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[bestekampfpilot58]

Thanks for the interesting response guys!

I had assumed that the fuel tank offset was a in-game design error, a mod error or a graphical 'glitch'.
Goes to show what happens when you ass-ume anything..

Just out of curiosity I looked into the history and the weights associated with this 300 liter drop tank.
Turns out that the original etc 250 rack was only for bombs, not for fuel, which to me at least seems
very short sighted on the part of the Germans. This etc rack fuel line fault was not rectified until October
1940 with the intro of the Bf109E-7 into service.
I did not find any weight references to the Etc bomb rack, but I did find a rough weight for the 300 liters of
fuel.
Just using a base line of 6.2 pounds per gal (USA), and not knowing the weight difference between 87 octane
and 100 octane aviation fuel, the fuel weight from what I saw and read on-line, is about 489 pounds of weight! 
This is a lot of weight for the Bf109 to carry OFFSET between its knock kneed undercarriage!!
The Bf109 had some really bad ground handling characteristics, now add about 500 pounds of fuel, offset to the
left of fuselage center line to make taking off even more FUN!!   

I also found out another thing that I did not know about the Bf109K, the 'K' model had landing gear pegs very similar
to the landing gear rods of the Fw190!!

Lastly, about 30 years ago in Minnesota, my brother, at his place of employment worked everyday with a former
Luftwaffe Bf109 fighter pilot!!
I never had a chance to meet and speak with this man. Back then I would've given a LOT to speak with this
guy. I believe his name was 'Rolf?', from what I remember.. I can only imagine what I could've learned about the
Bf109, and the Luftwaffe and the whole WW2 German fighter pilot experience from him...

Horrido!

[SAS~Storebror]

Turns out that the original etc 250 rack was only for bombs, not for fuel, which to me at least seems
very short sighted on the part of the Germans. This etc rack fuel line fault was not rectified until October
1940 with the intro of the Bf109E-7 into service.

It's the german arrogance which caused this.
They thought that first of all bombers won't need no fighter escort when they just were fast enough.
And when this just wasn't true even at the beginning of WW2 anymore, the idea was that Bf 110's would have provided sufficient escort.
Neither worked, the 109 had to escort both, 15min. combat time above London area wasn't sufficient, here we are.

The Bf109 had some really bad ground handling characteristics, now add about 500 pounds of fuel, offset to the
left of fuselage center line to make taking off even more FUN!!   

Now that german engineers don't do anything without a specific reason behind, it's safe to assume that this was carefully considered.
There could be many reasons, two of which just come to my mind immediately are fuel pipes to the auxiliary tank that had to be routed around a centerline rib, or some positive effect of the offset installation on the prop wash effects at cruise speed.

Best regards - Mike