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36-510: The Eindecker was based on Fokker's unarmed Fokker M.5K scout (military designation Fokker A.III ) which in turn was based on the design of the French Morane-Saulnier H shoulder-wing monoplane, although it differed in using chrome-molybdenum steel tubing for the fuselage structure instead of wood. It was fitted with an early version of the Fokker gun synchronizer which controlled

72-549: A Fokker A-series unarmed scout with the serial number A.16/15, at the beginning of World War I. This aircraft had been bought in 1913 by Oberleutnant Waldemar von Buttlar, and requisitioned by the Fliegertruppe along with his commissioning as an officer in the Prussian Army at the outbreak of hostilities, and had been painted a shade of green, the color of von Buttlar's previous Jäger regiment. Parschau had served with

108-471: A M.5K with a 7.92 mm (.312 in) machine gun bolted to it, the E.II was designed with the weapon system integrated with its airframe. On 13 June 1915, Anthony Fokker demonstrated the first E.II to an audience of German commanders, including Crown Prince Wilhelm of Germany , at a German Fifth Army airfield. On 23 and 24 June he demonstrated the aircraft at Douai to the German Sixth Army . It

144-423: A single Parabellum MG 14 machine gun. Anthony Fokker personally demonstrated the system on 23 May 1915, having towed the prototype aircraft behind his touring car to a military airfield near Berlin. The history of the first Eindecker aircraft (Fokker factory number 216), which was used for Fokker's initial synchronizer trials, is closely associated with Leutnant Otto Parschau , who was allotted this aircraft, then

180-672: The Pour le Mérite or "Blue Max", while flying the Eindecker, after each pilot passed the then-required eight victory total for each aviator. The arrival in early 1916 of the French Nieuport 11 and the British Airco DH.2 brought the dominance of the Eindecker to an end, and with it, the "Fokker Scourge". Wintgens flew the E.IV version of the Eindecker long enough to have been confronted by

216-456: The E.III . The E.II also had a larger fuel capacity of 90 litres (23.75 US gallons) to supply the Oberursel U.I's 54 litres/hour fuel consumption, as compared to the E.I's 69 litres (18.2 US gallons) capacity to feed its earlier U.0 rotary, which used 37 litres/hour of fuel. As with the M.5K/MG quintet of production prototype Eindeckers, the pilot was provided with a head support to help him resist

252-430: The Eindecker was the Fokker E.III , which used a slightly narrower-chord (1.80 meter, or 71 inch) wing than earlier versions. Boelcke's Feldflieger Abteilung 62 began operating the E.III towards the end of 1915. A few E.IIIs were experimentally armed with two 7.92 mm (.312 in) calibre lMG 08 "Spandau" machine guns, while most E.IIIs and the production E.I through E.III Eindecker models used only one of

288-512: The Fokker E.I . Fokker's design for the M.5 was very closely based on that of the French Morane-Saulnier H shoulder-wing monoplane although the fuselage had a welded steel tube frame in place of the wooden structure of the Type H. The power-plant was a 60 kW (80 hp) Oberursel U.0 7-cylinder rotary engine (Gnome Lambda licence-built by Motorenfabrik Oberursel ). As in the Morane original,

324-673: The Morane-Saulnier N and other Allied types at St. Omer before being sent to Upavon in Wiltshire for evaluation. It is now on display, without the fabric covering, at the Science Museum in London. Immelmann's original E.I, serial number E.13/15 , also survived the war and went on display in Dresden , where it was destroyed by Allied bombing during World War II . Data from German Aircraft of

360-414: The rudder and elevator were aerodynamically balanced; there were no fixed tail surfaces. This combination rendered the Eindecker very responsive to pitch and yaw . For an inexperienced pilot, the extreme sensitivity of the elevators made level flight difficult; German ace Leutnant Kurt Wintgens , who along with Leutnant Parschau was the primary Fliegertruppe pilot responsible for bringing

396-461: The tail and elevators were all-moving, having no fixed sections. There were two versions of the M.5: the long-span 'M.5L' and the short-span 'M.5K' ("K" for kurz meaning "short" in German). The M.5 was light, strong and manoeuvrable, capable of aerobatics (although, like all aircraft relying on the early style of Morane balanced elevators , it had very sensitive pitch control). Fokker himself flew

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432-457: The 'A.III', but before delivery five were modified, being equipped with a single 7.92 mm (.312 in) Parabellum MG14 machine gun , becoming the five Fokker 'M.5K/MG' production prototypes of the Fokker E.I. Data from General characteristics Performance Related development Aircraft of comparable role, configuration, and era Fokker E.II The Fokker E.II

468-476: The E.II's nine-cylinder rotary necessitated raising the upper nose paneling to match the larger-diameter cowl the U.I needed — this also caused the outer edges of the upper nose paneling to overhang the fuselage's upper longerons, making it necessary to extend the cowl. Production of the types, built in parallel, depended on engine availability. Many E.IIs were either completed as E.IIIs or upgraded to E.III standard when returned for repair. The definitive version of

504-441: The Eindecker fuselage was also used on the earliest Fokker biplane fighters, like the Fokker D.I but had ceased to be used by the Fokker factory on its designs by the end of 1916. All the E.I to E.IV Eindeckers used a gravity fuel tank which had to be constantly filled by hand-pumping from the main fuel tank, which, starting with the Fokker E.II , was mounted behind the pilot; this had to be done up to eight times an hour. Both

540-524: The First World War General characteristics Performance Armament Fokker M.5K The Fokker M.5 was an unarmed single-seat monoplane aircraft designed and built by Anthony Fokker in 1913. It served as a light reconnaissance aircraft with the German army at the outbreak of World War I and was the basis for the first successful fighter aircraft in German service,

576-660: The Fokker factory has not yet been proven, as it was lowered some time after the Fokker factory had received it back to be retained there, following Parschau's final use of it. The mid-fuselage wing mount modification was not fitted to the initial batch of five M.5K/MG production prototypes as originally built, with Otto Parschau's second Eindecker, the first M.5K/MG built bearing IdFlieg serial E.1/15 (bearing Fokker factory airframe number 191, accepted by IdFlieg on 26 May 1915 with shipping date of 15 June 1915) uniquely getting it sometime later, while in service. Production E.Is , and all further Fokker Eindeckers, were also fitted with

612-528: The M.5 at Johannisthal in May and June 1914, winning a number of awards. The German army adopted the militarised long-span M.5L, manufactured by Halberstadt, designated the 'A.II' . A two-seat version, known as the 'M.8' also entered service as the 'A.I' which was built by Fokker. These aircraft were used on the Western and Eastern Fronts in the early stages of the war. In early 1915, 10 M.5Ks were ordered, designated

648-482: The aircraft. (Allied accounts credit Corporal J. H. Waller, gunner/observer of a RFC F.E.2b piloted by 2nd Lt G. R. McCubbin, with firing the fatal shots at Immelmann during his attack on their aircraft and was credited by the British with shooting him down.) Eleven pilots scored five or more victories in the Eindecker . Boelcke, Immelmann, Parschau, Hans Berr , and Wintgens all received Germany's highest military decoration,

684-405: The airstream when he had to raise his head to use the gun sights. The heavier weight of the 75 kW (100 hp) Oberursel U.I rotary engine used to power the E.II necessitated both a somewhat lengthened rear fuselage structure, in comparison to the E.I version to achieve proper balance, with the U.I engine's larger diameter requiring a larger radius "horseshoe" pattern cowl to enclose it, and

720-402: The aluminum upper deck of the nose was raised along with it - resulting in metal soffits having to be fitted where the upper deck met the upper longerons, with additional structural metal tubing additions to the forward ends of the upper longerons immediately behind the firewall to support the "soffits" and sides of the raised upper nose panel. This format was continued with the E.III. The E.II

756-523: The definitive version of the Stangensteuerung gear, with a large cam wheel replacing the early drive taken from the oil pump drive shaft. One distinctive feature of the appearance of all the sheet metal panelling on the Eindeckers was a special form of "dragged" engine turning performed on all their surfaces, both exposed and internal parts. This distinctive appearance on the sheet metal components of

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792-434: The first E.Is were arriving as supplementary equipment, one per unit as "attached" aircraft, for the ordinary Feldflieger Abteilung - initially to provide escort protection for their usual quantity of six two-seat reconnaissance biplanes per unit. Three days after his unconfirmed"victory, Wintgens downed another "Morane Parasol" with the same aircraft, and a fortnight after his initial engagement, on 15 July 1915, he became

828-482: The first Eindecker pilot to be credited with an official victory. The two most famous Eindecker pilots, both of Feldflieger Abteilung 62, were Oswald Boelcke (initially flying M.5K/MG service test aircraft E.3/15 ) and Max Immelmann , - who received his first production E.I Eindecker (serial number E.13/15 )( just before July 1915's end. Both scored their first kills in E.Is in August 1915, just after Boelcke became

864-470: The first armed Fokker monoplanes into active service during the spring and summer of 1915, once stated "lightning is a straight line compared with the barogram of the first solo". However roll response was poor. The main difference between the E.I and E.II was the engine - the former having the seven-cylinder 60 kW (80 hp) Oberursel U.0 rotary engine ; the latter had the nine-cylinder 75 kW (100 hp) Oberursel U I. The larger diameter of

900-688: The fuselage behind the cockpit. This aircraft had its main fuel tank located behind the cockpit. Near the end of May 1915, while it was based at Douai with Feldflieger Abteilung 62, the Fokker factory fitted Parschau's aircraft with the first trial version of the Fokker Stangensteuerung synchronizer and a Parabellum MG14 light machine gun, leaving the wing panels in the stock A.III airframe's shoulder-winged location while armed and in Parschau's use in May and June 1915. Parschau made several attempts at aerial combat during June 1915, but at this stage

936-482: The gear proved very unreliable, the Parabellum gun repeatedly jamming. As no photos exist verifying any change in wing-panel anchorage location for Parschau's A.16/15 aircraft before its return to the Fokker factory a second time to serve as the "prototype" Eindecker airframe, the belief that it had been modified to have the standard mid-fuselage location used on the later production E.I airframes before its second return to

972-413: The improved Fokker D.VIII . Only one original Eindecker remains. On 8 April 1916, a novice German pilot took off from Valenciennes with a new E.III ( IdFlieg serial number 210/16) bound for Wasquehal but became lost in haze and landed at a British aerodrome east of St. Omer . He was forced to surrender before he realised his error and could destroy the aircraft. The aircraft was test-flown against

1008-526: The much more advanced SPAD S.VII fighter of French flying ace Alfred Heurteaux on 25 September 1916, which resulted in Heurteaux fatally bringing down Wintgens, as Huerteaux's victory number eight. Note: The Reinhold Platz -designed Fokker E.V bore no direct relation to the earlier Eindeckers (all designed by Martin Kreutzer), being a parasol aircraft, only built in small numbers before production switched to

1044-493: The same model. The final variant was the Fokker E.IV which received a 119 kW (160 hp) Oberursel U.III, 14 cylinder twin-row rotary engine (a copy of the Gnome Double Lambda rotary) and was fitted with twin machine guns as standard, after repeated failure of an experimental triple-gun installation, which was initially intended be standard for the E.IV. Total production for the entire Fokker E.I through E.IV series

1080-583: The same surreptitiously named Brieftauben-Abteilung Ostende (BAO), in Belgium as Oberleutnant von Buttlar in November 1914, where the two German officers could have first made contact. Parschau eventually spent most of the first year of the war with this aircraft, flying it on both the Eastern and Western fronts. At some stage he had the words "Lt. Parschau" painted on the right upper side (and possibly both sides) of

1116-470: The second-highest Eindecker score. He achieved all of his 15 victories in the type before being killed when his E.III broke up in June 1916, possibly after the synchronisation mechanism failed during an attack on British F.E.2bs , causing at least 7 bullets to shoot through one propeller blade, which subsequently broke off. This likely resulted in vibrations so severe that the loads exceeded the structural limits of

Fokker Eindecker fighters - Misplaced Pages Continue

1152-427: The sole pilot flying the E.3/15 service test aircraft. Leutnant Otto Parschau,flew the M.5K/MG aircraft numbered E.1/15 after the Fokker factory took back his now worn-out A.16/15 aircraft a second time, Immelmann's first Eindecker survived the war. Oswald Boelcke scored the most Eindecker victories - 19 out of his final tally of 40. His last victory in an Eindecker occurred on 27 June 1916. Max Immelmann had

1188-447: Was 416 aircraft (the exact breakdown by type is not clear, although the E.III was the most important model). The first Eindecker victory, though unconfirmed, was achieved by Leutnant Wintgens in the late afternoon of 1 July 1915 when, while flying one of the five M.5K/MG production prototype/"service test" aircraft, numbered 'E.5/15' near Lunéville , he forced down a French Morane-Saulnier L two seat "parasol" monoplane. By this time

1224-476: Was built in parallel with the E.I and the choice of whether an airframe became an E.I or E.II depended on the availability of engines. In total, Fokker production figures state that 49 E.IIs were built and 45 of these had been delivered to the Western Front Fliegertruppe by December 1915 ( Luftstreitkräfte from October 1916 onwards) at which time production switched to the main Eindecker variant,

1260-400: Was during these demonstrations, only one week before any kills would be achieved in the Eindecker type, that Fokker himself attempted to engage an enemy aircraft but he was unable to find a target. The major difference between the types was a reduced wingspan on the E.II, intended to increase speed, but handling and climbing performance suffered. The type was therefore quickly superseded by

1296-538: Was the second variant of the German Fokker Eindecker single-seat monoplane fighter aircraft of World War I . The E.II was essentially a Fokker E.I with the 75 kW (100 hp) Oberursel U.I 9-cylinder rotary engine , a close copy of the French Gnôme Monosoupape rotary of the same power output, in place of the E.I's 60 kW (80 hp) Oberursel U.0, but whereas the E.I was simply

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