The Blohm und Voss P.170 bomber was designed in 1942 by Dr. Vogt, designer of the BV 141 and other asymmetric designs. Although the BV P.170 was of a symmetrical design, it was still unorthodox in design and appearance. The P.170 never reached production.

The main characteristics of this bomber was the speed. The designed speed was estimated at 820 Kmh at 8000 m of altitude (510 mph at 26200 feet). Such speed was thought to preclude interception, thus no defensive armament was to be fitted.

Three BMW 801D radial engines provided the power. One engine was located on the front of the main fuselage, while the other two were mounted on wingtip nacelles. The BMW 801D engine was the engine mounted on the Fw190A and was already in production at the time the P.190 was at its design stage. This engine was rated at 1720 horsepower and used water-methanole injection to increase power to 2100 hp for short periods. The 801D engine was also fitted with the BMW system able to automatically control manifold pressure, mixture and propeller rotation/pitch. Each engine drove a three-bladed constant speed propeller. The two outside engines rotated in opposite directions, to help cancel out excessive torque.

The P.170 project was also characterized by simplicity and modularity. Each engine had is own tank containing 2000 liter (528 gallon) of fuel. The tank could only feed the engine ahead of it. A normal tail-dragger undercarriage was fitted, with the exception of there being three main landing gear legs. The three main landing gears were identical (and this is the only asimmetry of the aircraft). The wing was of constant chord, without other complications such as fuel tanks or internally mounted guns.

The two men crew (pilot and radio operator/observer/bombadier) sat in a cockpit located in the extreme rear of the center fuselage. The P.170 was able to carry up to 2000 kg (4400 lbs.) of bombs in underwing mountings.

Building a CFS2 version of this bomber is a challenging project: besides all the classical issues of modelling an aircraft, there are many opportunities to "complete" the aircraft design, inventing the most hystorically plausible solutions. Here are two previews of the CFS2 version of the aircraft, in two different skins, taken during its first test flights (updated August 7, 2002), click to see a larger image:

Currently, with the great help of Hermann "Krazy" Boltz, the damage model is under development. Here are some shots, click to see a larger image:

Implementation issues

The P.170 never reached production, so some hystorically plausible assumptions were made in the making of this virtual implementation of the aircraft. Issues regard the 3d model of the aircraft, the air model, the payloads, the textures and the interiors.

• Cockpit/canopy. There was different designs of the cockpit, the chosen one has the navigator/bombardier behind the pilot (there was another one with the navigator/bombardier inside the main fuselage ahead of the pilot). The navigator/bombardier has another window on the bottom of the fuselage, were also is located the bombsight (a Lofte 207 tachimetric device is assumed). The canopy has two separated exits. The fact that the canopy is hinged and goes to the right is guessed, but it was quite usual in other German aircrafts of that period.

• Flaps and ailerons. The drawings are not very clear. The adopted solution, while not usual, is the most plausible interpretation of the drawings: ailerons are mounted on flaps, which span all the wing; ailerons move with flaps which, on their part, have very little angle.

• Gear doors. Also in this case, from the available drawings was not possible to derive the exact shape of the gear doors. A simple solution with only one door is adopted.

• Propellers. The drawings do not specify the propeller type (only the diameter). The adopted solution is to mount a large blade type, namely the one coming with the BMW 801D engine on the Fw190A fighter. The propellers of engine 1 (center) and 2 (left) spin counter-clockwise, propeller of engine 3 (right) spins clockwise to balance the torque.

• Air model. The 1% assembly line is used with respect to the available performance data. A general "heavy" attitude is assumed due to the high inertia momentum derived by the wingtip engines. At the moment it is not yet clear how to model the BMW system for automatic control of manifold pressure, mixture and propeller rotation/pitch. Another modelling problem regards the separated fuel tanks.

• Textures. The P.170 was designed in 1942 and was characterized by simple solutions and reliable and already available technologies. Considering the potentials of the German war industry and assuming a bit of luck in the development of the project, it is plausible that the P.170 was ready to be operative in late 1943 or at least in the beginning of 1944. In this hypothesis, a plausible assignment for the primary fast bomber role is the III./KG 51 "Edelweiss". An other plausible assignment for a recon role is the I.(F)/Aufklarer Gr 123. The first skins for the P.170 will be realized according to these assignments.

• Payloads. The P.170 was able to carry up to 2000 kg (4400 lbs.) of bombs in underwing mountings. Therefore as standard payloads are available 4 x SC250, 4 x SC500 or 2 x SC1000. Thinking about a ship-strike role for the P.170, plausible payloads are the BT torpedo-bombs (4 x BT400 or 2 x BT700) and the Hs 293 guided bombs. For the fast-bomber version custom pilons are provided. In the recon version pilons are removed and cameras are fitten in the center section of the main fuselage.

• Panel. Because there isn't documentation available, the panel is inspired by the Me410 one, with an attitude section on the left, a navigation one on the right and an engine section in the center (in the Me410 this section was between the pilot legs, in the P.170 panel is only a bit lowered with respect to the other two sections).

• Sound. Currently the P.170 is using (with permission) the Fw200 Condor sounds: actually, the P.170 mounted different engines, but they anyway were BMW and radial ones.

Status of the project

The basic 3d model is near to completion, some little things have to be adjusted, the 3d damage model (including endcaps) is in place. Low poly versions for a multires model are yet to be implemented. Virtual cockpit is just sketched. A first set of textures is completed but needs some retouch. The 2d panel is defined, but the background bitmaps are not yet completed. The damage profile is ready. A first version of the air model is ready.

As soon as 3d model and textures reach a good stage, and there is an accettable flying model the first version will be released. Panel, virtual cockpit, and multires model will be in the following releases.

Contributes, credits and acknowledgements

People involved in the project:

• historical references: Daniele Sabatini;
  
• 3d model: Giovanni "Nanni" A. Cignoni;
  
• texture (Edelweiss & Aufklarer): Nanni & Daniele;
  
• damage profile: Hermann "Krazy" Boltz;
  
• air model: Nanni, based on a previous version by Krazy;
  
• pilots: reworked from the original Ja_Pilot with kind permission of Gary Wilson;
• payload: German Weapon Pack, by Graham and Krazy;
• sound: Fw200 Condor sounds with kind permission of Marvin Carter;
• panel configuration: Nanni, contributes by Marshel Thompson;
  
• panel bitmaps: Daniele;
  
• panel gauges: Mike "MoparMike" Wagner

The idea of building a virtual P.170 came from the Luft '46 Web site. Historical notes about the P.170 are from this site, with kind permission of Dan Johnson, that itself also provided useful hints and suggestions.

Many thanks to Chris File for Middleman (that makes possible to use GMax for building models for CFS2), his tutorials and his valuable help in the GMax forums, and to Martin Wright for DXTbitmap.