Olham

Not sure how successful these cannons were - French ace Guynemer experimented with a cannon on his SPAD, but he went back to twin machine guns.

It is a cannon - Voisin experimented with the M1902 cannon, which had a calibre of 37 mm. Not sure though, if this is that same model. See more here: http://www.dieselpunks.org/profiles/blogs/knights-of-the-air-sky-cannons

A website with an amazing collection of WW1 aircraft photos and postcards has gone - "Rosebud's Early Aviation" I went there often to check and double-check aircraft types and variations, and I always found what I was looking for, or even so much more. Now the domain name has expired, for whatever reason, and a great site is gone. Thank you for all the good information over a long time, Rosebud.

Checked it and it seems you are right; at least for Le Prieur rockets, Jim. I always thought they had been explosive, but these weren't. They seem to have been used against balloons (successfully), and - unsuccessfully - against airships. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Prieur_rocket Pol said it repeatedly, that the way the rockets are in OFF is more a CFS3/WW2 rocket. But maybe they could change them for WOFF?

...and you live to tell the story??? I would expect to be ripped to shreds by the blast. Or maybe that's what you think you should be courtmarshalled for? ..

Sounds like you had to get suicidal-close?

Hey, I always thought I'd got all the best out of OFF, but I never tried rockets. Never even once. UncleAl used to attack ground targets with them, and maybe balloons. Not sure about E/A.

Just found this early example of "nose art" over at THE AERODROME. They obviously took it from a marketing cartoon for "BROWNIE's Camera". http://www.theaerodrome.com/forum/other-wwi-aviation/54002-brownie-cartoon-belgian-aircraft.html

What did you fly - Pup or Tripe? White-knuckly fighting with wet hands, and no need for a cardiac pacemaker... Mmuahahahahaaa!!!

More "nose art" on Farmans - found at "Belgian Wings" website, which I recommend to visit. http://www.belgian-wings.be/webpages/navigator/Photos/MilltaryPics/ww1_precurseurs/Farman%20F40/Farman%20F.40-F.41%20frontpage.html

Yes, it is - I can get each page, and magnify it. You need to click on a page, then on "Full resolution", and then you can even zoom in and read.

Thanks for the pics, Socrate. Your postings made me wonder, if perhaps "L'Illustration" might be common property today, which can openly be read by everyone. So I looked into WIKI COMMONS, and really - there are many links to these magazines: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:L%27Illustration Enjoy looking through the ones you perhaps don't have.

The night photo and the winter picture are some great, rather rare views from the aviation of WW1. Thank you for sharing, Socrate!

Update 24 October 2013 - 15:28 h Berlin summer time (= GMT + 2) hurrican3, Pennsylvania, added. LtCasey, Germany, added. The maps are in post 1 of this thread

Tony, you lucky man - what a great project to join into! Good success!

Lothar von Richthofen made the experience, that even a partly missing airfoil on the top wing made the craft difficult to fly. So I guess you won't find any volunteers. Definitely not me - Mmuahahahahaaa!!!

..and if we had to prove it with Einstein's relativity theory - a German wonder weapon! Mmuahahahahaaa!!!

Better than guesswork or half-knowledge, anytime - thanks, Jim!

Found this link posted on "THE AERODROME". Maybe interesting for research for the Balkan front. A pity that they haven't added the Western Front maps yet, or the Italian theater maps. (Well, maybe the Austrians didn't have maps for the Western front) http://lazarus.elte.hu/hun/digkonyv/topo/3felmeres.htm

Well, if we see the fast development of aircraft in WW1, the Fokker Eindecker and the Halberstadt were actually like "different generations". According to WIKI, the last of the Eindeckers, the E.IV, was test-flown by Boelcke as early as November 1915 (and Boelcke was rather stand-offish about it). The Halberstadt D-types were conceptioned as the successor of the Eindecker. The first prototype flew in February 1916; three months after Boelcke's testing of the Fokker E.IV. Three months were a long time in a development race that lead from the Taube to the Fokker D.VII F; or from the Morane Saulnier to the SPAD XIII - in only 4 years. The Halberstadt could not carry two machine guns very well; the D.IV and D.V did have the installation option for a second machine gun, but that overcharged the aircraft with it's OPEL 120 PS engine. With the Albatros D.I and D.II the Germans received a new fighter concept in late September 1916. Although much heavier than any other fighter before, it's 160 PS Mercedes engine allowed it to carry 2 machine guns and still be some 20 km/h faster than a Nieuport 11 or Airco DH-2. This new concept must have been the end for the Halberstadt.

I guess it depends on what you did with an aircraft - after all they were less sturdy than today's craft.. If you dived until you had gained a fast speed, and then suddenly pulled up in a brutal way... F. K. Kurt Jentsch witnessed his commander falling like that. He dived onto a lower flying SPAD with his Albatros, and when he caught up the plane, the wings came off - all four - and the fuselage fell like a stone, while the wings looked like slowly tumbling down sheets of paper. But that was obviously a very brutal manoeuver, and it was an Albatros D.III or D.V. I guess generally the pilots would have felt, how far they could go, and only a handful of men ever drove their aircraft to extremes - maybe only in dispair.

Watched the video now. It seems they have made the DM so, that you easily shed your wings, when you pull out of a dive too hard. I have lost the wings of Albatros planes, when I pulled stick to hard/turned real tight in turn fights. But I have given up telling them. Every time I mentioned something I found wrong or overdone, the same group of RoF-defenders jumped at me, and if I didn't stop, my threads got closed pretty soon. Could be a great sim, but...

Thanks for the good historical knowledge, Shredward. Now I know why I always liked the craft.

Aha! A (virtual) urban legend. (My apologies, Olham. My response seems to have changed your post. Not sure how that could have happened)

The Junkers Ju52 transport plane was nicknamed "Tante Ju" by the pilots ("Aunty Ju").