Me 109 (The real name)

[Captain Chuck]

I hate to break it to ya'll, but it's actually called an Me 109 not a Bf 109!

And here's why in detail:

 

[Dragon1-1]

Yeah, because some rando on YouTube is more reliable than historical artifacts. All extant 109 airframes bear the "Bf-109" on their ID plates, which kind of trumps anything that guy might have to say (so no, I'm not watching the video). The aircraft was officially called Bf-109, because it was designed before 1938, when BFW got renamed. Wartime German documents use both Bf-109 and Me-109, but the latter is technically incorrect, even if it was in widespread use at the time.

[Rudel_chw]

57 minutes ago, Captain Chuck said:

I hate to break it to ya'll, but it's actually called an Me 109 not a Bf 109!

 

then why the flight manual of the real aircraft says "Bf" ?

 

 

Edited September 14, 2023 by Rudel_chw

[BitMaster]

Germans usually refer to it as Me-109, enthusiasts know the Bayerische Flugwerke AG origin but everybody knows Willi Messerschmitt desgined it, that's why maybe Me-109 is the one being used at the Stammtisch.....now google that one 

[Ala13_ManOWar]

The name was officially changed yeah, don't recall exact date but around 1944 or so probably. Not just for this one but everything, German ministry just thought (you know, important things to think about when you're miserably losing a World war… ) the names of the aeroplanes should reflect the designers' name and so the Bayerische Flugzeug Werke original builder's name was retired (anyhow, the designer's name was there all the time, it was Messerschmitt after all, not BFW Bf109, did you notice that?), same for Fw which new models and variants started to be Ta152 as well as other aircraft in the company. Funnily enough Me262, Me163, Me210/410 are all known by that name since the production started after the name change or very close, not to mention it wasn't BFW any more. Yeah, Ok, we all know that and since the last change and name was Me109 that should be the name that remains…? Well, depends on what you're naming since for instance if you have either an airworthy example, or a museum one, and it was build before the name change it's name was Bf no matter what, no need to use the "official German ministry name change", we aren't in that context any more. For later variants it should be taken into account and all that? Well yes, sure, but you get used to it and in the end it feels stupid to change the name of something you've already known differently. Even back then they didn't adopt the name change immediately or everybody, we're humans after all mate.

In the end it's like P-51/F-51 name, we all know it as P-51 no matter what despite we all know the name officially changed in 1947 as for any other fighters, bombers, attack aeroplanes and all, but since we've known it as P-51 and in a simulator we're using it in a WWII context before the name changed why would we want to use any other name? One gets used to it and keeps using the old one, just that.

[MAXsenna]

Because Bruce Dickinson sings "Ten ME-109's out of the sun" in "Aces High", and he flies ED Force One. So he's boss!

Sent from my MAR-LX1A using Tapatalk

[Captain Chuck]

On 9/15/2023 at 2:11 AM, Rudel_chw said:

 

then why the flight manual of the real aircraft says "Bf" ?

 

 

 

Well, that's a good question. Seems this must have slipped by Willy Messerscmitt's attention! 

I'd never heard one called a Bf in my life until about 8 years ago.  As far as I knew it was always an Me 109 till then. 

[Dragon1-1]

Many people called it that (Allies, in particular), but flight manuals and most crucially, actual ID plates on the aircraft, stuck with Bf-109 all the way. 

[Tom Kazansky]

Although I've always been in the Bf-corner of the ring, I found an interesting PDF with information from Switzerland that it wasn't that easy to say Bf or Me is right:

https://www.b17museum.ch/newspdf/63.pdf

(I'm sorry that I haven't got the time to translate it into English for it's not copy and paste.)

It shows that "Me 109"s were sold to Switzerland.

edit: seems worth to be mentioned: the documents are from "Messerschmitt A.G., Augsburg" and show the date "Oktober 1938"

Edited September 16, 2023 by Tom Kazansky

[Dragon1-1]

It's worth noting that even the Germans, with all their ordnung, were not consistent on this. If the docs are from Willy Messershmitt's company, of course he's like to toot his own horn and use a reference to his own name. I suspect that their ID plates all said Bf-109. 

[Tom Kazansky]

2 hours ago, Dragon1-1 said:

It's worth noting that even the Germans, with all their ordnung, were not consistent on this. If the docs are from Willy Messershmitt's company, of course he's like to toot his own horn and use a reference to his own name. I suspect that their ID plates all said Bf-109. 

Let me add this to the confusion;

[Dragon1-1]

I don't see what's confusing about this. It states the manufacturer's name and numbers indicating it's a 109. It does not explicitly say "Me-109" anywhere. Bf-109s were made by Messerschmitt A. G. after 1938, nobody disputes that.

[Tom Kazansky]

25 minutes ago, Dragon1-1 said:

I don't see what's confusing about this.

Well, there are a lot ID plates with "BF 109" to be found in the WWW, but this one shows that not all 109's had a "Bf" tag, and with the documents above one could say, that the Swiss might have had no doubt that they bought "Me 109"s.

On the other hand I haven't found any ID plates that show "Me 109". Only Bf, BF or just 109.

Edited September 16, 2023 by Tom Kazansky

[BitMaster]

You might find one or the other native german that doesn't know what a Bf-109 is and what it means but you will find none who doesn't know what Me-109 stands for.

 

[Ala13_ManOWar]

7 hours ago, Tom Kazansky said:

Let me add this to the confusion;

Let me add then those serial number placards are all over every plane, but not all are "the" plane placard with it's serial number (usually in the outer skin). Every spare part from those aircraft had it's placards, some times stating the part, some times not and it's just a spare part number which unless you have the spare parts catalogue you won't get to know what the placard and/or part was that. For instance I've had Ju-87A placards in my hand, and no, they weren't "the" aircraft placard and serial number yet the name Ju-87A was there.

Which means, that one in particular doesn't look like "the" serial number placard from a 109, probably some internal part. Landing gear legs have them, for instance, or any other part boasting it's placard but not "the" aircraft's placard necessarily, and I believe that one doesn't look like the part.

[MAXsenna]

Well, an Opel is a Vauxhall in Britain, a Holden down under and a Chevrolet in the other down under.

Sent from my MAR-LX1A using Tapatalk

[Tom Kazansky]

8 hours ago, Ala13_ManOWar said:

Let me add then those serial number placards are all over every plane, but not all are "the" plane placard with it's serial number (usually in the outer skin). Every spare part from those aircraft had it's placards, some times stating the part, some times not and it's just a spare part number which unless you have the spare parts catalogue you won't get to know what the placard and/or part was that. For instance I've had Ju-87A placards in my hand, and no, they weren't "the" aircraft placard and serial number yet the name Ju-87A was there.

Which means, that one in particular doesn't look like "the" serial number placard from a 109, probably some internal part. Landing gear legs have them, for instance, or any other part boasting it's placard but not "the" aircraft's placard necessarily, and I believe that one doesn't look like the part.

Thank you. With this information and the fact that I haven't seen any placards / ID plates with Me 109, for me the real name still is Bf 109. With some confusion that those Swiss documents let arise.

OP's statement that "the real name is Me 109" is not proven yet by the info here in this thread  imho.

Edit: And even with plaques that say "Me 109" it would mean there were two names. The real name would be neither one nor the other alone.

Edited September 17, 2023 by Tom Kazansky

[Slippa]

The proper name for what I’ve always known as an ‘Me109’ or ‘Messerschmitt 109’ seems to be a Bf109. 

Dependant on why I was saying the name and to who, I’d use either. If I were ordering parts I’d probably use the Bf, just chatting to someone I’d use Me.

I’ve always known them as a 109 or an Me109.

I once met a pilot who was introduced as someone that flew ‘109s’. He’d been shot down over Gravesend. I asked him if he knew what had got him, of course, he said a Spitfire. “They were good weren’t they” I said for a laugh. I didn’t have anything with me other than a DVD cover for The Battle of Britain film so I’m probably one of the only people that has a cover for the film signed by both Spitfire and 109 pilots.

So it’s settled. Their proper name is Buchon.  

[ams999]

From what I see the official designation was Bf 109 but I've always known and referred to it as the Me 109 and will continue to do so.

In German, I don't pronounce the individual letters as I hear it being said in English (i.e., not "EM-E" but "Me") and I can't do it so easily with Bf, so what would I call it - "Biff 109"? Not gonna do it, that sounds silly lmao.

[MiG21bisFishbedL]

I prefer to call it 'Hans.'

[BitMaster]

I knew a "Me-109" Pilot from WWII when I was a young kid, he helped me built my first sail plane and often took me for a walk through the woods telling me many things about airplanes, like Center of Gravity, Pitch & Roll and Yaw, the BASICS of how a plane flies. He never used Bf, for him it was the Me or Messerschmitt or often just "hunnerdneun" in slang.

Correct, in Wikipedia and manuals and other legal papers you will likely read Bayerische Flugwerke AG but that is not how the people here in Germany remember it.

It's actually one of the few WWII Birds I don't have a "Walk Around" book about....just checked eBay and Amazon....damn...it's 114,83€ for the Booklet nowadays. Got them for way less 30 years ago in the States.   The Book titel reads:  "Messerschmitt Bf-109g Walk Around".   https://www.amazon.de/Messerschmitt-109g-Walk-Around-Hans-Heiri/dp/B00SB24NGG/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1695064036&sr=8-1

[Aquorys]

Where I currently live, in the north-eastern part of Austria, everyone I know just calls it the BF 109 (spoken "B F hundertneun", for the language geeks out there, it sounds like beː ɛf ˈhʊndɐtnɔɪ̯n). A literal translation of that to english would be "B F hundred nine".

[Mars Exulte]

This is one of those minor breakdowns into internal organisation resulting from starting and losing a major war. Kind of Mp-43/44/STG-44 etc. It's not really ''either it'' it's both circumstantially. Based on commentary it seems in modern times at least BF is more of a modern non-German association, with Me being internally recognised, while in actual documents and production of the time it was back and forth.

Another example in modern times is how the manufacturer of the F-35 expected it be sequentially in line with the F-22, expecting it to be F-24 and referencing it appropriately in internal documents... only for the government to turn around and throw the F-35 curveball out there. Supposedly, internal docs still refer to it as a F-24. And that occurred without major political and military upheaval.

[Aquorys]

19 hours ago, Mars Exulte said:

Supposedly, internal docs still refer to it as a F-24. And that occurred without major political and military upheaval.

The only documents I have seen from the manufacturer that refer to the F-35 call it the JSF. I have never heard about the F-24 name until now, but not saying it isn't true. Documents are often all over the place with naming, even internal ones, in many companies.

[Mars Exulte]

Yeah, I can't vouch for the accuracy of that, as I've never bothered trying to verify it. Is something I've seen multiple times in reference from people generally more in the know than me. But you know how that goes sometimes, too.