Chinese Heinkel 50 (66) Werke Nummers etc. question

[Kari Lumppio]

Hello!

I would really appreciate this data to help my quest for solving the big puzzle Heinkel 50 production run and Werke Nummern blocks.

Does anyone know how many Heinkel 50/66 were actually sent to China? Or to Japan for that matter. Are their Werke Nummern known? Were any of them civil registered in Germany?

I've collected pieces of He 50 informations from here and there and many great fellows have offered their help and data. But it still seems impossible to brake the Heinkel 50 production run to logical batches. Even the subtype allocation is confusing (at least to me).

He 50 was used by NSGr 11 and knowing WNr - Stkz ties would help to bring more light to many individual cases where only WNr is given. NSGr 11 made use of the original Stammkennzeichen in a way where the first two letters were painted over with the unit code 3W. The rest were left as is. What really identified the individual plane for the personnell was the number painted on the fin (according a former He 50 mechanic). All He 50 were built before Stkz intorduction and seem to have received Kennzeichen in WNr order (within the unit not "globally"!). With additional data it might be possible to solve the subtypes of the individual NSGr 11 He 50 where code is known.

In some other forum I saw "Rasmussen" to give some data of the Hs 123 sent to China. Is similar data available for Heinkel 50?


Thanking in advance,

Kari

[Lennart Andersson]

Hello,

Heinkel production is quite complicated with many small c/n batches.

For your information I can tell you that during many years of reserch for my book on aviation and aircraft in China I have never encountered any evidence at all of deliveries of He 66s or He 50s to China. It is possible, however, that the Canton Government placed an order that was not carred out, but I doubt this. It seems that the "Chinese He 66s", like much of what has been published before about German aircraft, is pure fiction.

Lennart Andersson

[Kari Lumppio]

Hej!

Tack ska du ha, Lennart. Thanks!

The answer is just what I feared. It means there are a dozen airframes or so more to be "found" somewhere.

It just occurred to me that the Chinese version of He 50 was to have Jupiter VI engine. Also some of the Danish Fokker CVs were Jupiter-engined. Both types were used by the Estonian-manned NSGr 11.

It makes me more and more convinced that it is not a coincidence. Estonian Air Force had had Bristol Bulldog II, which was also Jupiter VI engined. Former EstAF depot was used throughout the war for overhaul place for Ju 88s etc. and there were lots of Estonians working there. Perhaps Luftwaffe made use of the Estonian Jupiter engine know-how and possibly tooling too?

MvH,
Kari