Swedens WW2 Radial Engined Fighter - FFVS J22

One of the lesser known WW2 fighters to reach production, the FFVS J22 is overshadowed even by its own company in the Flygvapnet, but was nevertheless a notable, and interesting design. Although often considered to be an all round average fighter, the story of the J22 is far from average - here is its story.

Sources:

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0:00 - 2:48 Introduction
2:49 - 3:37 Channel Update/Blacklisting
3:38 - 6:22 Swedens Aviation Situation
6:23 - 7:45 Aircraft Proposals
7:45 - 10:12 Seeds of a New Fighter
10:13 - 14:17 Design Stages
14:18 - 18:06 Construction & Prototype Stage
18:07 - 24:01 Service Life
24:02 - 26:39 Conclusion

[Niinsa]

I read somewhere a long time ago there was a fan club of this aircraft in America. The aircrew of an American bomber that had been damaged and was trying to reach neutral Sweden to make an emergency landing. To stay in the air, they had dumped everything heavy overboard after they left Germany and reached the Baltic Sea. That meant guns and ammo. Unfortunately, before they reached Sweden, they were attacked by a lone German fighter. They could do nothing to defend themselves, so things looked kind of grim. All they could do was look at the German fighter as it made a pass firing at them, and then climb away to slow down, make a turn, and come back firing at them. Only he didn't come back, because as he was slow and turning, a Swedish fighter opened up on him. A J22. He didn't shoot the German down, but he scared him away. The J22 pilot had seen what was going to happen, and had been going full throttle, engine temperature be damned, and had managed to place himself in a good position to do something. And then the J22 escorted the American bomber to Sweden so they could land there. The J22 pilot met them afterwards, and his surname was Smith, oddly enough. Apparently, he was a brother or cousin or something of famous SAAB test pilot Claes Smith. Smith is not a common surname in Sweden. That American bomber crew formed The J22 Fan Club, American Chapter. Maybe not the fastest or bestest fighter ever, but it was there, when it was needed! :-)

[finntastique]

A big respect to Swedish aeronautical engineers; J 22, SAAB 29 Tunnan, 32 Lansen, 35 Draken, 37 Viggen and 39 Gripen.

[nomennescio]

About the Pratt & Whitney engine. They way I have heard it told, apparently the Swedes were perfectly aware they were nicking it. What they did was start an account on P&W's behalf, make an assessment of what should be an acceptable sum of reimbursement per engine, AS IF there was an actual agreement in place, and deposited the sums there.

And what then happened after the war was that a Swedish delegation went to P&W, and as a total surprise to the P&W people presented the situation, with yay amounts of pirated engines produced, but also this fat back account with payment for P&W set aside, should they want. It is then to the very great credit of P&W that that absorbed this surprising new information, and swiftly came back with the purely symbolic one dollar claim, and besides they expressed their great satisfaction that the Swedes had chosen their engine as their best option in a time of national emergency.

[kentnilsson]

One thing of note, Swedens armed forces didnt have much when the war broke out, but the Swedish army and airforce gave what little they had. One third of the fighters went to Finland and also much of the armies artillery, machine guns, AT guns and AA guns and ammo of course. Total value of what was given during the Winter war 39/40 was 500 million SEK, which was 50% of Finlands budget total or military total cost. Either, doesnt say which in my sources, but either way, a lot

[Blackadder]

Minor error at about 5:20, it is referred to the transfer of aircraft from Haparanda to Malmen, presumably Malmen air base near Linköping, but the map zooms in to the town of Narvik, Norway.

[jameshall]

Great video overall. One small point, at 11:15, you show a picture of a Finnish Gloster Gladiator, but refer to it as a Fiat G50.

[FRIEND_]

I absolutely love your videos, please work hard on them.
You really put a lot of details most would not even look at which i love.

[DIREWOLFx]

When the war started in September 1939, Sweden had at most ammo for around 2 hours. And at worst, for less than 15 minutes.

The big problem was that when Sweden tried to start rearming in 1935, it was already too late, vast majority of suppliers were already busy producing things for their own nations.

The navy was old, but not quite obsolete, as their focus would be on using the coastlines to stay defensive and hit anything getting close, no gallivanting around and risking the big ships.

The army was mostly old, to some extent on the edge of obsolescence, but also with some level of modernisation, mostly thanks to the Germans circumventing the Versaille diktat by setting up the Landsverk company in Sweden, developing mostly tanks.

Now, the AIRFORCE however? In 1939 most of it was painfully obsolescent or even outright obsolete. And it wasn't big either. And Sweden had not a single manufacturer capable of massproduction of high performance aircraft engines, nor any designer with experience creating one.

Sweden purchased a small number of planes from Germany. They were not however capable of getting any of the "latest'n'greatest", just some minor upgrades in overall capability, like getting a few Ju-86 high altitude recon/bombers.

Sweden went to USSR. And COULD have gotten a quite decent deal for I-16s there, which would have been a clear improvement on existing planes.
But because the Soviets refused to also sell bombers, Sweden crashed the deal, very stupidly.

Sweden went to JAPAN even. And almost concluded a deal that would have been amazing for Sweden. Deliveries of the Mitsubishi Zero starting the same time they started delivering them to the IJN. And COMPLETE license rights for everything needed to build a Zero, with especially the engine and cannons as well as the alloy used in the airframe being extremely important as Sweden at time completely lacked the expertise and knowledge for those areas. This would also come with both deliveries and licensing for a bomber, possibly more than one, but i've never been able to find out which one.
However, due to the fighting with USSR, there was no way to get any deliveries overland, as the optimal solution would have been to send them via the Sibirian railroad. And during the negotiations, the war in Europe had started, which made transport by sea exceedingly dangerous. There was more negotiations regarding a possibility of buying only the blueprints and licensing rights, but with USAs increasing sanctions against Japan heralding a future war, Japan became much less enthusiastic about potentially giving away secrets without getting enough in return, so their asking price for blueprints and licensing ended up simply too high for Sweden.

Sweden purchased aircraft from USA. And before barely any had been delivered, USA broke the contract. At least SOME of the engines had arrived, and this was used to reverse engineer and make an improved version of the engine a few years later.

So, what did Sweden actually get in numbers? From the only place selling and available. Italy. A bunch of Reggiane 2000. And, as a result of a privately organised collection drive, also a bunch of Fiat Cr.42.

[TheLateBird]

I fell in love with this small but tough fighter when I visited the Swedish Air Force Museum last year. Great video!

[Cptnbond]

The newspaper headline (April 10, 1940) reads, 'Germany demands strict neutrality by Sweden' - in other words, do not get involved in the Nazi war. With the weak military capability of the Swedes, no wonder they obeyed.

[neiloflongbeck]

The converted torpedo boats used as blockage runners were the Gay Viking class had been ordered from Camper and Nicholson of Gosport and Northam by the Turkish Navy just before the start of WW2. They were powered by three 1000hp Paxman VRB 16 cylinder engines. The Turks had ordered 8 of these boats and three saw service with the Royal Navy as MTBs and the other 5 became fast merchant men (Gay Viking, Masted Standfast, Hopewell, Nonsuch and Gay Corsair) and crewed by officers from Ellerman Wilson and crewmen off Hull trawlers. These boats could cruise at 20 knots, with a max speed on 23 knots, at 17 knots they had a range of 1200 miles. Look up Operation Bridford to find out more on their service.

[TzunSu]

Very interesting to see you mention the Swedish help for Finland during the war. My gramps flew as a Swedish volunteer in Finland, as a radioman.

[Bourne]

Thanks for introducing this very interesting aircraft

[eue]

In 1986 or 87 I was helping out resquing a J22 from a former airforce training ground on the east coast of Sweden. I think its the one at Svedinos.

[The_Plastic_Ape]

I always look forward to your videos. You cover aviation subjects that even the most hardened aviation enthusiasts would miss.

[garyhooper]

Thanks, like the content on lesser know, but part of aviation history . That's why I subscribed here .

[petesheppard]

Outstanding video; great aviation history! The J22 sounds like a sweet ship--it certainly looks good.

[Mattiniord]

Svedinos J22 that is being restored to flying condition by Warbirds of Sweden is alive and kicking. But it has been moved to Aeroseum, a Museum and Aviation expirence center in Gothenburg. Aeroseum lies in an Cold war underground hangar by Säve airfield, the former home of F9, the first unit to be outfitted with the J22 in late 1943. Therefore visitors can come and see how the work progresses on the J22. They started out with the metal framework but little of the original wood for the hull and wings. What remained was not useable anymore.

However, Warbirds of Sweden had a stroke of luck.

Remember that furniture manufacturer that produced all the wooden components? When asked if they could help out, they had a look around and lo and behold, in their storage they found drawings and all the original moulds that had been used to shape the beechwood panels! Thankfully someone way back when had made sure to store these, maybe thinking that maybe they might become useful someday. The company would never make anything like that ever again, but just by preserving those moulds did an extremely important service to swedish aviation history.
So now the aircraft will be clad in newly produced beechwood panels, made using the original moulds, which frankly is mindblowing. After all, there was really no need for the company to keep those moulds, but keep them they did.

If you want to see the the work on what will hopefully become a fully flying FFVS J22, come to Gothenburg and visit Aeroseum.

[garrickmartin]

Very interesting, thanks. Sweden enjoys a well deserved reputation for innovation and quality and the J22 is a good example. Cheers.

[jankarlsson]

Wow! So nice video🥰💕Thank you❤️I'm swedish 😃and I live near Sweden's best preserved airfield from the Second World War "krigsflygfält 16" Brattforsheden in Värmland. Everything preserved as a museum.
A nice place where I usually fly radio controlled airplanes.