Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!att!cbnews!military
From: cperlebe@encad.Wichita.NCR.COM (Chris Perleberg)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Rotary engine airplane troubles
Message-ID: <10802@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 31 Oct 89 04:06:54 GMT
References: <10577@cbnews.ATT.COM> <10622@cbnews.ATT.COM> <10715@cbnews.ATT.COM> <10748@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM
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From: cperlebe@encad.Wichita.NCR.COM (Chris Perleberg)

In article <10748@cbnews.ATT.COM> djm@castle.ed.ac.uk (D Murphy) writes:
>
>In article <10715@cbnews.ATT.COM> cperlebe@encad.Wichita.NCR.COM (Chris Perleberg) writes:
>>            Sopwith Camel or Fokker Triplane.  
>>
>
>>Chris Perleberg
>
>Sopwith also built a triplane (the Sopwith Triplane - wow!) which I saw
>a photo of in a book once. It looked very similar to the famous Fokker
>machine. Who copied who ?
>
Although the Triplane concept was not totally new, Fokker copied it
from Sopwith.  The Sopwith Tripe was pretty much a Pup with three wings.
Like the Pup, it was a good aircraft, and like the Pup, the RFC wasn't
interested.  The RNAS had a couple of squadrons of Tripes, and in April
1917 (Bloody April to the RFC), Naval 8 helped bail the RFC out.  Raymond
Collishaw, one of Britian's top aces, flew the Tripe in the famous "Black
Flight" -- a group of Triplanes with names like "Black Maria,"  "Black 
Death," and "Black Sheep").  The Tripe went up against J.G. 1, Richtofen's
outfit, and performed very well.  A western front full of Sopwith Triplanes
would have changed the air situation greatly.  Still, the RFC was looking
into the B.E. 12 ...

Fokker reacted to J.G. 1's impression of the Sopwith Triplane and came
up with the Fokker Dr 1 triplane. The Fokker model wasn't as good as
the Sopwith model, having a tendency to shed the upper wing surfaces (i.e.,
it had a tendency to kill pilots).  Richtofen flew the first Dr. 1, while
Werner Voss flew #2.  Voss was killed in an epic battle against seven 
S.E. 5as from 56th squadron, RFC (one of the best).  Richtofen himself
didn't fly the Triplane that much (it was withdrawn for a while so that 
they could fix the wings), preferring the Albatross D-III.  He used
at least two Triplanes, only one of which (the one he was killed in)
was all red. 

Chris Perleberg
cperlebe@encad.wichita.ncr.com