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Heinkel He 219A Uhu-Owl

By Gunnar van der Meeren (Gunnar) - 11th Jul 2007
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This unique night fighter made its first flight as early as November 6. 1942, and entered service in 1943. However very few ever saw service due to a huge political battle between Josef Kammhuber (General of the Night Fighters), Ernst Heinkel (the constructor) and Erhard Milch (responsible for aircraft construction in the Reichsluftfahrtministerium).

The He 219 was one of the most advanced aircraft built during the WWII, and the few put in service, had a huge effect on the RAF night bombing plans. The aircraft was equipped with twin ejection seats, pressurized cockpit, nose wheel landing gear, and remote control defensive guns like the Messerschmitt Me 210's. Packed with 8 cannon (later versions), the firepower was lethal. The armour featured a special upward firing canon also known as ´Schrage Musikª (Jazz)
In the end, bad decision-making prevented this excellent aircraft from being the threat of it’s potential.


The Wings of Power He 219 A Model

The WoP model comes in six variants available for download only.
These are:
He 219 A-0-R2-G9-FB
He 219 A-0-R6-G9+FK
He 219 A-2-R1-G9+HK
He 219 A-2-R1-G9+TH
He 219 A-5-CZE-LB-79
He 219 A-7-R2-D5+CL (RAF)

For the last years, Wings of Power has become the major developer and supplier of WWII aircraft for MS Flight simulator 2004. WoP uses ´Built with Absolute Realism Technologyª as their Trade Mark, and this will cause expectations….

Looking at this spectacular model for the first time, it looks great in the simulator. The model has a lot of animated parts, such as moving ladder, (delayed) cockpit opening, cockpit side window opening, accurate ejection seat sequence, and accurate drop sequence of the external fuel tank to mention some…
The radar antenna mounted in the nose and the rough tricycle landing gear, are very detailed modelled. The 32 bit textures looks very good, although I would like to see a light version, using DTX3 textures.

The interior

Like previous WoP releases, the cockpit details and functionality are great. The stunning details of the advanced cockpit make it easy to identify all the instruments, leavers and switches. The windshield features a special armoured glass which can be retracted by pressing the ´Oª key. The lighting is historically accurate and night time visuals are very good. I will always prefer flying from the virtual cockpit. Well seated in the VC, you will feel comfortable. The VC looks quite as great as the 2D cockpit, and almost every single item is clickable.

The sounds

As for earlier WoP releases, the He 219 features a fantastic sound set.
The engine sounds are professionally recorded and mastered, and includes realistic prop effects, stall buffet, ground roll, flaps, gyro, authentic cockpit wind, and special canopy pressurizing and release sounds. The high quality and complex sound set can be a bit tough to handle from a pc with less performance than average. The size of sound folder is 36Mb. Normal size will be between 5 and 10Mb.

Absolute realism

The WoP He 219 is built to be flown ´by the bookª. The entire flight envelope is modelled via the actual pilot’s training manuals. While flying the aircraft, you will feel the authentic power characteristics of the supercharged piston engine. Absolute realism means realistic cruise performance under various conditions and with realistic fuel economy. When releasing the drop tank, you will notice drop in both fuel and weight. Start-up visual are modelled after the real aircraft, and looks very realistic. The authentic reflector gun sight can be tuned to both day and night mode.

Absolute realism also means that a lot of effects are stuffed into this great model. If you’re in for an emergency landing with your landing gear jammed, you will experience stunning belly landing effects and physics.

Documentations

The manuals uses Shockwave’s new standard for high quality manuals. These are among the best I have seen. The documentations are very thorough with lots of illustrations – very understandable and easy to get overview.

Conclusions

Yet another great aircraft model supplied by Wings of Power.
Overall good-looking model with lots of special effects. Realistic behaviour and good flight characteristics. Six liveries made for four different models gives you much for a reasonable price.
The model is available for download only, and the large file size (124Mb) can be a problem for those with slow connection speed.
In addition, I would also like to see a ´lightª version using DTX3 textures and smaller sound files. And seen from a re-painters point of view, paint-kits will be much appreciated.

But all in all the WoP Heinkel He 219A is a great add on – absolute realism, absolute recommendable!…..

Test system: Dell Dimension 8200 – Pentium IV - 2.4Ghz –
1024 Mb RAM – Geinward GeForce 6600GT (256Mb) – Santa Cruz soundcard 5+1