From Wreck to Flight: Restoring a Crashed BF 109

It is extremely rare what you see, extremely rare. If the money was needed, we found the money and we did it. We did not save a little bit here or there just to be able to finish. Everything is the best of the best. To be honest with you, I need to pinch myself every time I try these things. The idea was always to make an original BF109. When you have only a few pieces, it's important you have the serial number and you have some original pieces that we can recover. Through our connections, we could source some original parts that we could use for this restoration with a story. When you talk about the Luftwaffe during the Second World War, the aviation aficionados and general public will recognize one name, the Messerschmitt, particularly the Messerschmitt 109. These are wingtips. Then we have here rudders. They are already finished. These are the flaps and everything is ready to go now. Next step will be assembling and then painting. But basically, the plane will be assembled, ground painted, and then disassembled again, and then painted, and then assembled. And then starting the engine, roll out, test flight program, and then flying. There were 33,000 produced during the war. And today, BF109, we have a handful left in the world, original ones. And flying BF109, you have maybe four in the world. That's it. Why? Because the engine is very tricky. The know-how of the engine is not here. You need to have the right people. First, I want to show you the original Mercedes-Benz DB605 engine. Extremely, extremely rare. Hard to find. We could source one engine for the G6 from Germany, from a German collector. And then it was overhauled by a specialist in Austria, which is a very high specialist in 605 engines. There is very little experience worldwide in 605 engines. This particular engine was overhauled and was on a test stand. It has already run 15 hours on a test stand. And we hope to put it on the aircraft in the next few weeks. The fuselage is an original German BF109 fuselage. Obviously, it was completely overhauled, as you can see here. We have used as many original parts as possible. But of course, you want to fly it again, so you need to do some modifications, very tiny modifications. For the flying purposes are the disc brakes. They had no disc brakes during the war. But of course, it's much better to have disc brakes. On this wheel, then you see inside the disc brakes. They are put in a way that you cannot really see it very well, that there are disc brakes. These are the two main modifications from the original. The aircraft itself, they produced upwards of 30,000 Messerschmitt ME109 variants. The BF109 was the German fighter during the war. After the war, nobody was interested in this aircraft. The Americans, they liked their P-51, their P-40, all these American aircraft. But nobody really wanted to see the German aircraft. The British, they liked the Spitfires, the Hurricanes, fantastic, all good. They were built in large quantities. But now, Messerschmitts, you have a handful left. And that makes it extremely interesting, interesting for collectors, for museums. And we think also, value-wise, it is extremely rare what you see, extremely rare. By knowing the serial number on the plane, we knew where it was built. It was a 109G who was built in Germany in 1943. And then it was delivered beginning of 1945 to the Jagdstaffel 27, which is the sign on the aircraft. And the Jagdstaffel 27 was a very famous staffel during World War II from the Germans. Then we could more or less figure out exactly what color scheme the plane had. This Jagdstaffel 27 who was here then in Hungary, they came from Africa up here and then finished in Hungary. And this is the paint scheme as it was at that day when it crashed. Hans Flohr was the pilot flying that aircraft. He was born in 1920. He was, the day he crashed, he was 24 years old, so very, very young. Especially knowing how complicated it is to fly a 109. Having not even 200 hours flying something like that, wow, I think my heart rate would have doubled every takeoff and before every landing. A lot of adrenaline. So it is very authentic and the paint outside, inside, the numbers, everything. And of course, it was not easy to find all these original parts. We could use, of course, some parts, but we needed to find as much as possible original parts to finalize this aircraft. This aircraft is a piece of history. It's not just an aircraft. Of course, you can make a very quick plane flying and it looks a little bit the same, but here every, you know, we can say that inside the cockpit, every instrument, everything is exactly the way as it was. This plane was flown last time in 1945 in Hungary. It was crashed in Hungary. And now we are again in Hungary after four years of very intense work with a big team. Not easy. And everybody was very patient and very focused to finally finish that project. We see a beautiful aircraft. It's a great technology. It's interesting. In the beginning, you look at the plane, you start with the plane. You start, you know, to go through all the technical demands. But then suddenly, parallel, you have all the historians working on the story. And then everything comes together. And at the end, you know, the story is at least as important as the plane. It's not just the plane. It is one big circle who was close and it will be here for the future generations. This is really important that the future generations understand what a person like Hans Flohr went through. The sound is fantastic. It's not noise. It's like kind of music, philosophy and history. To move these millions of worthy machines. But I like it. And I especially like the 109 because it's a real pilot's challenge. I like it quite much.