Craig, 'C' Stoff C-Stoff - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia T-Stoff - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Wicked stuff! Regards and Happy birthday. Tom
This is the aircraft which Wolfgang Spate flew the world's first operational rocket fighter sortie on 14th May 1944. The groundcrew had given it a special tomato red paint job! Taken from Osprey Aircraft of the Aces 17 Thanks Tom
The development cost of the aircraft from the outset to getting a test aircraft in the air. The tooling up and workforce as you point out Kev, the fuel types their production transportation , safe storage and all that that would entail , training of groundcrews , pilots , locations of the aircraft - how compatible would operating the type have been with other aircraft , placing of them in a position to allow their limited range to intercept bombers on a regular basis , the design and production of specialist transport systems for the aircraft , development of pilots protective clothing (and that of ground crews). The saftey aspect is quite daunting in itself - an aircraft which is a delicate flying bomb - dangerous on take of and laning , landing on a ski - on a grass surface - a surface which would hamper either take off /recovery or landing depending on the nature of the weather. ( Landing in dry conditions - the impact - potential for damage - leaks of unspent fuel - wet weather - cutting up grass surfaces in landing and recovery of the aircraft). What was the service life of the engine - spare parts , how long to train pilots - they would have had to be experienced - there was no dual trainer - this took these men out of combat circulation to train them and get the craft operational. My understanding is that many of the aircraft were grounded because of fuel shortages . By reckoning the cost of operating the type has placed against what it achieved - balance the cost of the project against nine B-17's / B-24's and that is what it cost. The limited range / endurance - the high risk factors presneted by the dangerosu fuel compounds, the accident rate , the loss of expereinced aircrew , the targeting difficulties which were never really resolved. It was an aircraft designed and built for pure speed but so fast that it out paced those it was designed to shoot down - speed worked against it. To me it just does not seem that it was a practical weapon for German to develop at that stage of the war - the 262 offerred far better returns. It just seems to have had more potential problems and very real dangers for those who operated the type - it was just not a safe design to begin with.
