ORIGINAL: Warfare1
I am not a Nazi fan-boy,....
[]... I simply wanted to use it as starting point; not because I believed everything it contains.
[]... I also wanted to show just how advanced Nazi/German research was (the Sanger; the Me P.1101, etc...) even though these weapons never reached any useful stage.
Understood, fair enough. I noticed that you presented both opinions regarding the Amerika bomber, but I wasn't sure about your opinion regarding the collection of myths on the first webby you presented.
ORIGINAL: 06 Maestro
There was another rather advanced concept-heat seeking AA missals. According to A Speer, the developement of this surface to air missal was nearing completion in '42 (IIRC).
If he really emitted that statement, I don't buy it. First indications of the "the fighter-crisis" began to show as early as 1942. This term was used in design offices, and it referred to the critical situation where new piston-engines weren't available. During the crisis later on, most, if not all, recent fighters' piston-engines were tuned/"pimped" versions of the standard designs, which offered at most averages performances - compared to the fast turbo-charged Allied fighters, while (reliably) running for 50 hours, only.
The idea was to create a less expensive way to fight Allied bombers. In order to damage or even destroy several bombers Flak units had to fire several thousand flak rounds (one source indicates 4000 rounds for a similar example). Such an amount of ammo cost several hundred thousand Reichsmarks. In contrast, one rocket cost up to 14,000 Reichsmark.
The list with requirements/specs had been issued by the RLM in September 1942, and included the requirement that the missile should have an extended blast radius, using a fragmentation bomb that could deliver a sufficient amount of shrapnels, in order to damage as many enemy planes as possible.
Another requirement was to design the rocket in a way that several sections could be produced without the factories/workers knowing what purpose the particular parts had, to counter espionage. The sections were then supposed to be assembled in a secret plant.
Also, the rocket was supposed to withstand rough weather conditions so that it could be placed right on the ramp (camouflaged) until it was used, even if that would take weeks or months.
The final specs issued in Nov. 1942 required a missile with a top speed of Mach 2, able to hit or damage targets flying at 900 km/h, up to 20,000 meters altitude and a radius of 50 kilometers.
The radius was somewhat optimistic, IMHO, to say the least, as the mechanical navigation (a gyrostat) and the simple targeting computer did not provide a high accuracy, so nearby bomber groups would have been targeted until more accurate navigation- or homing-solutions would have been available - that's my guess.
The first successful start was accomplished in late February 1944, the very first start in January had been rated as failure by some sources - as the missile did not reach sonic speed and just reached an altitude of 7000 km, but there are references that the developers foresaw this behaviour, giving them the opportunity to apply changes and new ideas prior to the next start.
The developers decided to use the same principle/engine used in the V2 rocket, the Waterfall was just smaller.
The "Wasserfall" missile reached a max speed of around 2700 kilometers/hour, the missile ran out of fuel at around 20,000 meters.
The US Hermes-A1 rocket was a reproduction of the Waterfall rocket.
No doubt the guidance system would have been primitive, but just how much so? If it had worked at all it would have been much more deadly that standard AA.
The guidance system was a simple mechanical computer, which required that the crew knew location, direction and speed of the targeted bomber group. As it was only intended to use it to attack nearby bombers, the approach would have been almost completely vertical.
The main idea regarding the detonator was a remote (radio? wire?) controlled solution, and an automatic backup detonator that would destroy the missile in case it had missed (to protect civilians).
Other tests incorporated a magnetic detonator, an infrared homing solution for use at night, and an acoustic homing warhead (with the mechanism from the acoustic torpedos).
The tests with the acoustic system were actually carried out, but i am not sure about the infrared version. There is no way that a working system was available in 1942.
I could imagine that the blast would have been bigger than the one of a regular flak round, since the rounds couldn't carry more than a few kilogramm of explosives.
The V2-project, being totally independent from the Wasserfall project (and with a different dev team and different approach regarding controls/targeting device), competed with the Wasserfall rocket regarding the use of scarce resources and manpower. Hitler favoured the V2 due to its propaganda and terror effect (he over-estimated its accuracy and its effect on Allied war efforts, too, I guess), so the really useful Waterfall project got the short end of the stick.
Looking at the effectiveness of SAM sites in Vietnam and other conflicts (Israel/Syria), the waterfall could have made a difference. Good call Maestro, we found another contender for the "useful/superior German weapon technology" badge within our whatif-quest. [;)]
The waterfall production had been canceled in February '45, in order to focus on V2 production. Btw, the leading dev Dr. Thiel was killed in March 1943, during an Allied bomber raid targeting the installations in Peenemünde, home of the V2 and Waterfall development, which may have delayed the development process. Most sources indicate that ~50 prototypes had been built, some sources say that a number of 40 flights was documented.
