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Heinkel's He 112 was a fighter aircraft designed by Walter and Siegfried Günter. It was one of four planes designed to compete for the Luftwaffe's 1933 fighter contract, which was eventually won by the Messerschmitt Bf 109. Small numbers of the He 112 were used for a short time by the Luftwaffe, and small runs were completed for several other countries, but less than one hundred were completed in total. ==Condor Legion== When it was clear the 112 was losing the contest, Heinkel offered to re-equip V6 with 20 mm cannon armament as an experimental aircraft. The ''Technisches Amt'' was very interested; at the time many tanks were equipped with 20 mm guns as their primary anti-tank armament, the same armament on a plane could prove to be a powerful weapon. In September a 20 mm MG C/30L cannon was mounted to the plane, with the breech to the rear of the engine and the barrel lying between the cylinder banks and exiting in the propellor spinner. This is the first experimental mounting of what would later be called the ''Motorkanone'', a feature that would become a standard on most German fighters. She was then broken down and shipped to Spain on the 9 December. After being re-assembled she was assigned to ''Versuchsjagdgruppe 88'', a group within the Legión Cóndor devoted to testing new planes. There she was nicknamed the ''Kanonenvogel'', and joined three V series Bf 109s which were also in testing. The Kanonenvogel was adopted by Oberleutnant Günter Radusch who started flying the plane on the 9 December at Tablada. From then on it joined the Ju 87As and Hs 123s already in service and was used as a ground attack plane. On the 6 February the plane was moved to Villa de Prado near Madrid, and then in March she was reassigned to Jagdgruppe 88 at Almorox near Toledo. While sitting at Almorox due to a mechanical problem in his He 45C, Oberleutnant Wilhelm Balthasar heard that a Republican armored train was approaching and talked himself into the cockpit of the V6 by insisting he was a Heinkel test pilot. After teaching himself to fly the plane and managing to get into the air, he found the train parked at the station in Seseña and attacked it. On his third pass one of the 20 mm shells punctured the ammunition car and the entire train exploded. Then on the way back to Almorox he came across an armored car and set it on fire. His exploit in the V6 made him famous, and Balthasar found himself in command of the newly formed combat group with the V6 and three He 45C recon planes. Over the next few months the V6 was flown by a number of pilots, and on the 6 July Unteroffizier Max Schulze knocked out an additional number of armored cars. On the 19 July Schulze was once again flying the V6 when the engine seized during landing. Schultze walked away from the resulting pancake landing, but the plane broke her back and was a writeoff. V8 and V9 were then sent to Spain in the spring of 1938. The V8 was the earlier A series model with the larger DB600Aa engine, but it was only in Spain until July when it crashed. V9 was the B series platform and armed with the twin 20 mm cannons. Like the V6 it was then used primarily as a ground attack plane, but it was also flown by a number of experienced Spanish pilots before being returned to Heinkel and becoming the show plane. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア(Wikipedia)』 ■ウィキペディアで「Heinkel He 112 operational service」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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