Blohm & Voss' Other Bizarre Stuka Successors: Blohm & Voss BV 237 & More

[@nemilyk]

Blohm und Voss and Blackburn have the same energy: "You must be the worst aircraft designer I've ever heard of." "...but you HAVE heard of me..." With a side of: "This is either brilliance, or madness." "Funny how often those two traits coincide."

[@ayylmao8901]

Their ships were surprisingly normal, though. Not like a N3/G3 class or Rodney.

[@hoilst265]

"Guten tag. We are Blohm und Voss!" "Don't you make submarines?" "Your point being?"

[@Bob-b7x6v]

Crazy Luftwaffe B-Wing energy in this episode.

[@Bob-b7x6v]

You always use the best kit box art.

[@Bob-b7x6v]

The twin-boomer with 2 BMW jets looked a lot like a DeHavilland Vampire.

[@stevekirk8546]

I knew Blohm & Voss produced unconventional aircraft but never realised they had so many designs and concepts that never came to anything. Thank you for bringing them to us and trying to understand what their aerodynamic reasoning was.

[@Tuxon86]

I know that Germany had a big drug use problem in the interwar years, but damn those B&V engineer kept using the good stuff up until the end...

[@barelyasurvivor1257]

Well they did issue methamphetamines to troops before combat, so there is that

[@josephd.5524]

@@barelyasurvivor1257 oh so much more than that- it was the 'little-pick-me-up' you could get at the corner store in chocolate form. 5-Hour Energy, circa 1939.

[@barelyasurvivor1257]

@@josephd.5524 Ah I did not know that part Ty for the info.

[@davidhollenshead4892]

B & V was keeping their design staff busy so that they wouldn't be sent to the Eastern Front like a lot of defense manufacturers near the end of the war...

[@Tuxon86]

@@davidhollenshead4892 They were thinking outside of the box... Maybe they would've fared better then the Okwh.

[@nathanguyon7620]

Whenever B&V shows up I always think of Dr. Steinman in BioShock screaming, "This one. . . TOO SYMMETRICAL!"

[@jimsvideos7201]

B und V certainly weren’t afraid to try new ideas, if nothing else.

[@Ob1sdarkside]

Given the different speeds at which a piston engine and jet engine throttle up at that time, the concept sounds like a nightmare for the pilot

[@josephd.5524]

My favourite flying chaos merchants. Guarantee they had the Pervitin chocolates in a little bowl at the front desk.

[@RemusKingOfRome]

Yes, surely they designed for war hammer ? yes ?

[@josephd.5524]

@@RemusKingOfRome Have you ever played Crimson Skies? I would recommend it!

[@mpetersen6]

Most of these designs were very successful. They were a success at keeping their designers and staff out of uniform.

[@davidhollenshead4892]

Exactly, a lot of defense manufacturers were keeping their designers & engineers from being sent to the Eastern Front just to die for Hitler's Vanity...

[@Mgnostic]

And off the Eastern Front.

[@WarblesOnALot]

G'day..., Yay Team ! By virtue of simple Physics, and Anatomy, nobody sweating over a sweat-stained Drawing-Board and T-Square, meticulously neatly Labelling their Technical Specifications in Indian Ink, on pristine White Paper...; could ever be, Simultaneously Via "Superposition", Slogging through the Mud & Blood & Shit & Tears of the Eastern Front, lugging backpacks full of Panzerfausts into Attack Positions, Against the approaching Waves of T-34s... Funny, How Science Works...; Is that not So ? Such is life, Have a good one... Stay safe. ;-p Ciao !

[@jgrenwod]

Great way to contribute to the war effort and not contribute to the war effort.

[@JamieCarney-dh1or]

Re: engine positioning on the P196 Remember that those German jet engines had metallurgical issues, and very short lifespans as a result. If you put the engines under the fuselage like that, they are extremely easy to maintain/exchange. Burying them in the booms would make maintenance more difficult and replacement more time consuming, resulting in lower availability per individual airframe.

[@szymonnowak4628]

Not the first to comment, but man, do I love your vids. I've read people being critical of your delivery, but I genuinely enjoy it. Cool Logo ftw!

[@joe3114]

I love the delivery

[@woableattack2990]

Germany just fighting with tooth and nail to try and win the war, meanwhile blohm & voss is sitting on a sofa in the back of the room, high af, going like: "bro what if the plane was like SUPER asymetric wooooooaaaaaahhhh"

[@TheStanbawol]

"

[@Zbigniew_Nowak]

Great job! I like that you provide information about such sometimes completely unknown but interesting projects.

[@lighthousegravyP51]

All these designs by Blohm und Voss (as well as others) are very near and dear to my heart. Thank you for uploading these kinds of videos. I am inspired by them. 🫡

[@danweyant4909]

I've personally visited that Dornier at the Smithsonian collection, it's HUGE.

[@Bob-b7x6v]

Dr. Vogt had some Lovecraftian aircraft designs in his brain.

[@EffequalsMA]

The P196 has Vampire, Venom vibes all over it.

[@brendonbewersdorf986]

Absolutely and I think he might have missed the fact Germany used a twin boom plane already in the fw187 so it's probably not the p-38 that inspired blohm und voss but rather was the plane the bv141 lost to realistically

[@DanRyan-v5y]

Wasn't there a Dutch twin boom around the start of the war as well

[@EffequalsMA]

@@DanRyan-v5y Yeah Fokker made it!

[@gorry123]

Dastardly and Muttley approve them

[@LastGoatKnight]

BV-141 inspirations right there I see. Very happy though, the BV-141 is one of the coolest looking recon planes of WW2

[@Vicarious_Heart]

Luftwaffe: "Why can't you just make a normal plane??!!!" B&V: *SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEECH*

[@Rom3_29]

Define “normal”…

[@Wookie120]

Always enjoy your videos, do not change a bit in your delivery also, it is rather fresh in my opinion, not boring at all!

[@pencilpauli9442]

Mr. Britstanley-Crumhorn: I say old chep, Jerry doesn;t have a sense of humour, what what! Blohm und Voss: Please be holding mein bier stein.

[@admiral_alman8671]

You just say Bier. The Stein part is only used in a very small region, basically only Americans use it for some reason

[@zolmoltia]

This looks so strange, yet so cool

[@ȘtefanRonțu]

U play WT

[@zolmoltia]

Yeah

[@Bob-b7x6v]

A lot of these Luftwaffe 46' planes were just crazy enough to work. The USSR, US, and Britain got a lot of ideas and data from the drawings and wind tunnel models if available.

[@MrDmitriRavenoff]

I always loved the BV 141. Beautiful and strange in its asymmetry.

[@Xubor]

The B in the Star Wars B-Wing stands for Blohm&Voss BTW

[@SportyMabamba]

This makes as much sense as the rest of the canon 🤣 Approved ✅

[@KOZMOuvBORG]

Der B-Ving

[@garethjones9371]

Luv the narration. Always very interesting - good stuff.

[@c4sualcycl0ps48]

4:25 “radial engines are not ideal for a dive bomber” Whole Pacific Theater: “skill issue”

[@patrickgriffitt6551]

Gee it's a shame the Daunless and Helldiver were not very good. BS!

[@stangace20]

Interesting how the P196 looks A LOT like the later dehavilland vampire. Definitely seems like someone at Dehavilland was a fan of B&V designs. Also with the P196 the engines were probably placed where they were for ease of maintenance and likely replacement since early jet engines were very maintenance heavy as well as often being unreliable since it was such a new technology at the time.

[@ThePlecoPal]

Are we sure BV wasn't run by Cave Johnson?

[@ten-o3029]

Blohm & Voss Vampire confirmed

[@ravenclaw8975]

Another great video. As you state, why are they going back to the defunct dive-bomber concept. Structurally-hardened Fw190s (I think the F3 version, though I may be wrong on that) performed well as fighter-bombers on the Eastern Front and had some success in the tip-and-run raids over southern England.

[@Zbigniew_Nowak]

I recently heard an opinion that the whole concept of a fast bomber was stupid, because in practice multi-role fighters with attached bombs turned out to be the best. And although I have some doubts here (the fighters were smaller planes than, for example, the Ju-88 and the operational range had to be smaller)... However, this "multiplication of entities beyond the need" and the creation of small single-engine dive bombers was actually questionable...Let's say, in my opinion, accepted, but only on a "who can forbid the rich" principle - if you have a large cover of fighters...

[@mycatistypingthis5450]

​@@Zbigniew_Nowak on the other hand the Mosquitos were quite succesful.

[@ravenclaw8975]

@@Zbigniew_Nowak I think you are on to something there. In the days without sophisticated targeting software, a fast bomber pilot would have little chance to aim, release and get the bomb on target. Thanks for adding to the discussion.

[@Zbigniew_Nowak]

@@ravenclaw8975 I remember once asking an aviation nerd how exactly planes like the F4U Corsair or Douglas A-20 aimed their bombs at the target while passing quickly over the target. He explained to me how it was possible. Unfortunately, I cannot repeat his explanations :(

[@Zbigniew_Nowak]

@@mycatistypingthis5450 In fact, they were, which is why I say I doubt whether a small multi-role fighter could always be the solution. A larger twin-engine plane will carry more weight at a reasonable speed.

[@womble321]

Certain aspects look very much like the Vampire and Meteor. Makes you think.

[@Mgnostic]

Lots of inspiration for foam board R/C airplanes.

[@kitten-inside]

Oh, wow, you found some Blohm & Voss prototypes that were not "asymmetrical just because we could". Looking at their list of designs, that is an achievement.

[@bigblue6917]

Okay. Did we all look at the P.193 and think Grand Pa Warthog

[@torstenbock5236]

Right away! The thing looks like a mix of an A10 and a Predator drone (or was it the Global Hawk?).

[@JetBirdZ]

The offset engine may have opened up some tactical advantages , eg using engine as potential shield in ground attack.

[@guletz13]

Love this!

[@dude126]

Had an Airfix model of the BV 141 as a kid.

[@fireems1187]

The delays may have been due to the bombing of engine plants

[@Bob-b7x6v]

I like the pusher with the 2 37mm anti-tank guns.

[@RemusKingOfRome]

All those designs would put a person with OCD into a catatonic state. hmmmm Maybe BnV were just good old Sadists. :D Another great video. k

[@ronaldbyrne3320]

Brilliant look at Blohm & Voss. If anything this company makes building plastic aircraft models much more interesting for me. 😅

[@briancavanagh7048]

Interesting that the Luftwaffe was looking at building from new both a specific dive bomber & ground attack aircraft. The extra resources needed in material & labour to build specific production lines in a limited resource environment which were obviously in short supply. Britain in a similar limited resource environment repurposed their failed mid war fighter replacement, the Typhoon, to ground attack. In the USA, land of abundance their fighters were tasked with ground attack when the shortage of aerial target became hard to find. Allied specialised dive bombers & ground were proposed and unorthodox configurations were experimented but the very standard configuration remained. This is mainly due to keeping the production lines running of existing airframes. In a war you fight with what you have. B & V would have served the Luftwaffe more efficiently by being a sub contractor building parts to the Bf109 or Fw190.

[@chrisbraswell8864]

Saw a BV237 in a large radio-controlled model at a RC Air Show. It seemed to fly fine, and the pilot said it flew about like any other he had flown.

[@Bob-b7x6v]

B&V built some crazy asymmetrical aircraft.

[@michaelogden5958]

1:43 Naaah... winglets? So these guys in the 1930s thought winglets were a good idea, but it took like 50 years for the idea to catch on? That's interesting. 🙂

[@charlesrousseau6837]

The main problem with the BV141 types was that these were only stable and balanced within a very small speed range. Which, with an intended role as a reconnaissance aircraft with a medium power BMW 139 engine, wasn't that much of a problem and the airplane reportedly flew fine. Trouble started when the BMW 139 was replaced by the BMW 701 engine of much higher power. The unflexible asymmetric airframe layout had not been designed for such a power increase and subsequent flight tests showed only marginal stability. For a role as a dive bomber with huge differences in airspeed, resulting in vastly varying air loads on the cabin pod and engine boom, I can only imagine that aircraft balance must have been terrible.

[@geesehoward700]

Ha127 looks like it would be far happier flying upside down

[@captain_commenter8796]

B&V designers must have been getting some of the meth the army was getting 😂

[@MrJohndoakes]

The real Stuka "successors" were the F and G variants of the Focke-Wulf 190 fighter, but even then they were never built in the same numbers as the Ju.87, and the Stuka was still chugging along until 1945 as a night harassment aircraft, tankbuster, glider tug, and counterinsurgency ground attack aircraft.

[@EffequalsMA]

Some really wacky deigns here!

[@jean-francoislemieux5509]

i like them for the same reasons...their sea planes were kick ass

[@ChristianMcAngus]

I've seen an early design drawing for the A10 that had contra rotating pusher props. Not sure if that was real or not. But as well as aerodynamic problems, pusher props would make pilot escape problematic, especially without ejection seats.

[@iankemp2627]

My theory is that the other German aircraft designers allowed B&V to exist solely so that when the former turned out a bad design, they could excuse it with "well at least it's not as bad as the latest that B&V have come up with".

[@builder396]

23:10 Good question, but I think they did think of that and angled the jet engine accordingly to preserve that balance. On the image before you could clearly see it angled down (so nozzle angled up), God knows how much its angled to the side.

[@womble321]

Anyone notice the winglets?

[@sim.frischh9781]

Looking at B&V designs can give a man a seizure XD

[@doc_sav]

The world was having a war but Blohm and Voss was just having fun with it.

[@kendalldavis99]

B&V using left turning tendencies to make a perfectly flying plane that looks like that is unhinged

[@flickingbollocks5542]

Why bother with camouflage if you are going to paint bright yellow on the extremeties?

[@patrickgriffitt6551]

The yellow on German and Japanese aircraft and the white et al on US aircraft was used for identification in combat to prevent own goals. National insignia were not that visible in a shooting engagement. The colors are easily hidden on the ground. May I point out the large yellow and or black and white stripes the US used in Korean War.

[@stevewinegar6364]

I wonder why they didn't put the 196's engines on top of the fuselage to protect them from ground fire.

[@TinyBearTim]

Why would anyone want to dive with a single off centre engine

[@GraniteGhost778]

See with the P 196 I was thinking you could place the engines in either the booms or the wing roots the way the de Havilland Vampire did.

[@DanRyan-v5y]

In the vampire the engine was behind the pilot, only the intakes were in the wing roots

[@DeaconBlu]

😆😆😎👍 Great vid mate. Thanks!

[@BigUziVert2190]

yay im actually pretty early to the vid! keep up the great work!

[@DucDervin]

Historians have the BV single jet engine the tailless one swept wings even better that Heinkel, the emergency facility fighter.

[@EffequalsMA]

Jet engines just use pounds for thrust, not pounds/feet. That's for rotational torque, like lug nuts.

[@Bob-b7x6v]

You can tell it's a Planet Models Luftwaffe 46' kit because the box art is in black and white.

[@SoloRenegade]

P-39 and P-63 had a long dependable drive shaft. it's been done many times successfully.

[@elennapointer701]

That P.193 design is pretty horrifying. Aside from the likelihood of tail strikes on landing, in the event of a belly landing the engine could break from its mounts and crush the pilot, As for baling out with a whirling propeller behind him and ejection seat technology barely existing at that time... yikes.

[@Deviation4360]

I guess the German designers couldn't get past the eminent simplicity (for the time) of their podded jet engine. It would have made sense to them to eliminate the untried complexity of inlet and exhaust ducting within the fuselage. The jet in the tail idea also makes a design more unstable the further back it is set (see real estate of verticle stabs on most modern jet fighters)

[@JulienGardner]

I love your chanel

[@herschelmayo2727]

Did none of these engineers bother to reverse the wing shape, and notice it had less drag in wind tunnel tests?

[@thefly7331]

Im noticing a trend in this video. What ever BV makes at this point is to "replace the stuka"

[@Bob-b7x6v]

Ironically, this design would've been quite acceptable as a better Stuka by 1943...

[@TheoAbner-k8r]

Actually they didn't need to tell blohm& voss to stop,they needed to tell Hitler& the air ministry that they were on the defensive not offensive hence needing (offensive)aircraft, something they apparently never realized until much later in the war

[@zaphodqi122]

2:06 Hamburger aircraft factory

[@garethcairncross3312]

🍔✈️🏭

[@BenJamInn-q3o]

Id imagine that the Germans knew what they were designing considering how the entire aeronautical/ space/ maritime...etc industries are based upon their work

[@weldonwin]

Blohm And Voss: When no one in the design room is Sober...

[@waynesworldofsci-tech]

Blohm and Voss - Effing the Uneffable in airplane design studios near you.

[@jagsdomain203]

Blomenvas seems like the Kelly Johnson of Germany

[@patrickgriffitt6551]

They just did not have the luxury of time,resources and government support that the Skunk Works have.

[@KOZMOuvBORG]

25:30 Lutfwaffe's answer for the B-Wing? 26:33

[@richardsweeney197]

The tail section looks more like the Saab J-21.

[@bverheijden]

The P196 looks almost like a de Havilland Venom. Move the jet engines in the fuselage and you are almost there.

[@matttrafton2725]

Javisst. The BV 138 is way better than the vaunted PBY

[@BenJamInn-q3o]

BV P.204 did not have a centrally mounted fuselage.

[@DanRyan-v5y]

The 178 looks like a meteor lost an engine

[@Bob-b7x6v]

How were you supposed to bail out of the P.187 without becoming red mist and corned beef hash again?!

[@patrickgriffitt6551]

Reference Do335 or Martin XB-42 Mixmaster

[@bernardedwards8461]

If I keep deleting them I am bombarded by McAffee and Edge adverts at the rate of one a second, and if I stop deleting them its only one every minute or two. This makes it very diffucult to communicate by email with my GP and I have no phone. As I am extremely annoyed they have no hope of selling me anything, so why do they do it?

[@janmale7767]

The Germans were super innovative! 💥

[@alm5992]

17:07 Germany didn't steal the P-38 design- they already had the FW-189, so technically America stole the design from Germany.

[@solarflare623]

German speakers! What is that bomb saying to Churchill?! The font is impossible for me to type into google translate

[@wwmoggy]

wow winglets back in the 193os

[@mukadewolf530]

B-29 : i am unique Tu-4 D-500 , B-29 AWACS : PUNY SILLY PLANE.

[@jaanikaapa6925]

I wonder if the B-Wing designers were fans of B&V

[@oheebatch_algorytmu]

Check out who really brought them to USA...

[@alexprost7505]

25:26 be strong clarence))

[@emaheiwa8174]

So the DeHavilland Vampire was a stolen design. 😤