STORMO! Forums

Dear Stormo friends,
just finished my first 1/48 kit and I am soon back with a 1/72 one.
One friend of mine gave me this resin kit he had already half assembled and my curiosity about this plane immediately raised up as my knowledge about Reggiane production during WW2 stopped with RE2005.
I found some info about this plane on alireggiane website and I invite you to read this amazing link :
http://alireggiane.forumattivo.com/t238-re-2007
My first question is: if this plane was not built up, which colour would best fit for this kit?
To start I share with you the first pics of this kit










I don't know if this plane existed or not but I'm sure I'll enjoy with you to come back in that time and imagine how this story would end...

Ciao a tutti
Max

I wish I could read Italian because the translation is hard to grasp. and I would like to know if a model is available from somewhere. great story and model. vin

The color of the plane would most likely have been VOS2 (Metropolitan scheme). I look forward to this build and I agree, its quiet an interesting story and would have been nice to have seen this plane fly in at least its prototype form.

Hello Max3rd,
There are all kinds of interesting stories and theories , that surround this aircraft.
Here is one:
One states that Hauptmann Bohm, the Luftwaffe’s senior engineer at the Reggiane plant, was the person in charge of supplying the Jumo 004B engine in July 1944, but could not get it on time, delaying the production.
However, Roberto Longhi, the 2007 designer went ahead in building the fuselage, wing spars, undercarriage and cockpit. Then in October 1944, the completed components were moved to the Caproni plant at Taliedo, where they would remain until the end of the war.

At the end of the war, they were shipped to the USA were North American Aviation designed the F86 Sabre, which has an uncanny resemblance to the 2007.
Vincent.

Vincent Biondi wrote:Hello Max3rd,
At the end of the war, they were shipped to the USA were North American Aviation designed the F86 Sabre, which has an uncanny resemblance to the 2007.

... and from that Fiat license built the F.86 and built the G.91 from its expereince in that project All things go around

Hello Vincent,
another amazing version of this story states that Re.2006 was the last plane designed and built by Reggiane with two prototypes : MM.540 and MM.541. But during the project phase, in Germany started the construction of Junkers JUMO 004/B engines and for that reason in Reggiane decided immediately to change the project of the second prototype, MM.541, to adapt it to the new engine: this new prototype was the Re.2007. While some spare components of Re.2007 were moved from Correggio to Taliedo, the two engines never arrived from Germany.
One part of the fuselage (we don't understand which one of two prototypes) was carried into the cellars of Politecnico in Milano.
At the present one of JUMO 004/B engines has been given to Museo Storico dell'Aeronautica Militare in Vigna di Valle. See picture below (the engine is under the wing of Campini Caproni):



ciao a tutti
Max

Hello All,
I understand that Roberto Longhi went to the USA after the war and worked with a major aerospace company.
Does anyone know which firm it was?
Vincent.

I thought it was Seversky.

Hi Vince,
You're absolutely right, he did work for Seversky, however, I thought that he went to work for another US firm after the war, namely North American.
Hence, the similarities between the 2007 and the F 86.
Vincent.

Not sure who he worked for after WWII - good question! I'll look into that.

The Ali d'Italia RE.2005 publication has a few interesting words to say about the RE.2007 designation. Reggianes chief test pilot of the time, De Prato, had never heard of a jet fighter design ... 'a fairy tale' were his words. There are no documents in the Reggiane archive to support Longhis RE.2007 jet fighter design either (maybe he removed them?). A photo of wooden mock up of a single engined 6 seater/mail plane (another candidate for the RE.2007 designation) can be seen on page 44.

Whatever, it would be very unlikely to have had Regia Aeronautica markings.

Hello All,
You will find the following post, by Justo Miranda very interesting!!

Ing. Campini projects
Post by: Justo Miranda on January 15, 2008, 11:31:59 pm
Quote from: Skybolt on September 21, 2006, 05:04:40 pm
The Re 2007 (THIS Re 2007) is a notorious fake.

Hi,

I have a theory that could explain part of the puzzle on the Re 2007.. Please remember that it is just a theory.

In spite of all the existing publications on the Re 2007 issued in the last 58 years (please see attached biography if you feel up to the task) the problem remains unsolved.
There are two schools of thinking on the matter, both defended by serious authors who undeniably act on good faith.

Two points of view

• The “conservative” version says that the Re 2007 never existed. It was just a project of postal airplane with radial engine derived from the Re 2006 and which original designation had been Re 2006 PP.
Logical reasoning if we consider that this is the only type of airplane derived from the Re 2006 that could have been successful in post war Italy.
There is also significant evidence. The chef test pilot at Reggiane, Maggiore Tullio de Prato who, in declarations made in October 1977 denied his knowledge on the existence of a project known as Re 2007.

• The “liberal” version states that a swept wing jet fighter was built in Italy during the war. It never reached flying stage as it was impossible to obtain the Jumo 004B turbojet that Germans have promised to deliver to the Reggiane firm.
The main argument used to defend that option is a letter dated January 7th 1944 in which Ing. Roberto Longhi, former chief-designer of Reggiane, requested the help of Count Doct. Ing. Gianni Caproni. He wished to obtain information on measurements and performances of the Jumo 004 with the objective of initiating the assembly of the Re 2007.

It is obvious for us that this airplane was designed for an engine smaller than the Jumo, which would not be available for the Italians until much later than 1944.
Our opinion is that the design originated at 1949-1950 and, due to some obscure legal marketing issue, it was necessary to redraw it with a very earlier date on it.

The reason might be named Re 2008. This project of swept wing fighter was designed by Longhi in USA between 1947 and 1948 with the technical support of Cornell Aeronautical Laboratory, which counted with a high speed wind tunnel, impossible to find in Italy at that time.
Apparently Longhi tried to manufacture the Re 2008 in Europe when the Reggiane firm took up its activities again, something which did not happen due to political reasons.

The fact is that Americans did not like this covered transfer of technology. Actually, they suspected that the Re 2000 designed by Longhi was a copy of their Seversky P.35 fighter.
The Re 2008 also looked very much alike the F-86 Sabre and, given that such wing type could not have been designed in Italy for lack of technical means, there was a legal problem of copyright as Americans considered German swept wing technology as prize of war.
It is perhaps for that reason that a phantom project named Re 2007 was “created in 1944”, possibly alleging that the swept wing was a wartime Germany originated technology transfer.

The Re 2008 (Caproni-Reggiane Ca.2008 according to other authors) was a swept wing jet fighter propelled by an axial-flow turbojet of an unspecified type with 5000 lb of thrust.

The wing had 36º swept in the leading edge and -5º dihedral angle. It had four slots in the leading edge and mid-wing transonic fences. The airfoil was a high speed NACA 66.
The fuselage had airbrakes and could be divided in three sections to facilitate the change of engine.
The cockpit, of an archaic design, was pressurized.
The armament was to be four Mauser MG 151 guns of 20 mm, located around the air-intake duct.
It could also transport 12 HVAR rockets under the wings.


Estimated technical data for the swept wing Re 2007 (Re 2008 between brackets)

Span 9.5 m (9 m)
Length 9 m (12 m)
Height 3 m (2.75 m)
Wing area 17 m2 (16 m2)
Empty weight 2500 kg (2400 kg)
Loaded weight 3540 kg (3900 kg)
Max speed Mach 0.85 (Mach 0.95)
Service ceiling 15000 m (20000 m)

So, it appears that Longhi did work in the States after the wa, with the Cornell Aeronautical Laboratory!
Any thoughts?
Vincent.

Very interesting! Great research. With the evidence we have it does appear the Re.2007 [Re.2008] had in fact been on the drawing-board. Just because a test pilot didn't know of the design doesn't mean it didn't reach the design or mock-up stage i.e., I wouldn't hang my hat on the statements of a test pilot and we don't know the context of Prato’s statements, ie., whether he qualified the statement as simply being unaware of the design.

Interesting theories in this post and all quite plausible, especially with regards to the RE.2008, which I was not aware of before now.

As the English written histories of WWII have shown us, you need to dig deeper other than reading into a mere statement. I recall reading an excerpt from a source of Christopher Shores (Vince Biondi will remember this) about a supposed English citizen on Malta in 1940-42 who described Italian bombs as nuisances/ineffective, and then went on to describe a bombing run of the island by the Regia Aeronautica in which English citizens continued to tan as Italian bombs rained down around them. The story was so ridiculous and laughable that the person quoted in the book was either fabricating the whole thing or he was utterly stupid. Of course the author didn’t include the name of this supposed witness or witnesses. I think WWII historians need to do more than they’ve shown us.