Books on He 112

[Richard T Eger]

From 12 O'Clock High!:

Rob Romero
Me-109 vs He-112
Tue Mar 12 06:52:52 2026
209.246.77.216

To my understanding the He-112 was a superior product (range) with superior growth potential (as evidenced in the He-100) in comparision to the Me-109. So why was the Me-109 selected -and was this a mistake. Might some corruption or bribery have been involved.

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Dénes Bernád
Bf 109 vs. He 112
Tue Mar 12 22:22:05 2026
204.101.53.233

In my book, 'Heinkel He 112 In Action', by Squadron/Signal Publ., I presented the fighter contest between 4 aicraft types (not only the Bf 109 and the He 112) for the future Luftwaffe Jäger role. Although not exhaustive, the description gives you most reasons why the Bf 109 was eventually choosen over the He 112.

Dénes

[Richard T Eger]

From 12 O'Clock High!:

Dunash
He112 vs Me109
Fri Jan 16 12:33:14 2026
217.132.176.90

How did the Heinkel 112 really compare with the Me109? If it had been adopted as the main German fighter, would the Battle of Britain have gone the other way, and we'd all be speaking German now?!

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Graham Boak
Summary
Fri Jan 16 13:33:23 2026
20.138.254.2

In the initial trials, the early He112A prototypes were heavier than and inferior in performance to the 109. There can be little doubt that the correct decision was made, at the time. Heinkel then refined the design to the He112B, wich was lighter and by some accounts a nicer aircraft to fly than the 109B/C series, with similar or slightly better performance. By then the 109 was being developed for the more powerful DB601 engine. Attempts to modify the He112 with this engine were basically unsuccessful.

Given a better start, then perhaps the He112 could have proven an equivalent fighter to the 109 or even slightly better. Or perhaps not. However, the Luftwaffe did not lose the Battle of Britain because of the quality of its main fighter.

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

George Hopp
The He 112 vs. Bf 109
Fri Jan 16 17:01:45 2026
216.191.233.206

Unfortunately, there was never a level playing field between these two aircraft. Heinkel had to maintain a wingloading of less than 100 kg/square meter, build a double-sparred wing, and retain an open cockpit. At least one source also mentions the need to provide for storage of four light bombs. Messerschmitt himself states that he was given a clear slate in designing his aircraft, although Kosin says that he was limited to a wing loading of less than 125 kg/square meter. Heinkel's chances were not helped when the designers kept piddling around with the details of the aircraft. Yes, the 112 was all curves, but so was the Spitfire, and a German study in early 1941 -- which I mentioned some time ago on this site, and others -- showed that the Spitfire, using current German technology, took less than 5% more hours to build than did the 109, for the 1000th aircraft.

The various requirements resulted, obviously, in a larger aircraft for both Arado and Heinkel. So, the 109 would be faster and have a better climb rate, which it did. But, the 112 had a better turning radius, although I don't know if this was tested for. The 112 was an easier plane to fly, especially after it had been slimmed down and simplified somewhat. Falck's unit was assigned to the 112 for a time and loved it -- and was saddened when it needed to return the 112s for 109s. And, the 112 had better development possibilities than did the 109. The 112 wing was able to mount both a 20mm cannon and bomb racks totally internally. Meanwhile, the 109 had not been planned for any use of the wings except to support the aircraft. So, extraordinary means were needed to mount the ammunition for the wing-mounted machine guns -- a loop going from wing root to wing tip. When the cannon were first mounted in the wing, the only thing keeping the wing spar from buckling from the recoil was the rivets securing it to the wing upper and lower panelling, and rivets popped all around the spar mounting. And, as for engine mounted weapons, the early 112 was able to mount a 20mm cannon to fire through the engine spinner, while the 109 wasn't even able to successfully mount a machine gun in that position.

Now, I don't know if the Battle of Britain would have been affected by having the 112 instead of the 109, but I really don't think it would have ended any worse than it did. The best solution would probably have been to permit development of both aircraft, certainly all other wartime nations had provided for this.

All the best,
George

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Dénes Bernád
He 112 vs. Bf 109
Fri Jan 16 20:29:47 2026
204.101.53.233

I detailed the topic in my book on the He 112, published by Squadron/Signal, in their 'In Action' series.
Besides the He 112's qualities listed by the previous posters, we should also mention the all-around cockpit visibility for the 'B' series, as well as the robusteness of, and wide distance between, the main landing gears, which would have certainly reduced dramatically the number of landing and taxiing accidents the Bf 109 was notorious of.
However, the He 112 was more time and resource-consuming to be built, and the Luftwaffe could afford neither.

Dénes

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

hohun
Re: He 112 vs. Bf 109
Fri Jan 16 22:41:49 2026
172.182.74.229

Hi Dénes,

I liked your book on the He 112 very well :-) I seem to remember reading that you were working on a book on the He 100, too?

From Ernst Heinkel's "Stürmisches Leben", I got the impression that the He 112's development wasn't quite finished yet when the Luftwaffe decided on the Me 109.

Willy Messerschmitt in the 1960s (I believe) was interviewed by the news magazine "Der Spiegel" and explained that he didn't like the fighter design goals of the RLM. He argued in favour of top speed being the priority goal: "And when the 'Schnellbomber' (term for the new tactical category 'fast bomber') arrives, then what are you going to do?" Apparently, the RLM followed his logic and went with his priorities.

Heinkel included the following comparison between He 112 and He 100 in "Stürmisches Leben":

"While the He 112 required 2885 individual [HoHun: different] parts, the He 100 at a later stage only needed 969. Instead of 26964 rivets the He 100 required only 11543, and the number of normed parts had risen from 1279 for the He 112 to 2186 for the He 100. By the savings in rivets alone the time necessary for building the wing was reduced by no less than 1150 man hours. Additionally, in areas difficult to access for riveting with conventional measures we had previously frequently abandoned light-weight construction techniques, but now we had applied a new technique using explosive rivets developed in Marienehe by two of my engineers, the Butter brothers."

I assume this is an implicit admission that the He 112's production efficiency was inadequate. While Heinkel goes into great detail on the failure of the Luftwaffe to adopt the He 100, he devotes very little space to the He 112 vs. Me 109 competion. I believe this might be another indication he didn't really disagree with the Luftwaffe on the relative merits of both fighters.

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

[Richard T Eger]

From within a thread on 12 O'Clock High!:

Juha
Re: USAAF P-38 on 3/Mar/1943
Mon Oct 4, 2026 15:12
80.222.38.205

Hello
based wholly on my memory (not very reliable source anymore), there were at least one P-38 kill by a Spanish He 112 pilot in 1943. The P-38 pilot has got lost and flew into Spanish airspace and was shot down by a He 112 of the Spanish AF.

HTH
Juha

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Frank Olynyk
P-38 loss to He-112
Mon Oct 4, 2026 15:42
199.50.29.40

The aircraft was lost in Spanish Morocco, not in Spain. Details can be found in the Squadron Signal book on the He-112 by Dénes Bernád.

Frank.

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

Juha
Re: P-38 loss to He-112
Mon Oct 4, 2026 16:24
80.222.38.205

Thanks for correction, Frank. I have read on the incident also somewhere else, but my clearest mental picture was the cover of Dénes' book.

Juha

[Richard T Eger]

From TOCH!:

jerry brewer
thanks all , for the info (nm)
Mon Oct 4, 2026 21:35
81.178.203.31