Bought a Heinkel 162

[aferguson]

I bought a Heinkel 162 Volksjager on ebay several days ago. Arrived today. It's a wooden desktop model. It's 1/20 not 1/18, so about 10% undersized. I'm starting to get into 1/20 aircraft. I've bought a few now and i find that if you chose the subject carefully the underscale-ness is not so noticable.

Anyway, the model is quite nice, if plain (no pun intended). Finished in an overall dunkelgrun (i believe the current school of thought is that these were brown-violet overall......i like the dunkelgreen as it reminds me of a model i built when i was a kid..

Lines are good. I plan to add a few bits, do some detail painting etc and hang it. It should look quite nice.

There is another on ebay if anyone is interested....they have been on for about a month or so now, usually selling for $69.

[tmanthegreat]

Thats a really cool and unique plane. It was one of the first to have an ejection seat and actually did see a little combat in the final days of the war engaging and shooting down a Spitfire (I think.) Nonetheless, I don't think we'll see one in 1:18 anytime soon. Here's a couple of real ones I saw in London:

[aferguson]

sorry i forgot the link to a pic of model:


http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... =WDVW&rd=1

Yes there are many interesting facts about the 162: designed and built in only 100 days, first to have an ejection seat, made entirely of wood and i believe it was the fastest active jet of the war.

It has been confirmed that a few were in combat as tman said and one shot down an RAF Tempest....it was never claimed because the same plane was shot down during landing, by another Tempest (how's that for tit for tat).

I figured that the liklihood of seeing it in 1/18 was low, given the extremely slow new release rate we're seeing and the fact it would be low on the public recognizability scale; so that's why i went with the 1/20 desktop model..

here's a brief description of the Salamandar:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinkel_He_162

[Quixote511]

Strange, I thought the DO 335 Pfiel was the 1st aircraft to have an ejection seat. Maybe the 162 is the first jet and the 335 is the first plane ever to have one?
Aaron

[Folkwulfe]

I believe you are correct that the DO 335 Pfiel (Arrow) was fitted with an ejection seat, but the first "operational" aircraft was the HE 219 Owl. The seats were ejected by use of compressed gas and threw the pilot and radar operator clear of the twin-tail. The DO 335 also had explosive bolts to sever the tail members and rear propeller just prior to ejection of the seat(s). It was quite a shock to the people at the Smithsonian when they discovered that the explosive bolts were still there...and active...when they started rebuilding one that had been in storage for more that 40 years. As for the 162, it wasn't entirely made of wood, but the main wings and tail were...and that was it's undoing. Germany never was able to formulate good wood glue for aircraft and the wooden structures had a nast tenancy to come unbonded in flight. Almost every test pilot in the Salamander's development was killed in in-flight breakups...one very famous one was filmed when during a low pass, the left aileron unbonded from it's hinges, seperated, and the aircraft spiraled into the ground killing the pilot. That can't have encouraged alot of faith in their aircraft among new, young pilots with minimal training during the later war years.

[aferguson]

well at least i got the fact that it was the fastest operational jet of the war right

heheh...

i forgot about the he-219....should have known that but somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind it's saying that the ejection seat equipped Uhus never became operational but were merely experimental. Am i wrong?

As for the Arrow it was never operational so, while maybe ejection seat equipped before the He-162, the Salamandar did become operational, albeit on a limited scale.

I was under the impression that the fuselage was wooden too, on the Heinkel but it wasn't. I assumed the need to conserve strategic materials would have extended to making the fuselage out of wood as well...

[Folkwulfe]

Nope...sorry but your answer was not in the form of a question..hehehe! Actually, the 219 had it's first sortie in June 1943 (first test and it shot down 5 British bombers in 30 minutes). Operational squadrons received them starting in November 1943 and they served throughout the end of the war as one of the only nightfighters capable of taking the "Mossie" on on equal terms. You are correct that the 335 never reached operational status...service prototypes were all that were completed before war's end.

[aferguson]

i know the Uhu had a great operational career but what i was not certain of is if they were equipped with ejections seats. I know ejection seats were tested on Unus but i didn't think they were put in production aircraft.

[Bruzzer]

I've bought from their website before. Your post reminded me I wanted some plaques from their. I just bought 1 plaque but picked up a Me 163 that looks like it will fit in with 21st planes. Let us know how the 162 looks. I may have to get one of those too.

[Teamski]

Nope...sorry but your answer was not in the form of a question..hehehe! Actually, the 219 had it's first sortie in June 1943 (first test and it shot down 5 British bombers in 30 minutes). Operational squadrons received them starting in November 1943 and they served throughout the end of the war as one of the only nightfighters capable of taking the "Mossie" on on equal terms. You are correct that the 335 never reached operational status...service prototypes were all that were completed before war's end.

From what I understand, the 162 never saw combat. The unit that got issued them never engaged another combat aircraft......

-Ski

[aferguson]

that is the way it used to be thought but more current research has lead to the discovery that several combat missions were flown by He-162's. It was a test unit that flew them but they tested the aircraft in combat. Apparently several allied planes were shot down and about 10 Salamandars were lost....most to mechanical failures and about 3 were shot down, going by memory here.

Read the link i posted, it gives some details..

[Teamski]

that is the way it used to be thought but more current research has lead to the discovery that several combat missions were flown by He-162's. It was a test unit that flew them but they tested the aircraft in combat. Apparently several allied planes were shot down and about 10 Salamandars were lost....most to mechanical failures and about 3 were shot down, going by memory here.

Read the link i posted, it gives some details..

Ah, cool! I'll check it out! Learn something new every day!

-Ski

[Teamski]

Interesting..... I have to wonder if this is a "legend growth" sort of thing. For the last 25+ years, I've alway read that HE-162's were possibly in combat but no losses were recorded on either side from them (exept for operational losses due to malfunctions when in squadron use). Then, all of a sudden, we have multiple allied losses to Salamanders with an RAF pilot (name unknown) admitting to his interrogators that he got shot down by a jet. It might be just me, but I'd like to see some sort of solid proof of this. On another site, it mentions that the RAF recorded one Tempest lost due to unknown causes. Not what I call solid evidence..... Sorry for the skeptisism, but as the years go on, so grows the legend....

-Ski

[Folkwulfe]

Unfortunately...proof some 60 years later is gonna have to come from already archived materials. A Griffon powered photo-recce Spitfire (previously practically untouchable) was downed and the RAF pilot captured. Interrogation records (one thing the Germans liked was records) have shown that the RAF pilot described to a tee the Salamander that got him. Unfortunately the Salamander was downed by a Tempest pilot as it recovered (almost out of fuel) near it's airbase during the same mission. Pilot's gun camera film was reported destroyed in the crash and the pilot was killed. This represents at least one independent verification that a Salamander engaged another A/C and came out on top...only to loose in the second.
"I./JG 1 was declared combat-ready on 23 April, after it had already claimed one British fighter on 19 April. Feldwebel Günther Kirchner was credited with shooting down a fighter when the captured pilot admitted he'd been shot down by a jet. Unfortunately Kirchner himself was shot down shortly thereafter by another British fighter. At least two other claims were made by He 162 pilots before the end of the war, although only one Tempest V can be confirmed from British records since a number of British aircraft were lost to unknown causes at times and places that match these other claims. At least one and possibly three He 162s were lost to enemy action."
As quoted from sources such as http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/2072/He162.html .

[aferguson]

if anyone is interested i found some good pictures, photos and schematics of the He-162 cockpit. Scroll right to the bottom..

http://www.il2center.com/Axis/Germany/17/Index.html