The Arado Ar.198 was a reconnaissance airplane that never went beyond the prototype stage made by the Arado Flugzeugwerke for the Luftwaffe. Initially it was the preferred one, over the Blohm & Voss BV.141 and the Focke-Wulf Fw.189 "Uhu" but after some flight tests, it didn't live up to the expectations and therefore only one prototype was made.
It all started when in 1936 the RLM (German Aviation Ministry) issued an specification for a short-range reconnaissance airplane that would have a nice ground vision. Three companies, Arado, Blohm & Voss, Focke-Wulf and Henschel presented their candidates, and eventually the Focke-Wulf Fw.189 "Uhu" won.
The Arado Ar.198 had a crew of three, a pilot, a gunner/radio operator and an observer. The first two ones were placed above the wing while the third one was placed underneath it having good communications with his partners thanks to a well laid-out fuselage.
Thanks to the wing shoulder configuration, the pilot had an unrestricted forward visibility and the fuselage was made of steel tube with an all-metal monocoque of the tail boom.
Initially it was going to be powered by an air cooled BMW 132 engine, but due to it's limited availability the Bramo 323A-1 was chosen for the prototype although it was slightly lower powered.
It was armed with a forward firing 7.92mm MG 17 machine gun and two defensive MG 15 machine guns placed in the radio and observer's post. It could carry up to four SC50 bombs underwings.
It flew for the first time in March 1938 at the factory airfield in Warnemünde and the tests proved it to be satisfactory except for the stability in low speed flights. In order to fix that problem, automatic slats were installed which improved the stability but it was still hard to handle. Anyway due to it's below the expectations results, Arado's technical office decided to cancel any related development in the late months of 1938.
Sources:
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arado_Ar_198
2. http://www.airwar.ru/enc/spyww2/ar198.html (translated)
Wonderful, thanks for this ...
ReplyDeleteIve used your marineflieger Ar197 scheme to paint up a BMW 132 marineflieger version of the 198, looks great!
You're welcome!
DeleteCheers.
I found this over at Aviastar.org
ReplyDeleteI havent found any corrobaoration but it gives me licence to use this as a carrier recce.
This aircraft was built to a specification which also included Henschel Hs126, Blomm und Voss Ha141 and the Focke Wulf FW189. The Blomm und Voss and Focke Wulf aircraft had the extended specification of multi purpose plane put to the fore whereas Arado and Henshel had to stick to the requirement of short range reconnaissance. Henshel was well into production while Arado were still in development of their more complex plane and it was for this reason coupled to the already over burdened production commitments being experienced by Arado that the Technishe Amt cancelled the plane. On the contrary to what is noted the Ar198 had good handling and performance and was very much apprechiated by all those that flew in it.
Thanks for the extra info. We will look at it.
DeleteAs the info on aviastar comes from an unknown source, and wikipedia (where we take most of our written info) does mention their sources we decided to leave the post unchanged.
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