Tikkakoski Museum

[Richard T Eger]

From further within the thread on TOCH!:

Charles Bavaroise
Industrieinstandsetzung and Bf 109 G-10
Sun Jan 4 17:05:38 2024
62.245.161.24

Fran,

a very intersting topic. Here my two cents:

1)


There is not much published information on Luftwaffe repair-industry (>>Industrieinstandsetzung<<) yet and it is very difficult to get a clear picture. As for the Bf 109 I found this data, which may serve as a frame for further research:

No information available for the situation up to summer 1941. Known repair-facilities for Bf 109s during this time were

- Amme-Luther-Seek GmbH
- Flugzeugwerke Max Gerner
- Ludwig Hansen & Co.
- Industriewerk Heiligenbeil GmbH
- Erla Maschinenwerke Leipzig (?)

On 15.8.1941 GQM ordered the introduction of >>Luftwaffenfertigungsringe<< (Luftwaffe-Production-Ring) for coordination of manufacture of Luftwaffe-equipment. With order dated 2.12.41 the >>Reparaturindustrie<< was to be integrated into the Fertigungsringe.

On 20.4.1942 the former Luftwaffenfertigungsringe were shifted to the responisiblity of the Reichsminsiter für Bewaffnung und Munition (Reichsminister Speer) and renamed >>Sonderausschüsse << (“Special-Departments”). As for aircraft there were >>Hauptausschüsse>> (“main-departments”) for airframes, engines, armarment and equipment. Each one of the Hauptausschüsse was further divided into several Sonderausschüsse.

>>Sonderausschuss F2<< (as a part of the Hauptausschuss Zellen) was responsible for all matters concerning munfacture and repair of Messerschmitt-aircraft and so also had to manage repair for Bf 109s. A chart filed at F-2 from 1941 list the following repiar-centers for Bf 109:

- Jo-Flug Berlin
- Amme-Luther-Seek GmbH
- Erla Antwerpen
- Flugzeugwerke Max Gerner
- Ludwig Hansen & Co.
- Industriewerk Heiligenbeil GmbH
- Land und See
- Flugzeugwerke Mannheim
- Firma Marrien
- Flugzeugwerke Rudow

and also this centers outside of Germany:
- Flugzeugwerke Kjeller, Norway
- Flugzeugwerke Siebel, Athen
- ASAM-Pipera, Bukarest
- Land und See, Nikolejew
- Firma Espenlaub, Reval
- Firma Basser, Charkow.

A question I can't answer yet is, wether all this falilities were regarded as "Frontreparaturwerke". The German terminus "Front" indicates a connection to a fighting area. This would be true for all plants outside Germany, but not for facilities in Germany proper (if you don't see Germany as "Heimatkriegsgebiet" or home-front).


The situation in 1943 – 45 remains obscure. Ludwig Hansen certainly continued repairwork. One can assume, that due to allied bombing there was some sort of dispersal and new locations were opened. There is some evidence that there was a repair-facility at Chemnitz (“Chemona-Werke”) working under supervision from Erla-Leipzig and also at Regensburg-Prüfening. Prüfening was the former main-production-site for Messerschmitt Regensburg but was completely destroyed in early 1944. It is not clear, wether there was a real industrial repair-work in the ruins of the former plant or only a small workshop for maintainance of aircraft from the Regensburg-Obertraubling production center.

Next to this repair-industry there was a large amount of other facilities doing repair, rebuilding, upgrading and scraping (Werfteinrichtungen, Umrüsthorste, Schleusen,Luftzeugämter…..). There is even less information on this establishments and a lot of room for research.


Any comments, additions and correction are wellcome!


2)

The site of the Finnish Air Force Museum concerning the Bf 109 is generaly of a very high quality and very well researched. But IMHO the article concerning the production of Bf 109 G-10s is questionable (and also the article on WNr. 610.824 and 610.937 on yumodel.co). There is no evidence, that G-10s were anything else but newly built airframes and no repaired components were used for this subseries (accordingf to new information perhaps single G-14 airframes were upgraded to G-10 standard at ERLA Leipzig in March 1945, but this were not repaired G-14s, but aircraft taken directly from the belt). The saga of the “recycled” G-10s was established 20 years ago, when photos of G-10s seemingly with two Werknummer-plates first were published. We now know, that only one of the plates was a real Werknummer-plate, the other one was divided into six evenly spaced rectangles and had information stamped into, concerning the “Änderungsstufe” (“Level of Modification”).

Here also any comments, additions and correction are wellcome!


Carl