View Single Post
Old 18 November 2009, 01:03 AM   #15 (permalink)
Dave_Watts
Forum Ace
 
Join Date: Aug 2001
Location: Indy, Home of the 500 race
Posts: 776
Total BMW powered D.VII production

Hi all,

New direction;

Has anyone done the exercise of figuring out how many "F" D.VII's were made from Fokker, Albatros and OAW? We can only speculate, it will be a ball park number, but better than nothing.

I'll start the ball rolling by using the serial numbers of BMW motors. Lowest/highest serial numbers recorded by Fokker acceptances are 1229/1682, (Fokker also had/accepted motor Nr. V.5), that equals 455 motors as an absolute minimum. There are also the Opel BMW motors, Lowest/highest serial numbers recorded by Fokker acceptances are 12001/12146 that equals 146 motors. If we include the Mana III/IIIa motors lowest/highest accepted, they are 12/53 that equals 42 motors.

BMW #'s V.5 + 1229 - 1682 = 455.
Opel BMW #'s 12001 - 12146 = 146.
Mana #'s 12 - 53 = 42.

Total output = 643 "BMW" motors.

This is an absolute minimum, my guess is BMW could easily be 1200 - 1699, Opel could be 12000 - 12199, Mana 12 - 111. My expansion only raises the pool to 800, but we'll stick to the bare facts of 643.

We established Fokker recieved 220 BMW motors installed/accepted into 247/245 aircraft. 41 Opel BMW motors into 41 aircraft. 3 Mana motors installed into 3 aircraft, 2 accepted.

Total Fokker output of "F" aircraft = 291 made/ 288 accepted.

Using only the serial number ranges we are left with the following motor numbers for Albatros/OAW and everyone else like Pfalz D.XII.

BMW 255 motors
Opel 105 motors
Mana 39 motors

That gives us 399 motors for everyone else.

Once we get a pool number for Albatros/OAW we can use the same re-install rate of 12% of the strictly made BMW, no others/same as Fokker .

We could get into another discussion of how many of these would have seen action, but let's first nail down numbers made/accepted and more importantly who else got how many BMW motors from the limited pool of 400.

Okay Dan-San, and others, help me out with who else used BMW's and an idea of how many, rough estimates?

Also Dan-San, or others, what is the performance numbers for the Mana IIIa, as I'm including it at this time?

Have we done this exercise before?

Best wishes,
Dave W.

P.S. Dan-San you never answered my questions I put to you of "Dan-San, do you think the range you cited as "231/18 - 245/18" is too restrictive as those first delivered to Jasta 10/JG1? I assume your range came from observed aircraft in the Friedrich's wreck photos?" I just wanted a source for your range.
Dave_Watts is offline