Henschel Hs 117

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Hs 117 without jump starters

The Henschel Hs 117 was a German surface-to-air anti -aircraft missile of World War II . It was developed by Henschel Flugzeug-Werke AG , but was no longer used. The Hs 117 was nicknamed butterfly and promised low production costs and easy portability.

technology

The Hs 117 had a length of 4.29 m and a takeoff mass of 400 to 450 kg. It had short, swept-back wings and a cross-shaped tail unit , so that its structural design resembled an airplane . The bow of the trunk was asymmetrical and ended in two points. The 25 kg warhead was housed in the longer one ; the shorter one carried a small propeller at its tip , which was set in rotation by the airstream and propelled a small generator that supplied power to the control system .

The Hs 117 was powered by a liquid rocket motor . The launch took place from the carriage of a converted 3.7-centimeter anti-aircraft gun. For the first four seconds, two Schmidding solid rockets burned , which were arranged as start-up rockets above and below the fuselage and were later dropped.

The missile was observed by the operator from the ground and guided into the target by radio . The use of radar for control was under discussion. In addition, an air-to-air variant was tested under the designation Hs 117H .

The development of the Hs 117 began at Henschel in 1941, 59 flight attempts were made, 34 of which failed. After an initial rejection, the project was taken up again by the Reich Aviation Ministry in early 1943 in the face of massive air raids by Allied bombers. In May 1944, 23 missiles were successfully tested in Peenemünde and in December series production was decided: From March 1945, initially 150, from November 1945 3000 pieces should be built per month. In January 1945, however, the project was ended by SS-Obergruppenführer Hans Kammler .

A total of about 100 "butterflies" were built, three of which have been preserved.

See also

Web links

Commons : Henschel Hs 117  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

literature

  • Joachim Engelmann: Secret armory Peenemünde. V2 - "Waterfall" - "Butterfly". Podzun-Pallas Verlag, Friedberg 1979, ISBN 3-7909-0118-0 .
  • Fritz Trenkle : The German radio control process until 1945. AEG-Telefunken, Berlin et al. 1982, ISBN 3-87087-133-4 .