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Archive 1Archive 2

Flying the Me 163 section

Prior to my edit, that section contained 3 full paragraphs of direct quotation. We cannot and should not quote so much information from any source. I just cut out all but the first two paragraphs to make the section conform to policy; however, others can certainly come back and re-add some of that info, as long a it is summarized and put into our own words. Qwyrxian (talk) 08:02, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Concur. Ayyway, such info in detail is generally beyond the scope of WP aircraft articles, and should probably be limited to one or two paragraphs in the Design section. - BilCat (talk) 12:37, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Me-163:s nickname

Messerschmitt Me-163 "Komet" is also known by its nickname: "Power-Egg" in German, "Kraft-Ei". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ari-69 (talk • contribs) 20:38, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Do you have a reliable source that asserts that? Qwyrxian (talk) 00:09, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
In Finnish: that means "Voimamuna" - term "muna" has also other, like sexual meanings, not so harsh or rough. I'm adding a link herein: http://dbpedia.org/page/Messerschmitt_Me_163Ari-69 (talk) 20:56, 23 October 2010 (UTC)
This also is such a reliant source: http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Me_163Ari-69 (talk) 21:06, 23 October 2010 (UTC)

Notes & Pronunciations

Both of the pronunciation notes 1 and 2 are incorrect.

Note 1 would properly be "Messer-shmit Koh-met". A double S in the German language continues to sound like the English pronunciation and would not be pronounced as a Z sound.

Note 2 would properly be "Pay-nah-meen-deh". The closest the English language can come to the German ü would be the double e sound as in the words "bee" or "keep". The actual pronuncation is somewhere between an "oo" and "ee" sound. The "de" at the end of Peenemümde would be a "deh" and not a "dah" sound. — Preceding unsigned comment added by BearODice (talk • contribs) 07:16, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Luftwaffe

...is not the right name of the german air-force in 1988.--85.183.157.76 (talk) 17:10, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

Since it's German for "German Air Force", what else would it be? TREKphiler any time you're ready, Uhura 03:24, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

B-1 and B-1a variants

According to Smith, J. Richard, Messerchmitt: An Aircraft Album. New York: Arco, 1971:

"Later in 1943 the first 'powered egg' (as the Me 163B was nicknamed) was delivered to EK 16. The operation Komets were originally equipped with two 20 mm MG 151/20 cannons in the wing roots under the designation Me 163Ba-1.... The operational squadrons were now equipped with the Me 163B-1a which differed from the earlier model in being equipped with two 30 mm MK 108 cannons, a Revi 16B gunsight and full armour protection [emphasis added]." (pp. 87-88)

So, that gives us another source for the "powered egg" designation, and resolves the ambiguity of the B-series designations. Interestingly, it omits any mention of the B-0 pre-production model, simply saying: "The pre-production aircraft all bore Versuchs numbers, the last recorded being the Me 163 V40. Aside from the B-series aircraft, a small batch of ten Me 163A unpowered gliders were built by Wolf Hirth for training purposes." (p. 87)

I didn't want to jump in and make the change, but I hope this information can be put to use. Cheers. Sacxpert (talk) 05:58, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

Someone mixed-up B-0 pre-production and B-1 production aircraft, the former with 2cm and the latter with 3cm cannon. The small a/b letters were typically used for different engine types/manufacturers like on the Me 262 with a for Jumo and b for BMW. Similar info is in the article as well. --Denniss (talk) 13:44, 5 August 2013 (UTC)
I read what the article said about small letters, and they were used for all sorts of things. In the Bf 110G-4, for example, a/b/c/d designations indicated different radar equipment. There was little rationalization of German sub-variant designations, and the Me 163 is another example. It's also possible that this author is correct. From what I read in the article, it sounds to me like wiki-editor speculation as to the source of the various designations. This, at least, is a valid, researched source. 12:09, 6 August 2013 (UTC)
There was no small letter added to the aircraft version just because of different radar installation. That's a common myth also plaguing the Ju 88 article. They sometimes got a small letter or roman numeral painted onto the nose to show different radar generations or usable frequency bands. Not everything written in books is true, especially on very old ones, but this also applies to Wikipedia. As several authors tend to collect info from other books and rebrand this as new book one has to be careful upon selecting sources. Recent research on german ww2 tanks revealed lots of myths and incorrect information in old, older and even recent/reprinted books, thank to Thomas L. Jentz and others to discover this. --Denniss (talk)
Of course books make mistakes. Naturally, such errors are compounded if a second author uses the first as a reference. That said, if one asserts that the books are incorrect, then we need other sources to prove they are wrong, and those sources need to be superior in terms of their references. It's not enough to simply assert "such-and-such an author is wrong" merely because someone read something contrary somewhere, especially if one is not a published author oneself. The matter is doubly tricky today, since online sources assert so many things based on flimsy evidence, speculation, or out-and-out fabrication, such as the Jagdpanzer Krokodil controversy. So, in this case, if the assertion is that Smith is wrong about the Ba-1 and B-1a designations, find sources that disprove this based on specific evidence, either from factory memoranda or official RLM documents. That's all I'm saying. I'm not wedded to any particular author's claims. Sacxpert (talk) 23:45, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
Allgemeine Geräteliste Me 163 B-0 (July 1943): MG 151/20 up to V45, MK 108 from V46. Me 163B manual from August 1944: no subversion stated, just MK 108 or MG 151/20 as armament. Me 163B weapons manual of May 1944 is for MK 108 only. [1] has some Me 163 entries but states only B-0 and B. Conversion section is of more interest as it shows some protos with BMW engine instead of Walther engine. --Denniss (talk) 11:09, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

Non-Germans who flew the Me 163

The "Flying the Me 163" section of the article only mentions a flight by Eric Brown. The "Delta-wing testing" section of Roland Falk's page mention that this other British test pilot had experience flying the Me 163. A seemingly good source is mentioned but I do not have access to it. Any opinion about whether we should include this information here ? Anyone has access to the cited source ? --Jean-Marc Liotier (talk) 14:20, 24 November 2014 (UTC)

The RAF had a ban on both flying and even fuelling the Me 163, because of scare mongering over the propellant's hazards (the RN OTOH adopted submarines with similar fuel chemistry and even commissioned them into service). Several UK test pilots flew the 163 as an unpowered glider, but AFAIK only Brown (famously quick to find and fly new aircraft types before anyone told him not to) managed to fly one under power, before he heard (sic) the letter of the ban. If you haven't yet, read Brown's own books. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:23, 16 January 2015 (UTC)
The Allies issued a ban on the fuels used - C Stoff and T Stoff - and ordered any remaining stocks found destroyed when encountered, as they were considered highly dangerous in untrained ,i.e., Allied, hands - which they were. Soon after hearing of this Brown managed to find a recently-surrendered Luftwaffe operational airfield with a number of intact Me 163B's, fuel stocks, and several Luftwaffe ground crews members who were willing - after he signed a waiver releasing them from any responsibility for his safety - to fuel and supervise the ground operations of an airworthy Komet while fuel was still available. Before the Me 163B flight Brown flew as a glider a non-operational Me 163A that was also present on the airfield to familiarise himself with the flight characteristics. Brown then flew the Me 163B from the ground using the rocket engine as-designed - described by him as IIRC "like being in charge of a runaway train" or something similar. Soon after this the remaining fuel stocks were as ordered, destroyed.
Other Allied pilots flew the Komet - Brown himself flew the RAE's Komet VF241 as a glider several times back at Farnborough - but only as gliders. Brown is therefore the only Allied pilot to ever have flown a Komet in powered flight, as it was intended to be flown. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.148.221.50 (talk) 11:32, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Dangerously Unstable?

I've seen some articles that talk about the instability of swept wing designs and of the Me-163 in particular. Maybe there should be some investigation of this issue and something in the article to point this out. For example:

"Designers in Britain and America swiftly emulated Alexander Lippisch’s tailless rocket-powered Me-163 Komet, building similar (though jet-powered) designs, the de Havilland D.H.108 Swallow and Northrop X-4 Bantam. In service, though, the Me-163 had proved dangerously unstable, as fluctuations in the wing’s center of pressure triggered poorly damped longitudinal pitching, imposing high structural loads. (Pilots compared it to riding over a washboard road.) The Swallow killed experienced test pilot Geoffrey de Havilland (son of the firm’s founder) on September 27, 1946. Flying low over the Thames estuary at Mach 0.875, the aircraft abruptly pitched out of control and broke up." - Supersonic Revolution, R.P. Hallion, HistoryNet, 5/11/11. DonPMitchell (talk) 05:22, 19 September 2015 (UTC)
This washboard quote he mentions seems to be attributed to the Northrop X-4 in other articles. DonPMitchell (talk) 05:30, 19 September 2015 (UTC)
I think Hallion may be inaccurate here. An article in Flying Magazine (Jan 1950) seems to support the notion that the Me-163 behaved quite well. "The plane is said to stall normally and also is reported to be non-spinnable because of the action of the tip slots." Lippisch seems to have been very thoughtful about the wing design. The one criticism of this and his delta-wing proposals was that he did not yet understand the value of thin wings. That was an idea I associated with the NACA, but I haven't researched that deeply. DonPMitchell (talk) 23:32, 19 September 2015 (UTC)
IIRC, Eric "Winkle" Brown seemed to think the Me 163 was quite pleasant to fly, and had very good handling qualities. IIARC, he said that at the time Lippisch was the only one who had understood how to properly design a tailless swept-wing aircraft, and that the 163 was the only one that he had flown that flew well and was enjoyable to fly. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.150.10.189 (talk) 17:44, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

The main way this article doesn't meet the Good Article Criteria is lack of citations and sources. The Land 19:50, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Substituted at 21:52, 26 June 2016 (UTC)

why do all some non-american planes have those "being shot down" gun camera pics

while the american ones don't 94.154.66.240 (talk) 22:39, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't have an exact answer, but images taken by American soldiers in the course of their duty are automatically in the public domain as a work of the U.S. federal government (see Wikipedia:Public domain#U.S. government works). Such images are therefore available to be freely used on projects like Wikipedia. That may not be the case for photographs taken by soldiers of other nations, such as Germany or Japan, if such images even survive to this day. clpo13(talk) 22:44, 11 August 2016 (UTC)
Wrong The government does copyright images and they cannot be used without permission. However most are not but blanket statements are a fools analogy that should be best avoided. 172.56.13.28 (talk) 22:51, 11 August 2016 (UTC)
There may be rare exeptions to US federal government images being in the public domain, but it's certainly not a "fools analogy", whatever that is supposed to mean in this context. If anyone can find copyright free images of US aircraft being shot down, they are welcome to add them where relevent. - BilCat (talk) 23:00, 11 August 2016 (UTC)
And to the OP: There are thousands of articles on Wikipedia about non- American aircraft, and and only a very small percentage have photos of them being shot down. So please stop spamming this comment "everywhere". - BilCat (talk) 23:31, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Reference style

I found a number of references missing or inconsistent. My intentions were not motivated by changing the citation style, in consequence I do not consider this change to be in violation of WP:CITEVAR. Cheers. MisterBee1966 (talk) 08:56, 21 November 2022 (UTC)

WP:BRD welcomes bold editing, but notes that the proper process when challenged is to discuss it, not edit war it back in immediately before that discussion has even begun. Intentions or not, that is a citation style that did not exist in one single instance in the article up until your mass conversion. The inconsistency, in my opinion, was marginal - a vast majority of the citations, close onto 80 percent, were formatted identically in a style you have converted away from - I should know as I added 25% of them recently. Just because it is not your preferred style does not make it invalid or non-established. Kyteto (talk) 19:18, 21 November 2022 (UTC)
@Kyteto: Sorry, I have no intentions of creating an edit war, nor do I want to enforce a new style. You make assumptions on my motivations which are not true. I chose this style of citation because this style has advantages and allows any user to find errors in the references (not saying that they were caused by you nor that they were intentional, it can happen). By reverting, your re-introduced numerous citations which now point nowhere. I recommend you familiarize yourself with User:Ucucha/HarvErrors, it would also assist you in detecting the errors you re-introduced again. Good luck MisterBee1966 (talk) 21:35, 21 November 2022 (UTC)
I agree with Kyteto. WP:CITEVAR applies. Mztourist (talk) 08:51, 22 November 2022 (UTC)
If there are inconsistent cite styles present, the most equitable solution is to standardize on the style used by the very first editor to add a citation, however many years ago that might have been, as that style should have governed all subsequent cites.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 10:47, 22 November 2022 (UTC)
@Sturmvogel 66: I am not sure what you are saying. In my view, the article, in its current state, uses an inconsistent cite style. I acknowledge that it does not yet make use of the {{sfn}} template which I had introduced to fix and unify the citation style. Are you saying that sticking to the preexisting inconsistent style takes precedence to introducing a newer sfn-based style which allows users to detect and fix errors? Is the article not in a better state with citation errors fixed even if it does require consolidation of styles? Cheers MisterBee1966 (talk) 09:50, 23 November 2022 (UTC)

@MisterBee1966: I do lots of copy editing these days as I'm a shift worker and don't have the continuity I used to have for articles. I rarely get criticised for citevar but I only really know sfn so that's what I use to standardise citations; perhaps I'm lucky that no-one reads these articles. I would suggest that Mr Bee has a point about the usefulness of sfn to expose cite errors for remedy. Kyteto and Mztourist are right that the original style should be kept unless there is consensus for a change but what has this done to the article? Are they so committed to the non sfn style that they won't agree to a change if they won't need to do the work? Keith-264 (talk) 14:15, 23 November 2022 (UTC)

@Keith-264: Yes, that is my perception. I had done the change, I had fixed the missing references, and I was reverted purely on account of WP:CITEVAR. MisterBee1966 (talk) 14:50, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
Lets go beyond assumptions about my motions, which may seem to be extremely pessimistic - you could just ask me. I would be overjoyed to accept a new citation style for this article, and am in no way 'so committed' to the non sfn style - however, we're having trouble even agreeing if this is, or isn't, a citevar issue. If we cannot get a consensus on that, it seems that insufficient dialogue has occurred before racing ahead with conversion. The work is all fine and good, as long as we stop flipping two fingers to policy in the process. Good work doesn't overpower the need to do things in the long established and agreed manner. We shouldn't be converting without discussion, and we shouldn't press ahead if we cannot even agree if policy does or doesn't apply. The ends don't justify the means; we can deliver the same result without steamrolling by adhering to due process. If a consensus emerges for 'sfn', then citevar says we should convert. If not, it says the original style should remain. I'm trying to be fair and act no further than what policy would expect. Are we so committed to conversion that we cannot even discuss this? Kyteto (talk) 23:52, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
@Kyteto: I am sorry if I triggered the wrong impression, and yes, I am very open to discussion. So if you and others feel that my attempt at fixing the referencing errors is a good way forward, I will gladly implement the change. MisterBee1966 (talk) 05:53, 26 November 2022 (UTC)
I've readded the references that were radded and then removed in the back and forth - hopefully this is OK?Nigel Ish (talk) 20:21, 26 November 2022 (UTC)
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