately being continued but only to a very limited extent, and this was on the instructions of the Jägerstab.

Hence "Rather people were now making it up as they went along,.." would be better rephrased as "Rather the pragmatists of the Jägerstab were now making it up as they went along, grabbing whatever was available in terms of resources and sub-assemblies already built (or mostly built) and using those to the best effect still possible."

A suggestion regarding the list: when a Stammkz is relatively certain to have been assigned to a particular airframe, but was not actually marked on that airframe at the end of the war, perhaps place the Stammkz. in brackets?

Where the markings are uncertain then maybe brackets with a ? inside the final bracket?

(So those left unbracketed will be the airframes actually known to have been still carrying their Stammkz. markings at the eow.)

[spektor]

According to Barry Wheeler,
(REICH WRECKS RUSSIANS, AEROPLANE October 2018)
at Schwechat Airport, the remains of the He 219 were V11 and V23.
Image description: The tail of one of a number of He 219 wrecks, including the V11 and V23 development airframes, which still littered the periphery of Schwechat well over a year after Germany’s May 1945 surrender.




Ľubor.

[INM@RLM]

To post #42.
A very nice shot but no reliance should be placed on the caption if it truly reads "The tail of one of a number of He 219 wrecks, including the V11 and V23 development airframes, which still littered the periphery of Schwechat well over a year after Germany’s May 1945 surrender."

For anyone without ready access to the F.I.U. report a direct statement of the He 219 finds recorded at Schwechat is:
1. "Five wrecks of this type represented aircraft that had obviously flown"
2. "there were further wings and tail planes in new condition in various parts of the area"
3. "new mainplanes of both types on the railway siding and in the manufacturing jigs" (i.e. of both the standard length wing and the extended wing for the Jumo 222-powered variants)
4. "tail units (one marked VII (sic) and V23)"
the report then moves onto the engines found.
Bold text is where I have added stress.

So the pictured V23 tail unit was not that of "one of a number of wrecks", but a discarded unit abandoned at Schwechat, and the sole portion of the V23 airframe present there at the end of the war.
To make the position crystal clear in the EOW Listing maybe consider adding these two tail units into a separate sub-section, with explanations extracted from the notes below?

The five actual He 219 wrecks at Schwechat are exactly as listed as FIU Rept.53 entries for Schwechat in post #38. The major limitation in what the FIU team could inspect though was that "some enthusiastic airfield engineers had bulldozed them [meaning the aircraft identified in the report as (d) & (e)] into craters and covered them over".


In regard to why the tail unit alone of the V23 was abandoned at Schwechat, the standard works have so far been unhelpful. The V23 was the second Jumo 222 prototype with the longer span wings (V-Muster listing of 09-Feb-44, Remp p.86), and we are never told any more than this about the structure of the Jumo 222 aircraft.
With the longer wings and the much bigger/heavier engines, there was a lot more weight and wetted area forward of the aircraft's CG; it would not be a surprise then for EHF to have quickly discovered that for good flying characteristics, the Jumo 222 machines required an enlarged tail unit. The vertical tail unit of the V23 seen here is standard form, but an extended, wider horizontal tail unit would have been necessary to match the longer wingspan. Or such are my suspicions as to why the original tail unit of the V32 was abandoned at Schwechat. The answer will certainly be somewhere in the Heinkel documents.

It's another sidebar issue, but in his handling of the V32 and the V23 aspects (pp. 79 & 83/4) Ron has punted way out beyond what is supported by the facts. In reality there need be no mystery attached to either of these Versuchsmaschinen because what happened is very fully documented.

• · He 219 A-050, DV+DQ, WNr. 190 121 was selected to become the He 219 V32 (GM-1 prototype No. 2). This is documented in the Übersicht He 219 14-Jun-1944 & the V-Muster program of 24-Apr-44.
• · He 219 A-050, DV+DQ, WNr. 190 121 was subsequently selected to become the He 219 V23 (Jumo 222 prototype No.2), as documented in the V-Muster Industrie Lieferplan sheet dated 02-Jan-45 [see FD 61/46 at IWM Duxford which was also seen by Ron and indeed incorporated in his text at p.92. So the Werk-Nummer of the V23 is not as Ron stated "unknown". To the contrary it is documented clearly and beyond all reasonable doubt.]

What the V-Muster Industrie Lieferplan sheet of 02-Jan-45 also tells us is that the V23 airframe was to be broken up. Not broken up as in total-destruction-and-finis, but rather at the date this document was prepared, it was to be dismantled and the main elements were to be recycled. The enlarged wing was to go into storage as a spare for Jumo 222 prototype No. 1 (the V16) and the fuselage was to go to Eger.
Documented photographically at Eger at the end of the war, so fully as to again be beyond all reasonable doubt, is a standard He 219 airframe parked in a dispersal bay whose fuselage is marked with the battered remnants of 'V23' on the port-side nose, and with the Stammkz. DV+DQ on the rear fuselage. In short, the most (only?) logical conclusion is that when Eger received the fuselage of the V23 they used it to recreate a rejuvenated He 219 A-050, DV+DQ, WNr. 190 121 and this had been completed before the end of hostilities.
[Why would Eger assign a different identity when they used this fuselage to build a ‘new’ standard aircraft? The fuselage was the most complex part of the airframe, the largest single sub-assembly, and the one on which was riveted all of the manufacturer's data plates that identified the unique airframe number.]

In sum then, the V32 airframe was repurposed to become the V23, and both V32 and V23 were temporary, secondary designations of the same WNr. 190 121. This was an almost exact parallel to WNr. 190 071, V18 (Jumo 222 No. 1) being earmarked to have become the second prototype of the 3-man cockpit version. However, we can be certain that in the case of WNr. 190 071, this did not in fact happen because neither the V35 nor V36 designation (both to have been additional 3-man cockpit examples) is recorded as being associated with WNr. 190 071.
The sole recorded example of the 3-Man cockpit version was the V34, He 219 A-041, WNr. 190 112, and we know that V-number was issued on a date after 24-Apr-44. [This first 3-man example was indubitably completed and trialled - see Ron. p.85.]

The decision not to proceed to series production with the 3-man cockpit version was in all probability a pragmatic one based on the delays and disruption inherent in introducing a major change in the He 219 fuselage structure. So rather than commence production of the He 219 A-5 with the 3-man cockpit, as foreseen in LP 226/2 of 15-Jul-44, instead the A-7 with the existing cockpit was created, and became the new standard He 219 series production version.

Hence, the answer to the riddle of why the V32 tail plane was still at Schwechat at the end of the war, was, I suggest, that the tail plane for the V 23 with Jumo 222s, was non-standard, so was removed and abandoned at Schwechat, and a new standard form tail plane was substituted at Eger during rebuild there.

[And the different reason why a separate tail plane for the V11 was found at Schwechat was because this aircraft had been damaged in the bombing of Schwechat by 15th US Air Force on 23-Apr-44, and the V11 had subsequently received the tail unit of WNr. 190 063. WNr. 190 063 was the He 219 V33, which was destroyed in the same 23-Apr-44 bombing. (Not as Ron writes at p.84, "damaged in an accident on 23rd April 1944".) The tail unit of the V33, WNr. 190 063 was then salvaged and fitted to WNr. 190 061, the He 219 V11, as Ron correctly states on p.84, and the original V11 tail unit was placed on the dump at Schwechat.

[he219research]

Excellent detectives work and summary, INM@RLM!

Just a quick note:

Originally Posted by INM@RLM

...The tail unit of the V33, WNr. 190 063 was then salvaged and fitted to WNr. 190 061, the He 219 V11...

He 219 V11 in the quote above - this should be WNr. 190 011, right?

[INM@RLM]

Dear he219research,
To your #44:
Thank you for following the argument through to the end.

No, I'm afraid not. I have made a mistake in the final paragraph on the V11 tail plane. On this point I have also punted into waters where my pole does not reach the bottom.

Unfortunately, I read my notes too quickly and too late in the day. It was the A-011, WNr. 190 061 (and NOT the V11, WNr. 190 011) that received the tail plane of the A-013, V33, WNr. 190 063.

The reason why the V11 tail plane was mentioned separately in the FIU Report was because "the V11 was found in a knocked down state in Schwechat at war's end" - as Ron correctly states on p.71.

Hence, the contents of the possible sub-list of He 219 tail planes found all on their lonesome at the eow, now reduces to just that of the V23.

My apologies.

[he219research]

Thank you INM@RLM!
The information of yours in this discussion thread is truly great in order to lift a little bit of the fog surrounding the history of the He 219...

The fitting of the tailplane unit from WNr. 190 063 onto WNr. 190 061 perhaps also get an extra dimension, in that WNr. 190 061 was reported to have crashed not long after, on the 16th June 1944 (south of Rechlin).
According to my notes the cause of the crash was "tailplane failure", and the somewhat "unusual" crew of Ing.Karl-Heinz Huß & observer Helmut Friedmann might indicate this crash happened during a test flight after the modification?

[INM@RLM]

You are right. Despite the enormous strides taken by Ron and helpers through more than a decade, much fog still surrounds the He 219. Some of that is just the way it is until more discoveries are made, and those may be pure chance.

Some of the fog unfortunately is self-inflicted and those bits we can do something about. For example, my specialism is in production and delivery quantities (and production planning), and the number published by Ron for the total of He 219s delivered was still far too high.

Good spot on the loss of WNr. 190 061. How very ironic (and unlucky for that crew).
I think we can safely conclude that 190 061 was unflyable after suffering the damage on 23-Apr-44. So, Yes, the 16-Jun loss happened with the replacement tail plane in place. Although 190 061 was not a V-Muster example, it was the first series production example to be fitted with a new type of tail plane sub-assembly (Baugruppe 355) - see the 'Bauausführungs-Übersicht He 219' in the He 219 A-7 Ersatzteill-Liste & p.45 in Ron's latest. That might well have accounted for it being transferred to Rechlin first for a period of proof-testing. As Ron confirms it was being flown by a crew from E-Stelle Rechlin when it was lost so the probability was that this was indeed some form of test flight.

[ZOLTAN190D]

Originally Posted by he219research

Thank you ZOLTAN190D! 420333 is new to me - do you perhaps have any further info on this machine (condition etc)?

Regarding 1L+MK found destroyed at Halle - have a look at these additional images:
https://www.garaget.org/mypage/galle...&image=2877584

https://www.garaget.org/mypage/galle...&image=2877583

https://www.garaget.org/mypage/galle...&image=2877587

https://www.garaget.org/mypage/galle...&image=2877586

https://www.garaget.org/mypage/galle...&image=2877585

Note the light coloured (white?) spinners with dark (black?) spirals, and also the application of additional ground camouflage (Liegeplatz-Tarnung).

Although the fuselage code is illegible, the position of the spiral on the port spinner as well as the location of the broken (burned) off cockpit section (as well as the position of the nose gear strut), all point in the direction that this is 1L+MK (as depicted in your photo).

Regarding 420333 and 310204 G9+MH details following discussion regardind the picture which depict both machines :
https://www.facebook.com/groups/4190...1683148683379/

And,yes 1L+MK picture which I sent,as I know, represent the only picture from that side in which 1L+MK is clearly seen, altough this plane is well known after photograps and even a color footage,but none from that side in which the markings are seen .

[ZOLTAN190D]

Praha-Letnany one or two He-219
http://www.vrtulnik.cz/ww2/protektorat-letnany.htm
310201-unknown location
http://www.clubhyper.com/reference/he219cw_1.htm

[Roger Gaemperle]

I have 310215 as AM44 and not AM43 (based on photographic evidence).