Messerschmitt
Bf109
Photo: Robert Deering 1973
Greater Southwest International Airport (GSW)
Fort Worth, Texas
Messerschmitt AG was a famous German aircraft manufacturing corporation (AG) named for its chief designer, Willy Messerschmitt, and known primarily for its World War II fighter aircraft, notably the Bf 109 and Me 262. The company survived in the post-war era, undergoing a number of mergers and changing its name from Messerschmitt to Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm before being bought by DASA in 1989, now part of EADS.
PHOTOS        
Military Aircraft        

Bf 108
Taifun

Bf 109

Me 163
Komet

Me 262
Schwalbe
 

HISTORY

Wilhelm Emil "Willy" Messerschmitt graduated from the Munich Institute of Technology in 1923, with Messerschmitt founding his own aircraft company that same year at Augsburg, Bavaria. At first, Messerschmitt built sailplanes, but within two years had progressed via motor gliders to small powered aircraft - sports and touring types. These culminated in the Messerschmitt M 17 and Messerschmitt M 18 designs, which Messerschmitt sold to Bayerische Flugzeugwerke (BFW) (Bavarian Aircraft Works) in 1927, when the Bavarian state government encouraged a merger between the two companies. Messerschmitt became the chief designer and engineer, and formed a design team.

One of the first designs, the Messerschmitt M20, was a near-catastrophe for the designer and the company. Many of the prototypes crashed, one of them killing Hans Hackmack, a close friend of Erhard Milch, the head of Deutsche Luft Hansa and the German civil aviation authorities. Milch was upset by the lack of response from Messerschmitt and this led to a lifelong hatred towards him. Milch eventually cancelled all contracts with Messerschmitt and forced BFW into bankruptcy in 1931. However, the German re-armament programs and Messerschmitt's friendship with Hugo Junkers prevented a stagnation of the careers of him and BFW, which was started again in 1933. Milch still prevented Messerschmitt's takeover of the BFW until 1938, hence the designation "Bf" of early Messerschmitt designs.

Messerschmitt promoted a concept he called "light weight construction" in which many typically separate load-bearing parts were merged into a single reinforced firewall, thereby saving weight and improving performance. The first true test of the concept was in the Bf 108 Taifun sports-plane, which would soon be setting all sorts of records. Based on this performance the company was invited to submit a design for the Luftwaffe's 1935 fighter contest, winning it with the Bf 109, based on the same construction methods.

From this point on Messerschmitt became a favorite of the Nazi party, as much for his designs as his political abilities and the factory location in southern Germany away from the "clumping" of aviation firms on the northern coast. BFW was reconstituted as Messerschmitt AG on July 11, 1938, with Willy Messerschmitt as chairman and managing director. The renaming of BFW resulted in the company's RLM designation changing from Bf to Me for all newer designs that were accepted by the RLM after the acquisition date. Existing types, such as the Bf 109 and 110, retained their earlier designation in official documents, although sometimes the newer designations were used (in error) as well, most often by subcontractors, such as Erla Flugzeugwerke of Leipzig. In practise, all BFW/Messerschmitt aircraft from the Bf 108 four-seat touring monoplane, to the Bf 163 light observation aircraft (not the same plane as the later Me 163 rocket fighter) were prefixed Bf, all later types with Me.

During the World War II Messerschmitt became a major design supplier, their Bf 109 and Bf 110 forming the vast majority of fighter strength for the first half of the war. Several other designs were also ordered, including the enormous Me 321 Gigant transport glider, and its six-engined follow on, the Me 323. However for the second half of the war, Messerschmitt turned almost entirely to jet-powered designs, producing the world's first operational jet fighter, the Me 262 Schwalbe ("Swallow"). They also produced the DFS-designed Me 163 Komet, the first rocket-powered design to enter service.

Messerschmitt relied heavily on slave labor to produce much of the parts needed for these planes during the second half of World War II; these parts were assembled in an enormous underground tunnel system in Sankt Georgen an der Gusen, Austria. Slave labor was provided by inmates of the brutal KZ Gusen I and Gusen II camps, and by inmates from nearby Mauthausen concentration camp, all located near the St. Gorgen quarries. 40,000 inmates from Spain, Italy, Poland, Slovenia, France, Russia, Hungarian Jews and twenty other nationalities were murdered during the production of these planes at KZ Gusen. Messerschmitt officials maintained barracks at the concentration camp to oversee the work being done by the inmates. Messerschmitt, and its executive Willy Messerschmitt also occupied the famed Villa Tugendhat in Brno, Czech Republic, designed by Mies van der Rohe and Lilly Reich in the 1920s; the Messerschmidt aircraft factory office and the Gestapo occupied the property during the war.

Messerschmitt had its share of poor designs as well; the Me 210, designed as a follow-on to the 110, was a disaster that almost led to the forced dissolution of the company. The design problems were eventually addressed in the Me 410 Hornisse, but only small numbers were built before all attention turned to the 262. Late in the war, Messerschmitt also worked on a heavy Amerikabomber design, the Me 264, which flew in prototype form but was too late to see combat.

After World War II, the company was not allowed to produce aircraft. One alternative the company came up with was the three-wheeled motorcycle/bubble car or Kabinenroller (cabinscooter) KR175 / KR200, which was designed by an aircraft engineer Fritz Fend.

The cars were actually made by Fend's own company in the Messerschmitt works at Regensburg and Willy Messerschmitt had very little to do with the vehicles other than ruling that they carried his name. Production of the KR200 ceased in 1964.

Less known is the fact that the Messerschmitt factory also produced prefabricated houses, which were designed as "self-building-kits" mainly based on an alloy frame work.

On 6 June 1968, Messerschmitt AG merged with the small civil engineering and civil aviation firm Bölkow, becoming Messerschmitt-Bölkow. The following May, the firm acquired Hamburger Flugzeugbau (HFB), the aviation division of Blohm + Voss. The company then changed its name to Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm (MBB). In 1989 MBB was taken over by Deutsche Aerospace AG (DASA), which was renamed Daimler-Benz Aerospace in 1995. The former DASA now operates as "EADS Germany".

Source: Wikipedia 

AIRCRAFT    
M17 1925 Sports aircraft
M18 1926 Passenger transport
M19 1927 Sports aircraft
M20 1928 Passenger transport
M21 1928 Prototype biplane trainer
M22 1928 Prototype biplane medium bomber
M23 1928 Sports aircraft
M24 1929 Passenger transport
M25   Sports aircraft
M26 1930 Prototype light aircraft
M27 1930 Sports aircraft
M28 1931 Prototype mail-plane
M29 1932 Sports/racing aircraft
M31 1932 Sports aircraft
M33   Ultra-light parasol-wing single-seat monoplane
M35 1933 Sports aircraft developed from M23
M36 1934 Passenger transport
Bf 108 Taifun (Typhoon) 1934 Trainer & transport
Bf 109 1935 Fighter, bomber interceptor
Bf 110 1936 Twin-engine heavy fighter; also used for reconnaissance
Me 155   High-altitude fighter, developed from Bf 109; not built, project transferred to Blohm + Voss as the Bv 155
Bf 161 1938 Reconnaissance aircraft; prototype
Bf 162 Jaguar 1937 Schnellbomber (fast bomber) based on Bf 110
Bf 163 1938 STOL reconnaissance aircraft; prototype built by Weserflug AG, lost military contract to Fieseler Fi 156 Storch
Me 163 Komet (Comet) 1941 Rocket-powered interceptor
Bf 165 1937 Long-range bomber project
Me 208 Improved and enlarged version of Bf 108
Me 209 1938 Designed to break world air speed record; attempted fighter conversion failed
Me 209-II 1943 Fighter; update to Bf 109, never produced
Me 210 1939  
Me 261 Adolfine 1941 Designed as long-range record-setter; three built and used for reconnaissance
Me 262 Schwalbe (Swallow) 1942 Twin-engine fighter & attack aircraft; first operational jet-powered fighter
Me 263   Rocket-powered interceptor; advanced development of Me 163
Me 264 Amerika (America) 1942 Strategic bomber, developed under Amerika Bomber program in competition against Ju 390 and unbuilt He 277
Me 265   Attack aircraft, proposed
Me 309 1942 Fighter; advanced but underperforming design meant to replace Bf 109
Me 310 1941 Pressurized Me 210 development
Me 321 1941 Large transport glider
Me 323 Gigant (Giant)   Large transport aircraft; powered development of Me 321
Me 328 1943 Pulsejet-powered selbstopfer or parasite fighter
Me 329   Heavy fighter-bomber; unpowered glider only
Me 334   Tailless fighter, similar to Me 163 (development abandoned)
Me 362   3-turbojet passenger aircraft (development abandoned)
Me 409   High-altitude fighter project; evolved into Bv 155
Me 410 Hornisse (Hornet) 1943 Twin-engine heavy fighter and fast bomber; development of Me 210
Me 509   Fighter, based on Me 309, with engine located behind cockpit as in P-39 Airacobra
Me 510   Twin-engine fighter-bomber (not built)
Me 609   Heavy fighter; combined two Me 309 fuselages into one airframe, as with Bf 109Z and Me 409 (development abandoned)