Heinkel He 112
infobox Aircraft
name = He 112
type = Fighter
manufacturer =
caption =
designer =
first flight =September
introduction =
retired =
status =
primary user =
more users =
Royal Hungarian Air Force
Royal Romanian Air Force
produced =
number built =<100
unit cost =
developed from =
variants with their own articles =
Design and development
In the early 1930s, the German authorities started placing orders for new aircraft, initially training and utility aircraft. Heinkel, as one of the most experienced firms in the country, received contracts for a number of two-seat aircraft, including the He 45, He 46 and He 50. The company also worked on single-seat fighter designs, which culminated in the He 49 and later with the improved He 51.
When the He 51 was tested in combat in the
In October 1933,
Heinkel's design was created primarily by twin brothers Walter and Siegfried Günter, whose designs would dominate most of Heinkel's work. They started work on Projekt 1015 in late 1933 under the guise of the original courier aircraft, based around the
The primary source of inspiration for the 112 is their earlier
In many ways, the resulting 112 design was a scaled-down He 70. Like the He 70, the 112 was constructed entirely of metal, using a two-spar wing and a monocoque fuselage with flush-mounted rivets. The gear retracted outward from the low point of the wing's gull-bend, which resulted in a fairly wide nine-meter track, giving the plane excellent ground handling. Its only features from an older era were its open cockpit and fuselage spine behind the headrest, which were included to provide excellent vision and make the biplane-trained pilots feel more comfortable.
Prototypes
The first prototype, He 112 V1, was completed on 1 September 1935, but as the
The second prototype, V2, was completed on
The V3 took to the air in January. Minor changes included a larger radiator, fuselage spine and vertical stabilizer, but it was otherwise largely the same as the clipped wing V2. Other changes included a single cover over the exhaust ports instead of the more common "stack", and it also included modifications to allow the armament to be installed in the cowling. It was expected to join the V2 in testing, but instead was assigned back to Heinkel in early 1937 for tests with rocket propulsion. During a test, the rocket exploded and the plane was destroyed, but in an amazing effort the V3 was rebuilt with several changes, including an enclosed cockpit.
The contest
The 112V1 started in the head-to-head contest when it arrived at
At this point, the 112 was the favorite over the "unknown" 109, but opinions changed when the 109V2 arrived on
As would be expected, the 112 had better turn performance due to its larger wing, but the 109 was faster at all altitudes and had considerably better agility and aerobatic abilities. During spin tests on the
Meanwhile, news came in that
Testing continued until October, at which point some of the additional zero series planes had arrived. At the end of September, there were four He 112s being tested, yet none was a match for the 109. From October on, the Bf 109 appears to have been selected as the winner of the contest. Although no clear date is given, in "Stormy Life"
He 112A
Prototypes
Heinkel had expected orders for additional aircraft beyond the initial three prototypes, and was able to respond quickly to the new contract for the 15 zero series aircraft. The new planes would be given the series designation He 112A-0.
The first of these new planes, V4, was completed in June 1936. It included the more powerful 210Da engine with a two-speed
In July, both V5 and V6 were completed. V5 was identical to V4, with the 210Da engine, and it also sported two fuselage-mounted 7.92 mm
The last of the prototype A-0 series was V8, which was completed in October. It switched engines entirely and mounted the
In March 1937, the plane was assigned to rocket propulsion tests at
Production models
At this point, the prototype stage was ostensibly over, and Heinkel continued building the A-0 as production line models. The naming changed, adding a production number to the end of the name, so the next six planes were known as 112A-01 through 112A-06. All of these included the 210C engine and were essentially identical to V6, with the exception of the radiator.
These planes were used in just as varied a manner as the earlier V series had been. A-01 flew in October 1936 and was used as the prototype for a future 112C-0 carrier based aircraft. It was later destroyed during rocket tests. A-02 flew in November, and then joined the earlier V models at
The last two models of the A-0 series, A-05 and A-06, were completed in March 1937. They were both shipped to Japan as the initial machines of the 30 for the
He 112B
Prototypes
In October 1936, the RLM changed the orders for the zero series 112s, instructing Heinkel to complete any A-0s already under construction and then switch the remaining planes to an updated design. This gave Heinkel a chance to improve the 112, which they did by completely redesigning it into an almost entirely new aircraft called the 112B. It is at this point that it became a modern design that could compete head-to-head with the Bf 109.
The 112B had a completely redesigned and cut-down rear fuselage, a new vertical stabilizer and rudder, and a completely-enclosed cockpit with a bubble-style canopy. The canopy was somewhat more complex than later bubble designs; instead of having two pieces with the majority sliding to the rear, the 112B's canopy was in three pieces and the middle slid back and over a fixed rear section. Even with the additional framing, the 112 still had excellent visibility for its day. Armament was also standardized on the B model with two 7.92 mm MG17s in the sides of the cowling with 500 rounds each, and two 20 mm
The first B series airframe to be completed was V7 in October 1936. V7 used the DB 600Aa engine like the A-series V8, and it also used the original V1 style larger wing. This wing was later replaced with a smaller one, but instead of the clipped version from the earlier V models, a completely new single-spar fully elliptical wing was produced. This design became standard for the entire B series. V7 was turned over to von Braun in April 1937 for yet more rocket tests, and managed to survive the experience. It was then returned in the summer and sent to
The next plane was V9 which flew in July 1937, powered by the 680 hp Jumo 210Ea engine. V9 can be considered to be the "real" B series prototype, as V7 had received the DB 600Aa originally for experimental reasons. The entire surface was now flush riveted and the plane had several other aerodynamic cleanups. The radiator was again changed, this time to a semi-retractable design for reduced drag in flight. The plane also underwent a weight reduction program which reduced the empty weight to 1617 kg.
As a result of all of these changes, the V9 had a maximum speed of 485 km/h (301 mph) at 4000 m, and 430 km/h (267 mph) at sea level. This was a full 20 km/h faster than the contemporary 109B-2. Nevertheless, by this time, the 109 was already ramping up production, and the RLM saw no need for another largely similar plane. It is also worth noting that users of the plane generally found it impossible to reach this speed, and rarely managed to exceed 260 mph.
The RLM had already contracted for another six 112s, so production of the prototypes continued. V10 was supposed to receive the 960 hp
The last prototype, V12, was actually an airframe taken off the B-1 series production line (which had started by this point). The 210Ea was replaced with the new fuel-injected 210Ga, which improved performance of the engine to 700 hp for takeoff, and a sustained output of 675 hp at the reasonably high altitude of 4700 m. Better yet, the Ga also "decreased" fuel consumption, thus increasing the plane's endurance. The new engine gave V12 such a boost that it became the pattern plane for the planned B-2 series production.
With all of these different versions and experimental engine fits, it might seem like every aircraft differed significantly. But with the exception of the engine fits, the Bs are all basically identical. Due to the shortage of just about any German engine at the time and the possibility that advanced versions could be blocked for export, various models had to be designed with different installations. Thus the B models were different only in their engine, the 210C in the B-0, the 210Ea in the B-1, and the 210Ga for the B-2.
Production models
In order to show off the He 112, V9 spent much of the later half of 1937 being flown by pilots from all over the world. It was also sent around Europe for tours and air shows. The effort was a success and orders quickly started coming in. However, a variety of problems meant few of these were ever delivered.
The first order was from the
Spain was so impressed with the 112's performance during evaluation in the civil war that the Spanish Air Force purchased the twelve planes in early 1938, and later increased the order by another six (some sources say five). Of the first twelve, two were shipped in November, another six in January, and the rest in April.
In November 1937, an
In April, it looked like
A similar setback would accompany sales efforts targeting the
Fortunes would be seem to be reversed with
The final and perhaps most successful customer for the 112B was
By this point war had broken out, and with better models on the market –including Heinkel's own He 100– no one else was interested in purchasing the design. The production line was closed after a total of only 98 planes, 85 of those being the B series models.
Operational service
Condor Legion
When it was clear the 112 was losing the contest to the Bf 109, Heinkel offered to re-equip V6 with 20 mm cannon armament as an experimental aircraft. She was then broken down and shipped to
Oberleutnant Wilhelm Balthasar used it to attack an armoured train and an armoured car. Other pilots flew it, but the engine seized during landing in July and she was written off.
For the annexation of the
The Japanese rejected the He 112 as a fighter but took 30 for training duties, and V11 with its DB 600Aa was used for testing.
The Spanish government purchased twelve 112Bs. This increased to 19. The He 112s were to operate as top cover for Fiat fighters in the opening stages of the Civil War, the Fiat having considerably worse altitude performance. In the event, only a single kill was made with the He 112 as a fighter and it was moved onto ground attack work.
During the Second World War, when Allied forces landed in North Africa, Spanish forces in
Hungary
Like the Germans, Hungary had stiff regulations imposed on her armed forces with the signing of the
One of the highest priorities for the forces was to re-equip the MKHL as soon as possible. Of the various planes being considered, the 112B eventually won out over the competition, and on 7 September, an order was placed for 36 planes. The Heinkel production line was just starting, and with Japan and Spain in the queue, it would be some time before the planes could be delivered. Repeated pleas to be moved to the top of the queue failed.
Germany had to refuse the first order at the beginning of 1939 because of its claimed neutrality in the Hungarian/Romanian dispute over Transylvania. In addition, the RLM refused to license the Oerlikon 20 mm MG FF cannon to the Hungarians, likely as a form of political pressure. This later insult did not cause a problem, because they planned to replace it with the locally-designed Danuvia 20 mm cannon anyway.
V9 was sent to Hungary as a demonstrator after a tour of Romania, and arrived on
With the Japanese and Spanish orders filled, things were looking up for Hungary. However, at that point, Romania placed its order, and was placed at the front of the queue. It appeared that the Hungarian production machines might never arrive, so the MKHL started pressing for a license to build the plane locally. In May, the Hungarian Manfred-Weiss company in
As it turns out, the B-2 was never delivered; two more of the B-1/U2s with the 210Ea were sent instead. On arrival in Hungary, the 7.9 mm
Late in March, the He 100 V8 took the world absolute speed record, but in stories about the record attempt, the plane was referred to as the He 112U. Upon hearing of the record, the Hungarians decided to switch production to this "new version" of the 112, which was based on the newer engines. Then in August, the Commander-in-Chief of the MKHL recommended that the 112 be purchased as the standard fighter for Hungary (although likely referring to the earlier versions, not the "112U").
At this point, the engine issue came to a head. It was clear that no production line planes would ever reach Hungary, and now that the war was underway, the RLM was refusing to allow their export anyway. Shipments of the Jumo 211 or DB601 were not even able to fulfill German needs, so export of the engine for locally built airframes was likewise out of the question.
By September, the ongoing negotiations with the RLM for the license to build the engines locally stalled, and as a result, the MKHL ordered Manfred-Weiss to stop tooling up for the production line aircraft. The license was eventually canceled in December. The MKHL turned to the Italians and purchased the
Nevertheless, the three B-1/U2 aircraft continued to serve on. In the summer of 1940, tensions with Romania over
By 1941, the planes were ostensibly assigned to defend the Manfred-Weiss plant, but were actually used for training. When Allied bomber raids started in the spring of 1944, the planes were no longer airworthy, and it appears all were destroyed in a massive raid on the Budapest-Ferihegy airport on 9 August.
After the licensed production of the 112B fell through in 1939, the plan was to switch the production line to build a Manfred-Weiss designed plane called the W.M.23 "Ezüst Nyíl" (Silver Arrow). The plane was basically a 112B adapted to local construction; the wings were wooden versions of the 112's planform, the fuselage was made of a plywood over a steel frame, and the engine was a licensed version of the 1000 hp class
It would seem that this "simplified" plane would be inferior to the 112, but in fact the higher-powered engine made all the difference and the W.M.23 proved to be considerably faster than the 112. Nevertheless, work proceeded slowly and only one prototype was built. The project was eventually canceled outright when the prototype crashed in early 1942. It is still a mystery why so little work had been done in those two years on what appeared to be an excellent design.
Romania
The
Germany looked on Romania as an important supplier of war material, notably oil and grain. Looking to secure Romania as an ally, throughout the middle of the 1930s, Germany applied increasing pressure in a variety of forms, best summed up as the "carrot and stick" approach. The carrot came in the form of generous trade agreements for a variety of products and by the late 1930s, Germany formed about half of all of Romania's trade. The stick came in the form of Germany siding with Romania's enemies in various disputes.
On
Romania was placed in an increasingly bad position as her local allies were gobbled up by Germany, and her larger allies' (Britain and France) assurances of help proved empty, as demonstrated by their lack of action during the invasion of
With Romania now firmly in the German sphere of influence, her efforts to re-arm for the coming war were suddenly strongly backed. The primary concern was the air force, the FARR. Their fighter force at the time consisted of just over 100 Polish
In April 1939, the FARR was offered the Bf 109 as soon as production was meeting German demands. In the meantime, they could take over 24 112Bs that were already built. The FARR jumped at the chance and then increased the order to 30 planes.
Late in April, a group of Romanian pilots arrived at Heinkel for conversion training, which went slowly because of the advanced nature of the 112 in comparison to the PZL. When the training was complete, the pilots returned home in the cockpits of their new aircraft. The planes, all of them B-1s or B-2s, were "delivered" in this manner starting in July and ending in October. Two of the planes were lost, one in a fatal accident during training in Germany on 7 September, and another suffered minor damage on landing while being delivered and was later repaired at SET in Romania.
When the first planes started arriving, they were tested competitively against the locally designed
By
During the troubles with Hungary, the 51st was deployed to Transylvania. Hungarian
When Germany prepared to invade the USSR in 1941, Romania joined it in an effort to regain the territories lost the year before. The FARR was made part of Luftflotte 4 and, in preparation for the invasion, Grupul 5 vânãtoare was sent to
With the opening of the war on 22 June, the 112s were in the air at 10:50am supporting an attack by
Over the next few days, the 112s would be used primarily as ground attack aircraft, where their heavy armament was considered to be more important than their ability to fight in the air. Typical missions would start before dawn and would have the Heinkels strafe Soviet airbases. Later in the day, they would be sent on search and destroy missions, looking primarily for artillery and trains.
Losses were heavy, most not due to combat, but simply because the planes were flying an average of three missions a day and were not receiving adequate maintenance. This problem affected all of the FARR, which did not have the field maintenance logistics worked out at the time. On 29 July, a report on the readiness of the air forces listed only fourteen 112s in flyable condition, and another eight repairable. As a result the planes of the 52nd were folded into the 51st to form a single full strength squadron on the 13th of August. The men of the 52nd were merged with the 42nd who flew IAR.80s, and were soon sent home to receive IAR.80s of their own. A report from August on the 112 rated it very poorly, once again noting its lack of power and poor speed.
For a time, the 51st continued in a front-line role, although it saw little combat. When Odessa fell on 16 October, the Romanian war effort ostensibly ended, and the planes were considered to be no longer needed at the front. Fifteen were kept at Odessa and the rest were released to Romania for training duty (although they seem to have seen no use). On 1 November, the 51st moved to Tatarka and then returned to Odessa on the 25th, performing coastal patrol duties all the while. On
On 19 July one of the He 112s took to the air to intercept Soviet bombers in what was the first night mission by a Romanian plane. As the Soviets were clearly gearing up for a night offensive on Bucharest, the 51st was then re-equipped with Me 110 night fighters and became the only Romanian night fighter squadron.
By 1943 the IAR.80 was no longer competitive, and the FARR started an overdue move to a newer fighter. The fighter in this case was the barely competitive Bf 109G. The 112s found themselves actively being used in the training role at last. The inline engine and general layout of the German designs was considered similar enough to make it useful in this role, and as a result the 112s came under the control of the Corpul 3 Aerian (3rd Air Corps). Several more of the 112s were destroyed in accidents during this time. It soldiered on in this role into late 1944, even after Romania had changed sides and joined the Allies.
pecifications (He 112A-0 V4)
aircraft specifications
plane or copter?=plane
jet or prop?=prop
ref=Fact|date=July 2007
crew=1
capacity=
payload main=
payload alt=
length main= 9.0 m
length alt=29 ft 5⅜ in
span main=11.5 m
span alt=37 ft 8¾ in
height main=3.7 m
height alt=12 ft 1⅝ in
area main= 23.2 m²
area alt= 250.5 ft²
airfoil=
empty weight main= 1680 kg
empty weight alt= 3,704 lb
loaded weight main=
loaded weight alt=
useful load main=
useful load alt=
max takeoff weight main=
max takeoff weight alt=
more general=
engine (prop)=
type of prop=liquid–cooled inverted
number of props=1
power main= 680 hp
power alt=507 kW
power original=
max speed main= 488 km/h
max speed alt= 303 mph
cruise speed main=
cruise speed alt=
stall speed main=
stall speed alt=
never exceed speed main=
never exceed speed alt=
range main= 1,100 km
range alt=684 miles
ceiling main= 8,000 m
ceiling alt= 26,245 ft
climb rate main=
climb rate alt=
loading main=102.5 kg/m
loading alt=
power/mass main=
power/mass alt=
more performance=
armament=3 × 7.92 mm
avionics=
pecifications (He 112B-2)
aircraft specifications
plane or copter?= plane
jet or prop?= prop
ref=
crew=1
capacity=
payload main=
payload alt=
length main= 9.22 m
length alt= 30 ft 11 7/8 in)
span main= 9.09 m
span alt= 29 ft 9¾ in
height main= 3.82 m
height alt= 12 ft 6¾ in
area main= 17 m²
area alt= 183 ft²
airfoil=
empty weight main= 1,617 kg
empty weight alt= 3,565 lb
loaded weight main=
loaded weight alt=
useful load main=
useful load alt=
max takeoff weight main= 2,248 kg
max takeoff weight alt= 4,957 lb
more general=
engine (prop)=
type of prop=liquid–cooled inverted
number of props=1
power main= 522 kW
power alt= 700 hp
power original=
max speed main= 510 km/h
max speed alt= 317 mph
cruise speed main=
cruise speed alt=
never exceed speed main=
never exceed speed alt=
stall speed main=
stall speed alt=
range main= 1150 km
range alt= 715 miles
ceiling main= 9,500 m
ceiling alt= 31,200 ft
climb rate main=
climb rate alt=
loading main= 132 kg/m²
loading alt= 27.1 lb/ft²
power/mass main=
power/mass alt=
more performance=
armament=
* 2 × 7.92 mm
* 2 × 20 mm
avionics=
References
Notes
Bibliography
* Bernád, Dénes. "Heinkel He 112 in action". Carrollton, Texas: Squadron/Signal Publications Inc., 1996.
* Fleischer, Seweryn. "Heinkel 112 (Wydawnictwo Militaria 164)" (in Polish). Warszawa, Poland: Wydawnictwo Militaria, 2002. ISBN 83-7219-145-X.
* Heinkel, Ernst. "Stormy Life". E.P. Dutton, 1956.
* Hirsch, R.S. "Heinkel 100, 112 (Aero Series 12)". Fallbrook, California: Aero Publishers, Inc., 1967. ISBN 0-81680-544-X.
* Kens, Karl-Heinz. "He 112 Took Only Second Place". "Flug Revew 1/2000". Stuttgart, Germany: Motor-Presse Verlag, 1999. [http://www.flug-revue.rotor.com/FRheft/FRH0001/FR0001d.htm]
External links
* [http://www.csd.uwo.ca/Elevon/baugher_other/he112.html Heinkel He 112]
* [http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/LRG/he112.html The Luftwaffe Resource Group He 112 page]
* [http://avia.russian.ee/air/germany/he-112.html He 112, along with illustrations and a three-view]