Me109 vs Bf109 - the age old debate.

[leccyflyer]

Came across this video this morning from my favourite aviation artist Mark Postlethwaite, several of who's prints adorn my walls, on his Wingleader branded FB page.

 

Interestingly I always referred to the Messerschmitt Me109 in my young days making Airfix kits and the like and it was only in later years when I had been corrected by someone that I'd looked into it in print sources and been brought round to the Bf count. I think Mark makes a fairly compelling argument, not least in that the contemporary RAF pilot's log books referred to the Me109 prettymuch exclusively. It's likely that there might have been the occasional reference to them as BFs, but not that sort of Bf and, of course to a whole generation of Battle of Britain film fans they will more correctly be referred to by their proper name of YNBs. 😄

 

 

 

[Alan Gorham_]

Actually it isn't a debate. There is a clear timeline where the 109 was initially manufactured by Bayerische Flugzeuge Werke and RLM system of nomenclature required the model number to be prefixed the the two letter code representing the manufacturer. Hence Bf == Bayerische Flugzeuge. The BFW company became Messerschmitt AG in 1938 and hence the manufacturer code was subsequently changed to Me.