All Articles Tagged 'biplane' (63)

Nothing weird in your mail this Saturday. Just a family of Italian warplanes flown over four continents.

Probably the only weird thing about this glorious family is its lifespan, starting soon after the Great War and fading away in WWII air battles. These biplanes, once listed among the world's most advanced fighters, were a sad oddity in…

When the radar existed only in science fiction but the aviation was already here, the most common way of spotting a distant target was to send a reconnaissance aircraft based aboard a battleship or a cruiser.

For submarine fleet, spotting and early warning was probably even more vital than for the large surface ships. No…

This photograph looks like a shot from a sci-fi movie:

Just a few seconds - and the aircraft will change its shape to emerge as a giant robot... But what we see is a bomber, not a transformer.

First flown in prototype form in mid-1930, the Handley-Page HP.50 Heyford was the last of the RAF's long-range biplane night bombers. It was powered in…

1920s airliners... Some are famous, some have fallen into obscurity.

Have you ever heard of the Albatros sleeper - a very unlikely descendant of WWI Albatros fighters?

The Albatros L 73 was a German twin-engined biplane airliner of the 1920s. Of conventional configuration, it featured a streamlined, boat-like fuselage and…

Igor Sikorsky is remembered as an aircraft designer well ahead of his time. But at least once in his long career, he was unfashionably late.

As early as in 1913, he designed world's first four-engine bomber (initially destined for transport &.research). Nine years later, he…

Designed by Gianni Caproni and Dino Giuliani, this six-engine biplane was the largest landplane in the world.

The Caproni Ca.90 made its maiden flight on October 13, 1929 - two weeks before the 7th anniversary of Fascist takeover. It had an unusual layout, with two tandem pairs of 1,000hp Isotta Fraschini Asso engines above the 46.6 m (153 ft)…

The Saturday Air Mail is never short of weird aircraft, civil and military. Meet the Vickers 161.

"This plane is not actually weird, if it was 1916! But in 1931, it was plenty strange, " - wrote Mysterious Bill.…

Hail the minor powers! Their aces probably achieved less than von Richthoffen (or Ball, or Guynemer, or "Billy" Bishop) but their bravery should be remembered.

So why not remember a Belgian ace of the once-famous "Thistle squadron" - Andre de Meulemeester. Meet him and his live…

Most airliners designed in late 1920s had to retire after only a few years of active service, making way for more advanced and reliable all-metal aircraft.

The story of the Handley Page 42 is totally different. A large biplane of composite construction, with an unusual engine layout, it gave a sterling service through 1930s, outliving a score of it's…

I always wondered why the word Wunderwaffe is applied only to the late-WWII German projects.

In the history of WWI there is a whole lot of weird and scary "wonderweapons". And if you think that the DFW giant bomber was the only one with Mercedes inside,…

The guy at the controls was a businessman, a writer and a socialite. First and foremost, he was an aviator.

 But a WWI ace he wasn't - although his contribution to war effort cannot be overlooked.

"Owned one of the first petrol-driven cars in England; toured South Africa;…

Want to fly over Paris? A mere hundred francs will buy you a seat onboard the Goliath, the Jazz Age flying streetcar.

The two FF.60 bomber prototypes of 1918 heralded the start of a great family of passenger airliners and night bombers which dominated European aviation for the next decade. However the design formula remained fairly constant with equal-span…

Among all WWI bomber designs, German DFW biplanes earn a special mention, thanks to their unusual powertrain.

The first was the R.I (don't forget that "R" index is for Riesenflugzeug, i.e. giant airplane). Developed as a private venture by DFW, it was a…

Don't be afraid of this beast. The Saturday Air Mail will do you no harm!

Remember the WWI Caproni bombers? They looked weird with their puller-pusher twin-boom layout but their inflight stability was exceptional and performance was great at all altitudes, allowing for…

In wartime, even of the most brilliant technical innovation can lead to a failure.

This is exactly what happened to a talented French engineer, his story told by Gary Warne (Warnepieces blog):

Variable Incidence, the mechanical…

Got something weird in your mailbox? Hello, the Saturday Air Mail is here!

This Saturday (cold and windy, I must admit) our guest star is the GA-1 (ground attack aircraft No.1), a brainchild of Engineering Division, U.S. Army Air Service, and their engineer, Isaac M. Laddon. It was built by Boeing Airplane Company in Seattle, Washington.

The…

It started as a moth and evolved into a dragon.

Under the steady guidance over four decades, pioneer Geoffrey de…

Just a few images of the Escadrille, its pilots, aircraft and lions.

The Escadrille Lafayette in July 1917. Standing, left to right are Soubiron, Doolittle, Campbell, Persons, Bridgman, Dugan, MacMonagle, Lowell, Willis, Jones, Peterson and de Maison-Rouge (French Deputy Commander). Seated, left to right are Hill, Masson with "Soda" lion cub; Thaw, Thenault (the…

The Caudron R.11 (aka R XI) was the last bomber the French built during the Great War.

Evolved by Paul Deville from the R.IV reconnaissance bomber designed by Rene Caudron, the R.11 three-seat biplane was originally intended as a Corps d'Armee aircraft, but was destined to find its forte as a three-seat escort fighter. Its design was similar to the Caudron R.4, but with a more…

Most decorated Canadian WWI hero, William G. Barker was a person of outstanding bravery and skill.

The son of Mrs. George Barker, of Rathwell, Manitoba, William George Barker left high school in Dauphin to enlist in the Canadian Mounted Rifles in December 1914. He spent eight months in the trenches before he received a commission in the Royal Flying Corps in April 1916. After starting out as a mechanic, he qualified as an observer in August 1916 and…