B-29 versus he. 277??

How do you think they compare?

 

no comparison the B-29 is superior

 

Let's see here:



Specifications (He 277B-5)

General characteristics

• Crew: 7
• Length: 23.00 m (75 ft 5 in)
• Wingspan: 40.00 m (131 ft 3 in)
• Height: 6.66 m (21 ft 10½ in)
• Wing area: 133.00 m² (1,431.60 ft²)
• Empty weight: 21,800 kg (48,060 lb)
• Max takeoff weight: 44,500 kg (98,105 lb)
• Powerplant: 4× BMW 801E radial engines 14-cylinder, twin row-radial engine, 1,492 kW (1,973 hp for takeoff) each

Performance

• Maximum speed: 570 km/h at 5,700 m (354 mph at 18,700 ft)
• Cruise speed: 460 km/h (286 mph)
• Range: 6,000 km (3,728 mi)
• Service ceiling: 15,000 m (49,210 ft)

Armament

• 2 × 20 mm (0.79 in) MG 151/20 autocannon in remotely operated, undernose Fernbedienbare Drehlafette FDL 151 Z "chin" turret
• 4 × 20 mm (0.79 in) MG 151/20 autocannon in twin dorsal turrets, one forward and one aft
• 2 × 20 mm (0.79 in) MG 151/20 autocannon in remotely operated, ventral turret facing aft. behind bomb bay
• 4 x 13 mm (0.51 in) MG 131 machine guns in Hecklafette HL 131 V "quadmount", manned tail turret
• up to 3,000 kg (6,612 lb) of disposable stores

B-29 Performance

Maximum speed: 357 mph.
Cruising speed: 220 mph.
Range: 3,700 miles
Service Ceiling: 33,600 feet

B29 Specifications Span: 141 feet, 3 inches
Length: 99 feet
Height: 27 feet, 9 inches
Weight: 133,500 pounds
Armament: Eight .50-caliber machine guns in remote controlled turrets plus two .50-caliber machine guns and one 20mm cannon in tail; 20,000 pounds of bombs
Engines: Four Wright R-3350s of 2,200 horsepower each
Cost: $639,000


Even with the pesky engines fires initially, the B-29 carries the day...and it was an operational aircraft with combat under its belt. He-277 - too little too late

 

Plane for plane, obviously no contest. The B-29 was the most advanced and capable bomber of the war by far, no other was even close, and probably no other nation besides the USA could have built anything like it in significant numbers.

the HE-277 was the next closest thing, the HE-177 was its predecessor as you know, and the only luftwaffe heavy bomber deployed in significant numbers (about 200 by war's end). Range and bomb load were of course inferior to the B-29 and the engines were even more unreliable and prone to catch fire.

Heinkel He 177 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

although the prototype of the He-177 first flew in 1939, the Luftwaffe was from the start, hampered by the fact that pre-war luftwaffe planners had decided that German industry was incapable of producing very many heavy bombers (of the kind being produced by Britain and the USA). Therefore the importance of strategic bombing was almost completely neglected in Germany until the middle of the war - by which time Germany was hopelessly behind the allies and could never have hoped to catch up.

 

The wiki page at Heinkel He 277 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
gives the same range as below (6,000km/3,728miles). However the wiki B-29 page gives the followiing ranges: B-29 Superfortress - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Niether give the bomb load carried at range although the B-29 is listed as carring a standard load of 20,000lbs/9,000kg which it would be reasonable to assume was the load carried to combat range.
Travis Air Museum
states: range 4,100 miles with 16,000lbs of bombs

 

Poorly. The B-29 is in a class of its own by comparison. The B-29 flies higher, faster, has longer range, an incomparably better defense system, is pressurized, has near infinitely better electronics, has a better bomb aiming system (particularly for blind bombing).... Basically, there is no comparison.

 

Kind of what I thought...I do know according to my sources On August 10,1944 B29(early models ) carried 20-500 lb bombs from China Bay to Palembang ,one way about 1900 miles flying in stacks at 27-31K but bombing run was at around 17-20K at night. On August 14/1945 in the raid on Akita B-29's flew 2182 miles(making several turns to aquire landmarks) one way carrying 56-250 lb bombs each(14,000 lbs.) and as I understand it eventually climbed to about 30-33 K but final run was at or around 17-20K. In the book "The Last Mission" it was stated that often B-29's exceeded the 135,000 lb max take off wieght by taking off at up to 144,000 lbs carrying up to 9 tons of bombs out to 1500-1600 miles.

 

The He-277 would make a closer comparison to a B-24.

 

Considering combat service among other factors, the B-29 is superior to the He 277.

 

Just how good was the JUMO-222 engine? I've heard it had severe reliability problems.

 

The Jumo 222 pretty much never got beyond development. Junkers had perpetual problems with it and it was never delivered for the aircraft it was intended for like the Fw 191 or Ju 288.

 

There is no comparison, not only was the B-29 superior, the Germans could neither afford to "waste" large crews nor huge quantities of aluminium to build those giant aircrafts. It was both hazardous and too expensive and it was far more efficient for the Lw to invest in small one man fighters , or should I say, they had no choice anyway, not to mention that time was against them . Even the HE-177 was never fully completed with a recurant problem of overheating engines due to oil leaks causing the bombers to be grounded most of the time anyway, due to excessive losses and putting crews in danger at all times.

 

Do you mind to elaborate? The He had heavier guns on paper.

 

I believe that Terry was thinking of the computerized aiming system which the Superfort had installed. The ability of fewer gunners to aim and co-ordinate multiple turrets at a single target, with bullet drop compensation built into the thing.

See:

http://books.google.com/books?id=AyEDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA88&lpg=PA88&dq=B-29,+gun+computer&source=bl&ots=TDDuqx_o8N&sig=bNWoW5fmZYpybESSrxMZtkabWsA&hl=en&ei=Jr_mS77vKou0NtyZ9YUI&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CC4Q6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=B-29%2C%20gun%20computer&f=false

 

The B-29 had a centralized fire control system like a naval ship of the period did. The gunners had gyroscopic sights with remote controls that allowed any gunner control of any combination of turrets on the plane. The turrets were unmanned (except the tail which was seperate from the rest of the system). Boeing solved the parallax problems (the difference between where the gunner was and where the turret was) and had the same lead computing gunsight system that allowed the turrets to more accurately aquire and fire on a target.
The tail gunner had in addition to a gyro gunsight a ranging and lead computing radar system that allowed him to blind fire on targets at night.

This is lightyears ahead of anything the Germans managed to get into service. Even other US companies couldn't manage to get the same thing to work. Consolidated's B-32 Dominator had to revert to manned turrets for example. The Germans tried systems like this on a number of their prototypes but simply couldn't get it to work. Parallax problems were never solved. The sights had problems with fogging and sight picture. The gun turrets didn't work as advertised.
The closest thing they managed was the marginal system used on the Me 410.

 

Follow the link and read post # 58. It seems some think the Ju-288 could have gone into production in 1942. However it seems from what I've read there were serious problems with both the engine & aircraft to have gotten it ready for production that quick.


He-277. Superior to the B-29? - The Air Forces - NavWeaps Discussion Boards - NavWeaps Discussion Boards - Message Board Yuku

 

I doubt that severely. The Ju 288 had major, MAJOR, issues with it.

First and foremost, the Jumo 222 engine planned for this aircraft never materialized. It was a development nightmare. So, all the prototypes ended up flying on BMW 801's initially. These left the plane badly underpowered.

The wings proved too small and progressively rose in length to more than 10 feet added to try and get the wingloading down to reasonable figures.

The pressurization system never worked as advertised. The remote control gun system proved unworkable and much of it was abandoned.

Weights rose and the landing gear began to fail on prototypes, unable to handle the weight.

At this point the eight flying Ju 288 prototypes were abandoned as unworkable.

Junkers then initated work on the "improved" Ju 288B model. This had even larger wings. The Jumo 222 engine was abandoned in favor of the DB 606 (the same disasterous engine the He 177 was using). Five more prototypes were built. But, not unexpectedly from a historical perspective this model proved a technical and maintenance nightmare too. Again, the remote control armament didn't work. The engines had the same performance problems Henkel had with it along with the same fires.

The whole project started in July 1939 had now progressed into late 1942 with just this handful of occasionally flying prototypes. The Junkers design team in August of that year decided to abandon the B model and move on to the Ju 288C.

Now, note that there wasn't one operational Ju 288 flying and the program was now on the third iteration of the aircraft. This doesn't bode well for things.

The C model got the "inproved" DB 610 engine (a more powerful and just as reliable 606 engine). Junkers continued to tinker with pressurization and remote armament but never got either to really work right. Eventually 8 more prototype C models got produced. These flew off and on into 1944 with a variety of odd ball experiments being conducted for various production schemes. Probably the most insane (which thankfully for some unlucky crew never got beyond the drawing board) was to put a 35.5cm (14" roughly) cannon in the bombay and then extend this during flight to fire a single round in a shallow dive at a ground target....


Well, enough of that insanity.

The B-29 as a program was a tour de force in new production methods. Aircraft complexity goes up as an expotential function with size. So, a single seat fighter might have 50,000 (10^4) total parts while a typical 4 engine WW 2 bomber would have say 500,000 (10^5). The B-29 took this into the millions (10^6).
With a huge number of subcontractors making parts and systems the whole program grew to a point where Boeing had to come up with completely new methods of orgainzing and scheduling production.
This was something the Germans never managed to even come close to doing. In fact, with the possible exception of Ford Motor Company no other corporation matched Boeing in doing this. Consolidated / Convair couldn't match this and this was a major reason their B-32 program failed where the B-29 succeeded.
What Boeing put on a production line the Germans managed to only do with hand built prototypes that took many months to complete. Britain and Russia really didn't even try contenting themselves with more modest aircraft that fit their immediate needs well.

 

Well, I just had to look that up.

More info at the original page.

Here's another page about ludicrously oversized German aircraft guns.

 

An example of the complexity of the B29 design is found in the engine nacelle. I was just out of high school & working at a garage where the night shift “guy” was a WWII USAAC vet. He had served an apprenticeship w/ the Fisher Body Division of General Motors in the early 1940’s as a model & fixture builder. Boeing contacted GM about help with processing & building components of the B29. Basically Boeing engineers had designed items which were so complicated they were unable to design the needed tools, jigs & fixtures required for manufacturing. Fisher not only designed the tooling they also wrote the build process. Building one of the four nacelles was more complicated than building either the fuselage or the wing.
This gentleman worked on the nacelle program until he was drafted into the air corps. While training as ground crew on the B17 he told his squadron mates of the new super bomber that was coming which was so sophisticated it would make the B17 & B24 look primitive by comparison. They laughed at him & told him there would never be anything like that. When they arrived at their new base in Kansas they were trucked to a remote part of the base where there was parked a B29 which was guarded by a group of Thompson SMG armed sentries stand shoulder to shoulder around the aircraft. While the rest of the squadron stood around w/ the mouths wide open Ralph had a good laugh at them. They were amazed that anything that big could fly & that it did dwarf the B17’s they had trained on.
One side note about this member of the Greatest Generation; there is a tendency to deify those who served in WWII for their saintly service. Ralph was a great guy to work for & always treated me well. He was proud of his service to the war both in industry & in the air corps on Guam. But he was also a notorious womanizer w/ a few divorces under his belt & one of the biggest scammers I’ve ever met. I always look back fondly at what a character he was & the really great stories (true ones too!) he would tell a 17 year old kid who liked to listen.

 

B-29

Not an accurate portrayal sorry. Allow me to quote from an account of General Chennault's reaction to his fiirst briefing on proposed bombing raids against Japan from Kunming. This is from a declassified document in the CIA library:

Chennault was ordered to prepare for a raid from Kunming to Tokyo, distance of 2,305 sm.

The B-29's realistic payload was full bomb load for 1,200 sm radius.


He-177

The He-177 was similar in performance to the Lancaster, but the He-277 was an extremely high altitude and long range aircraft. The He-177 however had a limited ceiling just like the Lancaster.

He-277

The He-177 A-6/R2 prototype was converted by Reichlin Estelle 2 into the He-277 B6 with Jumo 213F engines and this aircraft had a range with bombs up to 4,500 miles.

Eight He-277 B-5 were completed with DB 603N engines. The He-277 B5 could carry a genuine 6,000lb intenal bomb load as verified by it's cousin the He-274 eventually completed in December 1944 and flown by the French.

The He-277 B-5 had a ceiling of 49,210ft well above the B-29's 33,600ft. The He-274 flown by the French with less powerful DB 603A engines could carry 6,000lb to 46,905ft.

Interception

Irrepective of false and misleading claims about flights to 51,000ft by a hypoxic Spitfire pilot based in Hong Kong after the war and a couple of likewise pilots over Egypt, Spitfires could not intercept above 44,600 ft and the Gloster Meteor could not perform at such altitudes.

In Germany warned of a threat in July 1944 to turn B-29's loose over Germany, Kurt Tank converted the FW-190D Dora into the impressive Ta-152H which could intercept up to 48,300 ft.