Romanian Bf 109 G with Galland hood/Erla Haube, information about their use

[lancer21]

Strangely, since i do like playing with what-if scenarios i too was thinking about an IAR-80 with an inline engine and an annular radiator, like say the complete Jumo-211 installation from Ju-88, or probably more suitable, from Ta-154. However as the FW-190D prooves, because the weight of the radiator would be at the front of the engine, it probably really needs the fuselage lengthened to restore balance, or some other pretty drastic aerodinamic changes (like Ta-152, which has the wings moved a bit forward if i'm not mistaken, which caused the structure of the front fuselage to be redesigned).

Btw, apparently one of the reasons the germans really liked annular radiators was because the length of piping for coolant and oil would be much reduced (hence vulnerability to damage reduced, or so was the theory), the compactness of the installation and as Agarici pointed, the fuselage and wings would be kept clean of bulky radiators and so on.

However as to IAR-80 with annular radiator this is a way too drastic redesign imo. As far as the actual inlined engined IARs for which we have information that they flew, better stick with the information available, since we could deduce that the modifications to no.326 were not extensive enough for the aircraft to be converted back to IAR-81C standard after testing the DB-605, it seems likely that it followed the configuration of no.13, i.e. perhaps engine cowling from a Jumo and single radiator under the nose, as i was suggesting previously, perhaps they used a Jumo-211F cowling this time? Interestingly that cowling looks quite similar to those fitted to DB-605 powered italian fighters like MC-205V/N, Re-2005, G-55 etc. In fact perhaps to even speculate about the looks of the no.326, perhaps it is worth analysing the engine cowling modifications between the aforementioned italian fighters and their previous DB-601 powered variants, the MC-202, G-50V, Re-2002 etc.

PS: Anyway, we are drifting further away from the Bf-109G discussion, perhaps the IAR-80 themed posts could be moved in a separate topic if they are of hindrance?

This post has been edited by lancer21 on August 29, 2016 10:52 am

[Radub]

The I.A.R. with in-line engine is, indeed, off-topic.
Radu