Bf 109 G-6 (Sweden)
Contents
Description
The ▄Bf 109 G-6 is a premium rank IV Swedish fighter with a battle rating of 5.3 (AB) and 4.7 (RB/SB). It was introduced in Update "Red Skies".
The Finnish Messerschmitt is one of the 159 units of German Bf 109s that arrived for the Finnish air force to use during the Continuation War; out of those 159 units, 109 were G-6 models. The model in-game carries the designation number MT-422.
MT-422 was one of postwar serving Bf 109G-6s. Shark mouth artwork was created and painted on MT-422 by Sergeant Börje Hielm. According to him the mouth was short lived as his CO ordered it to be removed later that year.
The performance is virtually identical to the Bf 109 G-6 in the German tech tree; the difference between the two is that the Finnish G-6 has a tropical air filter and a Finnish paintjob. These differences do not affect the performance, they are purely visual.
General info
Flight performance
Characteristics | Max Speed (km/h at 5,500 m) |
Max altitude (metres) |
Turn time (seconds) |
Rate of climb (metres/second) |
Take-off run (metres) | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
AB | RB | AB | RB | AB | RB | |||
Stock | 635 | 616 | 11500 | 21.3 | 22.1 | 14.0 | 14.0 | 343 |
Upgraded | 705 | 668 | 19.3 | 20.0 | 27.6 | 19.5 |
Details
Features | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|
Combat flaps | Take-off flaps | Landing flaps | Air brakes | Arrestor gear |
✓ | ✓ | ✓ | X | X |
Limits | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Wings (km/h) | Gear (km/h) | Flaps (km/h) | Max Static G | |||
Combat | Take-off | Landing | + | - | ||
790 | 360 | 437 | 408 | 260 | ~13 | ~6 |
Optimal velocities (km/h) | |||
---|---|---|---|
Ailerons | Rudder | Elevators | Radiator |
< 450 | < 390 | < 450 | > 715 |
Survivability and armour
- 60 mm Bulletproof glass in front and rear of the cockpit.
- 4-8 mm Steel plates on pilot seat.
- 10 mm Steel plates around pilot's head.
- 21 mm Steel plate on the rear of the fuel tank, with 4 mm plates surrounding it on other sides.
- Self-sealing fuel tanks (1 large one behind pilot)
Modifications and economy
Armaments
Offensive armament
The Bf 109 G-6 (Sweden) is armed with:
- A choice between two presets:
- 1 x 20 mm MG 151 cannon, nose-mounted (200 rpg) + 2 x 13 mm MG 131 machine guns, nose-mounted (300 rpg = 600 total)
- 1 x 30 mm MK 108 cannon, nose-mounted (65 rpg) + 2 x 13 mm MG 131 machine guns, nose-mounted (300 rpg = 600 total)
The two machine guns are located just forward of the pilot firing out of the nose of the aircraft. The cannon (either 20 mm or 30 mm) is mounted in the propeller shaft and will fire through the propeller hub. The 30 mm cannon can only be installed once the corresponding module at tier III is unlocked. The best 20 mm belt is "Air Targets", the best 13 mm belt is "IAI" or "Stealth" and the best 30 mm belt is the "Universal" or "Stealth".
Suspended armament
The Bf 109 G-6 (Sweden) can be outfitted with the following ordnance:
- Without load
- 4 x 50 kg SC50JA bombs (200 kg total)
- 1 x 250 kg SC250JA bomb (250 kg total)
- 1 x Flam C 250 incendiary bomb
- 2 x 30 mm MK 108 cannons (35 rpg = 70 total)
- 2 x 20 mm MG 151 cannons (135 rpg = 270 total)
- 2 x Wfr.Gr.21 rockets
Usage in battles
An altitude advantage is imperative in the G-6, no matter what the enemy is. WEP is very effective, and with radiator and oil radiator management overheating is fairly negligible and takes a long time. The engine also cools down very quickly when disengaging WEP.
If you're engaging an enemy while you have an energy advantage, you should do everything in your power to keep or regain this advantage while depleting his. The Bf 109 can achieve this through the use of energy traps like rope-a-dopes, and to disengage when a foe avoids your boom. When neither you or the enemy has an advantage, you should avoid head-ons with the least amount of energy waste. Most of the time the enemy tries to get back on your 6 o clock, which drains his energy much more than yours. This gives you the opportunity to extend, climb, or bait him into an energy trap. Should you, however, face an enemy with superior altitude or speed, attempt to evade his booms on you or force him to overshoot.
When it comes to armament you have the choice of a 20 or 30 mm cannon in the engine, and gun pods of the same calibre. The 20 mm gun has good gun characteristics with decent damage and a good ammo count, while the 30 mm deals devastating damage but has a low ammo capacity and a very slow shell velocity.
In Simulator, the Bf 109 G-6 is quite a friendly fighter that can perform many tasks. It offers great flight performance with its smooth handling, adequate speed, and impressive climb rate and turn rate. Its nose-mounted guns do not require any convergence setting, making it very easy to aim. The nose gently slopes down from the windscreen, offering great over-the-nose visibility. The late G models also have an improved canopy side with less frames, and the solid armour headset is replaced by a transparent bulletproof glass, allowing some rear views which is better over the F models. Said bulletproof glass, however, has a thick metal frame, thus you can only see through the middle at a small portion of the tail. Still this is better than not being able to see anything behind at all. There are bombs of 50 kg and 250 kg to choose from which are beneficial for ground-pounding or base-bombing, although these are not its primary objectives. However, the Bf 109 G does have pretty limited cockpit view obstructed by its numerous canopy frames and handles. The inclusion of two 13 mm MG131 creates two large, visible bulges on the nose, just in front of the windscreen, obstructing the pilot's downward view. The plane also behaves poorly during takeoffs due to its torquey engine.
The Bf 109 G-6 excels in bomber hunting: arming the aircraft with the single 30 mm, dual 13 mm, and dual 20 mm gunpods allows the aircraft to very quickly deal devastating damage to enemy bombers. In this preset the 109 can be considered a heavy fighter with fantastic performance, though turn fighting is somewhat out of the question. Boom 'n' zooming enemy fighters with this heavy armament is also very effective as only a couple of hits from the Mk 108 or MG 151s will completely cripple or outright destroy any single engined fighter.
The aircraft, despite having coolant in the wings, is also very durable for a single-engined fighter and is armoured very well. The fuselage, wings and tail assembly can take an enormous amount of punishment whilst staying in one piece to get you back to a friendly airfield. This characteristic adds to the bomber hunting capability, as it will be able to soak up a fair number of rounds from even relatively heavy defensive fire. However, flight performance is significantly reduced when damaged. Any damage to the water coolant system is fairly serious and will cause the engine to overheat and die fairly quickly, so an immediate disengagement is recommended in this situation.
Taking off in a late Bf 109 is harder than other aircraft, so one should familiarise themselves with the earlier 109s. When taking off, the Bf 109 will shift severely to the left side due to the huge torque, so consider setting keybinds for left and right brakes, as they are more effective at directional control than the rudder while on the ground. As the plane just lifts off the ground it will automatically roll to the left again due to the torque, so you must immediately roll a little right to keep it level, or the left wingtip will strike the ground.
The Bf 109 handles very sluggishly in the roll axis at low speed, so take this into account if dogfighting at low speed/altitude. You can even pull the elevator fully for maximum agility, but only if you pull gently and gradually will the 109 manoeuvre as you wish. If the stick is pulled harshly and suddenly, the plane will start swaying around and enter a flat spin. The 109 has very favourable characteristics in terms of getting out of a flat spin, and often corrects itself. If not, cut throttle, opposite rudder, stick forward and neutral ailerons.
- Landing may need practice for some. It is easy at first: decelerate and descent towards the runway, deploy combat, takeoff, landing flaps and gears in such order, fly at ~210 km/h before touchdown. Now note that you must align the plane with the airstrip correctly prior to touchdown and do not yaw/break one side too much when breaking, as the undercarriages are so close together that they cannot support such lateral force, causing the plane to wobble on the tires dangerously or even tilt towards one side, striking a wingtip into the ground. At last, you can break until the plane reaches a full stop and not worry about propeller strike.
Specific enemies worth noting
Your worst enemies in the Bf 109 G-6 are the Spitfires and the P-47D/N/M Thunderbolts. The Spitfire can out-turn you at almost all altitudes below 4,000 m. You have to be really careful when engaging a P-47 with an altitude advantage against you. The best thing you can do in that case is to turn away and keep climbing. If the Thunderbolt dives on you, turn into the head-on, fire a few rounds then use your superior roll rate to do a split-S. If a Spitfire engages you, do not try to turn with it! If you try, you will have fallen into their trap, your best defence is similar to the tactics employed against the Thunderbolt, split-S and use your roll
Manual Engine Control
MEC elements | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Mixer | Pitch | Radiator | Supercharger | Turbocharger | ||
Oil | Water | Type | ||||
Not controllable | Controllable Auto control available |
Controllable Auto control available |
Controllable Auto control available |
Separate | Not controllable 1 gear |
Not controllable |
Pros and cons
Pros:
- Very good climb rate
- Very good energy retention
- Great stall characteristics and vertical handling
- Good low speed manoeuvrability without gunpods: you'll out-turn planes like the P-47s and the early P-51s at low speeds
- Can install 2 types of gunpods for greatly increased firepower
- The plane is overall very durable, with armour plates covering the only fuel tank
- Very powerful engine when using WEP
- More agile than the Fw 190s
- Very good radiators for being a late war 109, they're responsive and will keep the engine cooler for way longer than the G-2's
Cons:
- Poor armament: unless using gunpods, head-ons should be avoided at all costs
- Outdated airframe means compression speed and rip speed are lower than most enemies you'll face
- Mounted weaponry/payloads will reduce flight performance significantly
- 30 mm MK 108 cannons have low ammo count
- Flaps are very sluggish to deploy and they rip at low speed
- 13 mm machine guns don't hit very hard
History
Describe the history of the creation and combat usage of the aircraft in more detail than in the introduction. If the historical reference turns out to be too long, take it to a separate article, taking a link to the article about the vehicle and adding a block "/History" (example: https://wiki.warthunder.com/(Vehicle-name)/History) and add a link to it here using the main
template. Be sure to reference text and sources by using <ref></ref>
, as well as adding them at the end of the article with <references />
. This section may also include the vehicle's dev blog entry (if applicable) and the in-game encyclopedia description (under === In-game description ===
, also if applicable).
Media
- Skins
- Videos
See also
Links to the articles on the War Thunder Wiki that you think will be useful for the reader, for example:
- reference to the series of the aircraft;
- links to approximate analogues of other nations and research trees.
External links
Sweden fighters | |
---|---|
ASJA | J6B |
Saab | J21A-1 · J21A-2 · A21A-3 |
FFVS | J22-A · J22-B |
Foreign Import | J8A · Iacobi's J8A · J9 Early · J11 · J20 · J26 David · J26 |
Finland | |
VL | Mörkö-Morane · VL Myrsky II · VL Pyörremyrsky |
(NL) Fokker | ▄Fokker D.XXI-3 · ▄Fokker D.XXI |
(DE) Messerschmitt | ▄Bf 109 G-2 · ▄Bf 109 G-6 Erla · ▄Bf 109 G-6 |
Other | ▄B-239 · ▄Hurricane Mk I/L |
Sweden premium aircraft | |
---|---|
Fighters | Iacobi's J8A · ▄Fokker D.XXI · Mörkö-Morane · VL Myrsky II · J9 Early · J26 David · VL Pyörremyrsky · ▄Bf 109 G-6 |
Jet fighters | J29D · J35A · Saab J35XS |
Strike aircraft | SAAB-105OE · A32A Röd Adam |
Bomber | ▄Ar 196 A-5 |