Am I imagining things, or does Sweden's FFVS J 22 look like the radial powered Bf 109 V21 of 1938-39?

Don't think so, IMHO. Rudder is different. One is a "bubble top", the other is a "razorback". The cowling is similar but not the same. The wings and landing gear are remarkably similar though. It makes you wonder if the an engineer from the German project ended up at FFVS, but with the war that would be unlikely. The engine for the Swedish fighter was a copy of the Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp, which was the same engine used in the V21. That alone will cause the cowling and COG and other factors to be almost the same as the J22. I would call them "kissing cousins". ;)
 
The wings and landing gear really arent similar. FFVS uses a two-spar wing while the 109 had a single spar near the mid chord - also very likely the J22 is using a much more modern airfoil than the 109s NACA 2R. Landing gear is likewise completely different, with a much more complicated mechanism on the 22 retracting rewards vs the simpler 109s outwards retraction. The only real similarity between the two was trying to make the load path from engine to gear mount as short and direct as possible.

People should really stop looking at poor quality 3 views and drawing conclusions about design pedigree. The structural side of things is just as important as aerodynamics in aircraft design and if you aren't taking that into account than you aren't really comparing things.

Unless someone can prove that there was a sharing of data/staff/whatever between FFVS and Mess., I think this is just another case of a similar layout producing a similar looking end result that is easy to see as a "copy" if one only looks at the surface side of things.

Now the Tunnan and the Messerschmitt P.1101 though........
 
Many thanks for the thoughts. After coming across drawings of unknown accuracy, I wondered if the two aircraft looked similar, and I got some answers.
 
Justo, what is item 38 (and possibly 37) on the cutaway. From the external view, I'd have said it was a roll-over protection post, but the cutaway shows something different.

thanks

Chris
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Bf 109 X drawings
 

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Interesting place for a recce or gun camera. Is item 28 what I think it is?

I think we need the key.

Chris
 
Thanks. Seems a very heavy and complex gun camera installation!

Chris
 
Justo, what is item 38 (and possibly 37) on the cutaway. From the external view, I'd have said it was a roll-over protection post, but the cutaway shows something different.

thanks

Chris
View attachment 650059
It is the periscope for a vertically mounted gun camera (source: "FFVS J 22 in Detail", IPMS Stockholm)

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Interesting place for a recce or gun camera. Is item 28 what I think it is?

I think we need the key.

Chris
Rear firing machine gun?
Whatever it is, I very much doubt that it is a gun. It does not look like a Swedish 8-mm M22 or 13.2-mm M39, which were FN-Brownings. My best guess would be that it is an actuator rod for the tail wheel.
 
Many thanks for the thoughts. After coming across drawings of unknown accuracy, I wondered if the two aircraft looked similar, and I got some answers.
I suspect that the superficial resemblance results from the limited choices facing the designer of a fighter powered by a relatively low-power Twin Wasp radial: everything has to be compact and low drag. In addition to the differences mentioned above, though, the J-22 had a steel-tube fuselage, while the Messerschmitt had a light-alloy stressed-skin structure.
 
Thanks. Seems a very heavy and complex gun camera installation!

Chris
Not really. The installation is low-drag, on the center line, near the center of gravity, and unobstructed by other equipment and structural elements.
 
In 1919, the Swedish Army had an aircraft division formed by twelve war surplus Phönix D.III fighters joined by twenty-four FVM Ö1 Tummelisa advanced trainers in 1921.

Four years later, they acquired ten units of the Nieuport-Delage NiD 29 ex-French fighters. The Swedish Air Force (Flygvapnet) was created in 1926, unifying Army and Navy aviations. The new service required the use of two-seat long-range fighters. They acquired fifteen Fokker C.Vd in 1927 and the following year six Heinkel HD 19 seaplane fighters.

The weapons race started by the Soviet Five Years Plan in 1928, prompted the countries close to the U.S.S.R. to modernize their combat aircrafts. After the entry into service of the Polikarpov I-3, in August 1929, Lithuania ordered fifteen Fiat C.R. 20 fighters and Latvia seven Bristol Bulldog Mk.II. In Mach 1930 the prototype of the first Polish monoplane fighter P.W.S.10 flew for the first time and four months later the prototype of the Polikarpov I-5. At that time the VVS already had two-hundred-and-fifty I-3 in service.

In August Sweden ordered three Bristol Bulldog Mk.II and eight Bulldog Mk.IIA (286 kph) fighters in May 1931. That same year the Swedish Government ordered the construction of 18 units of the indigenous fighter Svenka Aero Jaktfalk. The VVS fighter strength was of three-hundred-and-eighty-nine I-3 and sixt-six I-5. In 1932 the expansion of the Flygvapnet was planned, with the construction under licence of thirty-six Tiger Moth and twenty-five Tigerschwalbe elementary trainers, joined by ten Sparmann S-1A advanced trainers in 1934.

Between 1936 and 1938, the U.S.S.R. made a demonstration of force by sending to Spain hundred-and-eight Polikarpov I-15, ninety-three Polikarpov I-152, ninety-three Polikarpov I-16 Type 5, sixty-eight Polikarpov I-16 Type 6, hundred-and--twenty-four Polikarpov I-16 Type 10, thirty-one Polikarpov R-5 Army cooperation airplanes, thirty-one Polikarpov R-5 Cht strafers, sixty-two Polikarpov RZ light bombers and ninety-three Tupolev SB-2 medium bombers. They also sent 347 tanks, 60 armoured vehicles, 1,186 cannons, 340 mortars, 20,486 machine guns, 497,813 rifles, 862 millions of cartridges, 3.5 millions of artillery shells, 10,000 aviation bombs and four torpedo boats.

Lithuania ordered thirteen Dewoitine D.501 L monoplane fighters.

With the publication of the Defence Act in December 1936, the second plan of expansion of the Flygvapnet to five combat wings was started. To equip these units with enough airplanes it was necessary to organize the indigenous production of forty-two Hawker Hart light bombers, eighty Junkers Ju 86 K-1 medium bombers, hundred-and-two Douglas 8 A-1 attack bombers, hundred-and-ninety SAAB 17 dive bombers, eighty-five Focke-Wulf Fw 44 elementary trainers and hundred-and-thirty-six North American NA-16-4M advanced trainers, which should be delivered between 1937 and 1941.

At 1937 the VVS strength was of 8,139 front-line aircraft, including 443 medium and heavy bombers. The Polikarpov I-152 started fighting in China.

In June, Sweden ordered thirty-seven Gloster Gladiator Mk.I fighters. In 1938 the production of Polikarpov I-153 started and Sweden ordered eighteen Gloster Gladiator Mk.II (414 kph). At the end of that year the Soviet aviation was defeated in Spain thanks to the technological superiority of the Legion Condor.

On 11 May 1939, the VVS entered into combat against fighters of the Imperial Japanese Army in Khalkin Gol. In September, the Soviets were forced to sign an armistice, overcome by the technical quality of Japanese planes and pilots.

On 29 June, Sweden ordered fifteen Seversky EP-1-106 fighters.

After its defeat in Spain the U.S.S.R. was also forced to sign the German-Soviet non-aggression pact and be satisfied with 'freeing' weaker objectives by occupying eastern Poland when the Polish Army had already been defeated by the Wehrmacht. That same month the ANBO VIII indigenous dive bomber took its first flight in Lithuania and its Government ordered thirteen Morane-Saulnier M.S.406 fighters that the French never delivered because of the war. Nor did the British deliver the Spitfires acquired by Estonia or the Hurricanes acquired by Latvia.

On 11 October Sweden ordered a second batch of forty-five Seversky fighters.

Despite the losses suffered in Spain, Manchuria and China, the VVS strength was of 7,320 aircrafts. On 30 November, the Soviets began the invasion of Finland. At that time the Flygvapnet possessed a front-line strength of only 140 aircraft (of which about one half consisted of Harts and Gladiators biplanes) but went to their aid forming the Flygflottilj 19, a volunteer unit with four Hawker Harts and twelve Gladiators equipped with skis undercarriages.

On 1 January 1940 the Swedish Government ordered a third batch of sixty Seversky EP-1-106 and two Republic 2PA attack bombers. On 6 February, they also ordered hundred-and-forty-four Vultee Model 48C fighters but, fearing that the airplanes might fall into Soviet hands, the U.S. State Department placed an embargo on the export of military aircraft to Sweden on 18 October.

The embargo also included the export of engines, so the Douglas 8 A-1attack bombers had to use the Bristol Pegasus XII, the SAAB 17 used the Bristol Pegasus XXIV and the Piaggio P.XII bis RC 40D and the North American trainers used the Piaggio P. VII RC 16, less powerful and reliable than the original Pratt & Whitney and Wright Whirlwind. The situation derived in panic and the Swedish Government ordered seventy-two Fiat C.R. 42 bis and sixty Reggiane Re.2000 fighters from Italy, as stop-gap solution until the indigenous industry could build their own fighters.

Unfortunately, the SAAB 19, a project of fighter based on the Bristol Type 153, whose manufacture was started in 1941, had been cancelled when the British rejected to continue the production of the 1,400 hp Bristol Taurus II engine. The SAAB 19 would have been a low wing monoplane with 10.5 m wingspan, all-metal construction, retractable undercarriage and armed with four wing-mounted 13.2 mm m/39A machine guns. Its estimated maximum speed would have been 605 kph and his maximum take-off weight of 2,690 kg.

On 1 January 1941, the design work of the J 22 'panic fighter' was started, under the leadership of Bo Lundberg. The General Nils Söderberg established the FFVS workshop, to temporary organisation intended solely for the production of the new aircraft. As the Swedes expected to get the fighters in the USA, all available aluminium 2024 T3 was already being used in the production of the S 17 and S 18 bombers.

The construction system of the J 22, based on that of the Finnish Myrsky, consisted of welded Chrome-Molybdenum steel tube structure covered with plywood panels. To circumvent the engines embargo, Sweden managed to purchase a batch of 100 Pratt & Whitney R-1830-45 Twin Wasp engines in 1942, from the Vichy-French Curtiss H-75 fighters, and Svenska Flygmotor-Trollhättan started an programme to copy the Twin Wasp as the Swedish-made 1,050 hp STWC-3G.

The J 22 prototype made its first flight on 20 September 1942, reaching 575 kph.

Between 1943 and 1946, 198 units were built. Of these, the first 143 units were J 22 A (with two 13.2 mm m/39A and two 7.9 mm Bofors m/22F machine guns) and 55 units of the J 22 B version (with four m/39 A). The J 22 was light and very manoeuvrable fighter equivalent to the Spitfire and Messerschmitt Bf 109 of 1940, but it could not compete with the latest German and British designs when entered service.

This did not represent a serious problem as Sweden already maintained good relations with both and the J 22 exceeded or equalled the Soviet fighters Polikarpov, LaGG, Hurricane Mk.II and Airacobra that posed the real threat.
 
Bf 109 X info
The sixth and seventh pictures are too inadequate to be described as "info"; the sixth picture does not belong to the Bf 109 X. The dimensions of the landing gear tires on the Bf 109 X are 700x175.
The seventh is a diagram of the Bf 109 V21 from a Polish book, which is very unreliable because it was created based on the limited information available at the time. In fact, the nose of the Bf 109 V21 is very different when compared to the existing photos of the Bf 109 V21.
 
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