Pfalz Dr-1

[Dan_San_Abbott]

Andrew:
You are most welcome, glad to be of help.
Blue skies,
Dan-San

[Droops]

Originally Posted by BAPilot2

From the information that you have provided it seems that there is not much of a story to tell. I had come across a website;

http://webpages.charter.net/hel0695/...e_pfalz_dr.htm

that leads one to believe that several of these aircraft were produced, something on the order of 220. (Whoever made that webpage is under the impression that the serial numbers, 228/18 and the like, are indicative of the actual number of this model being produced.) Also, it states that the Pfalz DR-1 was used by Jasta 73. Pardon my ignorance, but was there a Jasta 73? I am not that well read regarding the total number of Jasta that operated during the war.

Andrew,

The person who made that webpage is Baron von Helton. He is a Red Baron player and one of the people who makes mods for the game.

BvH has a theory that the game short-changed the German pilots because it didn't provide enough rotary engined aircraft in the planelist (with a correlary belief that rotary engine aircraft are, by their nature, superior). From that he started looking at all of the rotary engined aircraft produced by Germany, such as the early Fokkers and the Pfalz. He contends that such planes as the Pfalz Dr.I and the Fokker D.V were produced in numbers and saw combat, and so should be included in the game (or any future WWI flight sim).

There are a lot of people who disagree with that, and believe that the facts indicate most of these aircraft were either few in nature or saw little front-line combat.

VBR,

John

[Dan_San_Abbott]

Droops:
If you check, you will find the aircraft with rotary engines were smaller and lighter in all up weight that the fighters with in line or V8 engines.
The weight of the engine determines the size of the machine. The Nieuports series, the Fokker D.II and D.III are examples. The problem is the centrifugal force limits the engines maximum rpm and thus limits the power that can be produced. The Siemens-Schuckert ShIII was a bi-rotary whereas the propeller and the engine turned 900 rpm clockwise and the crankshaft turned counter-clockwise 900 rpm, thus was able to develope 260Ps, which was about as good as it got.
The Hispano-Suiza V8 was an engine in between the light rotary and the heavy in line engines. The Hisso developed very good horse power to weight ratio on the order of the rotary without the limitation of rpm. At wars end the Hisso were turning 2100 rpm, the rotary is 1250 to 1300 rpm and the in lines 1600 to 1800 rpm.
Blue skies,
Dan-San

[Taz]

BAPilot2- if you want to read some of this data for yourself, Lt Col (also Dr) Roy Houchin wrote an excellent article in Volume 9, #3 of Over the Front titled "Germany's Technological Imperative: Why the Pfalz Triplanes Achieved Only Limited Production". Jack Herris also wrote an excellent book published by Flying Machine Press titled Pfalz Aircraft of World War One which covers the Pfalz Dr.I and Dr.II. Copper State Models just reissued their excellent 1/48 Pfalz Dr.I model if you are a modeler.

The Pfalz Dr.I fuselage was the basis for the much more successful, but still low production Pfalz D.VIII interceptor.
The teething problems with the Siemens-Halske rotary also plagued the early SSW D.III and the Pfalz D.VIII. The Sh.III turned out to be probably the best rotary engine of the war once developed and was responsible for much (if not most) of the Pfalz Dr.I's climbing prowess. The engine's 160 hp was as underrated as the BMW inline engine's 185 hp.

Taz

[Dan_San_Abbott]

Gentlemen:
The main problem with the rotary engines were lack of castor oil. The German engineers developed a chemical oil subsitute called Votol. As best can be said, It was better than nothing. The oil used could not be diluted by the benzine fuel, it had to maintain its viscousity to properly lubricate the engine. The Germans did not grow castor bean plants, nor were sources available to them, hence they were force to develope a synthetic oil.
blue skes,
Dan-San

[Cigogne]

I also read a piece by Peter Grosz that said some of the Voltol distributed was the wrong viscosity and had been mislabelled.

Was this engine ever tested with castor oil? Maybe after the war? If it was tested did it perform up to its potential? Also it was "rated" the same as the gnome 160 but was it more powerful? And how did it compare to the brII or gnome in dimension and weight?
That's all.

[EricGoedkoop]

Originally Posted by bucktoenges

And how did it compare to the brII or gnome in dimension and weight?

Not sure about dimensions off the top of my head, but I do know that the Sh III weighed about 437 lbs and the Gnome 9N 340.

[dpcmodels]

Greetings All,
Another factor as to why only 10 Plalz Dr.1's were built, other than what has already been discussed is that the fokker Dr was quicker to manufacture than the Pfalz. Almost nearly 3 times as fast (just a guess) if not longer.

Dpc

[Dan_San_Abbott]

The Pfalz Dr.I was superior in performance to ALL other fighter aircraft. The problem of the Pfalz DR.I was the SHIII engine. The problems of the ShIII engines had not been resolved. The parallel developement was the SSW D.III, it was contemporary to the Pfalz DR.I the production which was limited to 10 engineering evaluation aircraft. Had the problems been solved, The Pfalz DR.I was a very good interceptor and would have been, in my opinion, issued to the Kest for home defense against the British and French bombers.
Blue skies,
Dan-San
P.S. It sure makes a beautiful model.