For The Year's End, My Friends: Aeroplane In A Bottle....

The high-aspect-ratio wing and lack of dihedral could account for the tendency to spin. It's unusual to see round motors on the larger craft of that era. are they LeRhones?

A beautiful bird, my friend!

Pulling out of the spin was partly fixed by making the vertical stabilizer bigger (this is a late production machine with the modification), but the basic problem was the continued use of wing-warping control. The wing structure was basically that of the earlier G.IV, only with a fuselage.



The motors are indeed LeRhones, 120hp versions (as opposed to 80hp models on the G.IV). I have read an account by a man who flew both types, and his report is that the G.IV was much more pleasnt to fly, and more manouverable, but that the G.VI was much better if you faced a fight.

I am not surprised you have never seen one of these, they really have fallen down the memory hole, even though they equipped about half of French reconnaisance escadrilles during 1917. There are not even any wholly relaible drawings of them in circulation; it took a lot of looking, an some fortumate correspondence, to put this together.

Your kind comment is much appreciated.

... At Wright-Patt AFB and they have quite a few French aircraft on display.

It proved on restoration to be one of an uncommon variant with an armor floor for the crew.

There are several G.IIIs preserved; they were popular sport planes after the war.

The closest they have is one of the engines that was used on the G.III and G.IV.

http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=810

That is a wonderful model you've made.

I am truly impressed at the detailed work...

My poor fingers just ache as I gaze ...

Thank you, and a very Happy New Year to you and yours!

This one took several months. All the raised ribs are seperate pieces. If I do this again (and I might, for a G.IV or a Chinese G.III), I will taper the ribs first, rather than work them on the wing; that might give a finer result.

Best wishes of the Season to you and your's, Ma'am!

Pleased to see you back at it.

Wife did photoshop a bottle around one of these a while back, but I cannot find the file. This one, I am afraid, would need a serious jug....

The front wings are WAY too large for the rear end to control. If it had a longer fuselage or larger rear components, it probably would have been rather stable.

The previous G.IV from which the wing was inherited was, with its bare longeron structure, actually even shorter, but that had four separate vertical tail surfaces.

Even more so considering it is scratch built and in that small scale. Do you have any more pictures of your work? Are you familiar with FineScale Modeler magazine? You should submit this to their Reader Gallery, I'm sure they would run it.

I put my work upon several sites,mostly Aircraft Resource Center and HyperScale.

Here are a couple more, both in 1/72 (the only scale I do)....

First, a scratch-built Farman Mf.11, of Escadrille MF62, operated at the Third Artois in September, 1915, fitted with a 120cm focal length camera:





Second, a Seversky 'Convoy Fighter', operated by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service 12th Kokutai (Wing) out of Nanking in 1939. It is from a resin kit by Kora Models, and finished in aluminum foil, distressed by boiling with egg-shells. As this plane was quite similar to the then still first line USAAC P-35, the sale of twenty of these to Japan produced something of a scandal....

and I like these two as well. I have a great appreciation for that kind of detail work. I was never able to master the art of rigging the wing wires in this small scale. Maybe I'll have better luck with the 1/4 scale Air Camper I'm working on. It should be easier with an 84" wingspan and about 1/10 the number of wires.

Seversky made some cool looking aircraft back then. I didn't know they sold some of these to Japan.

Are you familiar with Squadron.com? they have a large selection of early era aircraft in this scale. That is if you get tired of scratch building. Once you get the bug for designing and building your own it is kind of hard to return to kit building.

Once again, great work, and thanks for sharing.

I had heard somewhere that there was an Italian aviation pioneer who cried when he heard that airplanes were being used in WW1. I've been trying to find the name since I read the article.
By the way GREAT work Magistrate. I work on ship models myself.
Richard