Book about Wiener Neustaeder Flugzeugwerke

[edwest]

I had not heard of this company before, but they were responsible for building a lot of Me 109s.

http://www.christian-schmidt-fachbuc...oducts_id=3176



Usual disclaimer,
Ed

[werner]

They "only" produced around 1/4 to 1/3 of all Bf/Me109s

WNF was also the reason why Wiener Neustadt was the most bombed ( and destroyed ) city in Austria.

[werner]

8-13-43 (1.attack)
13:52 61 Liberator ( 83 started for the mission ) bombed Wiener
Neustadt in 3 waves ( = echelon ??)
Loss of production:
Werk 1: 30%
Werk 2: 15%
It was planned to build 280 Me109 in August 43, because of
the attack only 180 were delivered.

10-1-43 (2.attack)
12:45 90 bombers attacked the northern part of Wiener Neustadt and
Werk 1
Loss of production in Werk 1: 50%
79 killed persons

10-24-43 (3.attack)
12:00 very dense low stratus
Neunkirchen and Ebenfurth were hit
30 killed persons

11-2-43 (4.attack)
12:15 200 Bomber in several waves
city and industry hit very hard
production loss in Werk 1 and 2 : 100%
=> instead of partial transfer now the plan was a total transfer
102 killed persons

1-16-44 and 1-31-44
attacks against WNF Klagenfurt, after that transferred

WNF Werk1 and 2 repaired
March 44 400 Me109
April 44 443 Me 109

4-12-44 (5.attack)
northern part of Wiener Neustadt and WNF
82 killed
on the same day also WNF Fischamend was heavily bombed

4-23-44 ( 6.attack)
500 bomber with very heavy escort attacked Wiener Neustadt and
WNF in several waves
Very heavy damage
70 killed
on the same day also WNF Köttingbrunn-Vöslau ( near or on the a/f)
was attacked)

5-10-44 (7.attack)
400 bomber
heavy damage in the southern and northern part of the city, the same
with Werk 1 and 2
14 killed
on the same day also the evacuate works WNF Hirm and WNF Wulkaprodersdorf ( both stores ) were heavily bombed

5-24-44 (8.attack)
heavy attack on the city and Werk 1 and 2
9 killed civilians and 20 killed Flak soldiers

5-29-44 ( 9.attack)
very heavy attack on city, industry and airbase
81 killed
180 Me109 destroyed on ground
on the same day also attack against WNF Atzgersdorf and WNF Neudörfl ( after that both works were evacuated))
this was a tough day above Austria - 1400 bombers attacked targets all over the Ostmark

6-8-44 (10.attack)
periphal area

During attacks 1 to 10 588 persons got killed, 327 heavily wounded;
6000 were left homeless.
401 buildings were destroyed; 621 heavily damaged; 651 medium damaged and 2000 light damaged

7-8-44
heavy attack against airbase Markersdorf, the WNF work there was hevily damaged ( was a big transfered assembly work for assembly of Me109G )
8-23-44
this work was destroyed by a second big air attack

in the second half of 44 WNF tried to dislocate and also went underground. The displocation of the works was all over central Europe and so there were many problems with transportation of the parts and pieces.
In spite of all these problems WNF built 3564 Me109 in 1944
(~ 25% of all Reich production )
in the last quarter of 1944 WNF built 1110 Me109.

2-15-45 (11.attack)
2-21-45 (12.attack)
mainly railroad
47 killed

2-25-45 (13.attack)
no real damage

3-4-45 (14.attack)
railroad and military academy

3-12-45 (15.attack)
railroad and infrastructure

3-14-45 (16.attack)
3-15-45 (17.attack)
3-16-45 (18.attack)
each day between 13 and 18 attacking waves
180 killed

3-18-45 (19.attack)
some strafing

3-20-45 (20.attack)
2 waves against railroad

3-23-45 (21.attack)
City

3-24-45 (22.attack)
night attack

3-25-45 (23.attack)
night attack

3-26-45 (24.attack)
25 waves against city, railroad, infrastructure, industry
very heavy damage, big fires

3-29-45 (25.attack)

3-30-45 (26.attack)

3-31-45 (27.attack)

4-1-45 (28.attack)
night attack

4-1-45 (29.attack)
american bombers



attack 1 to 18: 825 killed
after that no real counting but it is estimated that there were more than 1000 killed persons in Wiener Neustadt

Of the 4000 buildings in Wiener Neustadt only 18 were undamaged; 65% destroyed and 23% very heavy damaged ( = uninhabitable )
At the end of war only 800 people still lived there.

[werner]

In Wiener Neustadt there were 2 complexes of WNF:
Werk1 in the Wienerstrasse 120 which was founded in 1935 by Julius Arigi ( a WW1 pilot )
and Werk 2 which used the former Daimler Motoren AG buildings in the Pottendorferstrasse ( Daimler closed its plant here in 1933 )

but aircraft industry started much sooner in Wiener Neustadt:
Oesterreichische Flugzeugfabrik AG (Oeffag):
they started in 1915 and had to close after the end of war, later the Austro Daimler used the area.
Oeffag was the third largest A/C producing plant in the AustroHungerian Monarchy, they produced inter allia Albatros D II and D III; but also Oeffag C I and II and for the KuK Navy the Types K, R, S and G

[edwest]

Thank you for the very detailed information.



Regards,
Ed

[werner]

WNF did not only build Bf109s they also were used as repair-plant ( Werk 1 - Halle 35 and Halle 45) of a big variety of other A/C like He111, Ju88, Ju52. In 1941 they repaired, equipped and giave back to the LW 289 Ju52, Ju88 and He111.

WNF had not only plants in Wiener Neustadt.
WNF also had:
Werk 3 Fischamend ( east of Vienna )
Werk 4 Atzgersdorf
Werk 5 Klagenfurt
Werk 6 Ober-Graffendorf
Werk 7 Semlin

in some sources Werk 4 is Ober-Grafendorf.

After the the first attacks ther were discussions about shifting/dispering the WNF and later in middle 1944 they started to disperse to a huge amount of sites between Carinthia ( Southern Austria ) to Hungeria and the Protektorate with around 40 sites.

[Rabe Anton]

But nobody has said anything about the book. The book! The Book! Allow me to say that I've had it for years. It's a beautiful piece of work. When I first got it, I sort of yawned and went on. But as the years have passed, it has become more and more useful and intriguing. This work is probably the best treatment ever of a wartime German (read Austrian) aircraft plant, with the possible exception of Peter Scholl on Messerschmitt/Regensburg. Not a book for modellers, but one really gets a powerful sense of what it was all about from dozens of splendid photos of workers, assembly lines, factory life, and so forth. Reproductions of contemporary documents are most interesting, too. All in all, a wonderful book, highly recommended!

RA

[JoMe]

Hey


The book contained a lot of very beautiful pictures, but no production lists !

JoMe

[Rasmussen]

I agree complete with you, JoMe. An wonderful and beautiful picture book but the informations about the factory are "minimal" - no production list, small informations about the development of the factory, the persons, the pilots, the life situation of workers, the processes before the end of war (the factory in Tisnov) and so on.

So I would say - high recommendly for friends of pics, but recommendly with reservations for friends of historical informations and a history of an factory.

THE BOOK about the German aircraft industry is the book from Jochen Budrass "Flugzeugindustrie und Luftrüstung in Deutschland 1918 - 1945". It's an dissertation with 975 pages. But ... it's an scientific book and not an picture book ;-).

Best wishes
Rasmussen

[Falcon]

I love this book, because i love 109 photos. And this book has got big photos in a great quality.