LVG C.IV Question

Patrick · 9 September 2007, 03:55 PM

On November 28, 1916, Leutnant zur See Walter Ilges and his pilot Deckoffizier Paul Brandt flew LVG C.IV 262/16 to London and attempted to bomb the Admiralty buildings at Whitehall from about 13,000 feet. They missed by at least a mile and their six 10 kg bombs fell fairly harmlessly between Brompton Road and Victoria Station. Engine problems forced them to land near Boulogne where they were captured by the French. They sat out the rest of the war as POWs.

Other than these bare facts, I haven't been able to find out much more about this early (and first German airplane) raid on London. In Air War over Great Britain, 1914-1918, Ray Rimell states that the S/N of the LVG C.IV was 272/16, while Peter Grosz gives it as 262/16 in Windsock #112, so even the plane's S/N is variously stated. The most detailed account of the raid itself is in The Sky On Fire by Raymond Fredette.

Ilges and Brandt flew for either I or II Marine Feld-Flieger Abteilung out of Mariakerke. Here's a few questions about their LVG:

1. Did they use the old-style 10 kg Carbonit or the newer P.u.W. type bombs?

2. How did they mount six bombs to an LVG C.IV? This plane was primarily a specialist-type high altitude recon plane and doesn't appear to have bomb tubes like the LVG C.II. I can't picture carrying six bombs, even small 10 kg types, inside the plane without any special arrangements to stow and drop them. What appears to be more likely is some kind of external racking. I've got pictures of 12.5 kg P.u.W. types racked four-together under the fuselage, behind the wheels, on an LVG C.II. But I have no pictures of an LVG C.IV with similar installations, and in any event this only accounts for four bombs. I've also got pictures of 25 kg P.u.W. types mounted under-wing, three on each side, on an LVG C.II, but again nothing on the C.IV. Finally, I've seen the Carbonit-type hung in a row by their tails from the fuselage underside -- is this a possibility for the C.IV?

How the heck did they carry and drop six bombs from an LVG C.IV?

3. While we're on the topic, the single picture I've been able to find of an LVG C.IV in service with II Marine Feld-Flieger Abteilung (Windsock #112, page 19, picture 35) shows a finish of either natural linen or sky-blue. Were any of the LVG C.IVs assigned to the Marine Feld-Flieger Abteilung finished in the terrain camo finish, or would it be more likely to see them in the solid sky finish? Specifically, what scheme do you think applied to Ilges' and Brandt's C.IV?

Varese2002 · 9 September 2007, 10:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patrick

Ilges and Brandt flew for either I or II Marine Feld-Flieger Abteilung out of Mariakerke. Here's a few questions about their LVG:

----

Interesting question Patrick. Walter Ilges flew with 2. (Marine-) Landfliegerabteilung at Morsele/ Flanders. This is referenced here, where Ilges is also pictured with a lot of the members of the Abteilung.
Related to your bombing story, picture was taken before 28 November 1916.

Kees

Patrick · 10 September 2007, 12:29 AM

Thx Kees, that's a start -- at least we know what Walter Ilges looked like. In addition to the bombs, Ilges also operated a camera that was unfortunately ditched when they ran into engine problems. For reasons of weight and space considerations, I'm thinking that this was probably the handheld-size 25 cm version rather than the larger, heavier floor-mounted one.

And, apparently 10 kg Carbonit bombs were available and used by the MFAs as anti-ship weapons -- in German Naval Air Service, Alex Imrie shows an installation of these hung from the belly of a Gotha WD 14 " . . retained by a simple carrying strap across the tail of the bombs, no specially designed bomb cradles being required." They were dropped in clusters to straddle a ship. So perhaps the LVG C.IV was similarly rigged because the bombs were available and the armourers familiar with a workable configuration.

Naturally, since this is all pure speculation, it will turn out that someone has a picture of Ilges' and Brandt's C.IV just before taking off for the raid, showing racked P.u.W. bombs and Ilges balancing the huge floor-mount camera with both hands just before mounting it in the observer's cockpit

Taz · 10 September 2007, 10:51 AM

Patrick- Windsock Datafile 112 on the LVG C.IV has a photo of an early production C.IV with bomb carriage attachments under the forward fuselage, aft of the landing gear axle. Another photo of an inverted, crashed C.IV shows the same type and location of bomb racks under the fuselage. Since the aircraft went into service in May 1916, I would assume these racks were widely available by Nov 1916. Forward mounted, they would not have compromised a camera mounting. The C.IV was rapidly removed from service in late spring, 1917, as was its first cousin, the Alb C.V.

Peter spells out the 28 November 1916 mission in the Datafile and states the aircraft used was 262/16, which was burned before the French could capture it. The incident was never highlighted by the Germans since the crew remained in French custody for the duration. Flugsport published a report taken from a British newspaper in Dec 1916, but no other official notice was given. If the crew had returned, it would probably have been a different story and been more widely publicized.

There are photos of CDL/tinted sky blue doped C.IVs and also of 2/3 color upper surface and CDL/light blue undersurfaces on C.IVs. In all cases, the gear and struts appear to be painted a light color, presumably light blue. There is a photo of a II M FFA C.IV which appears to have CDL/light blue tinted doped fabric and light blue painted struts, undercarriage, and plywood/metal panels. No telling whether they had camouflaged versions. If I were betting, I would use the color scheme on the cover of the datafile, with maybe blue tinted dope on the botom.

Since you have the book, you are working from the same info as I am. A search of Marinkorps Flandern by Ryheul Johan turns up no mention of the 28 November, 1916 mission and no photographs of a C.IV. A contemporary LVG C.II is shown in CDL.

Taz
Terry Phillips

Patrick · 10 September 2007, 11:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Taz

Patrick- Windsock Datafile 112 on the LVG C.IV has a photo of an early production C.IV with bomb carriage attachments under the forward fuselage, aft of the landing gear axle. Another photo of an inverted, crashed C.IV shows the same type and location of bomb racks under the fuselage. Since the aircraft went into service in May 1916, I would assume these racks were widely available by Nov 1916. Forward mounted, they would not have compromised a camera mounting. The C.IV was rapidly removed from service in late spring, 1917, as was its first cousin, the Alb C.V.

Peter spells out the 28 November 1916 mission in the Datafile and states the aircraft used was 262/16, which was burned before the French could capture it. The incident was never highlighted by the Germans since the crew remained in French custody for the duration. Flugsport published a report taken from a British newspaper in Dec 1916, but no other official notice was given. If the crew had returned, it would probably have been a different story and been more widely publicized.

There are photos of CDL/tinted sky blue doped C.IVs and also of 2/3 color upper surface and CDL/light blue undersurfaces on C.IVs. In all cases, the gear and struts appear to be painted a light color, presumably light blue. There is a photo of a II M FFA C.IV which appears to have CDL/light blue tinted doped fabric and light blue painted struts, undercarriage, and plywood/metal panels. No telling whether they had camouflaged versions. If I were betting, I would use the color scheme on the cover of the datafile, with maybe blue tinted dope on the botom.

Since you have the book, you are working from the same info as I am. A search of Marinkorps Flandern by Ryheul Johan turns up no mention of the 28 November, 1916 mission and no photographs of a C.IV. A contemporary LVG C.II is shown in CDL.

Taz
Terry Phillips

Terry, thanks for giving the Windsock a close look -- I either overlooked the bomb rack photos entirely or didn't recognize them. When I get home tonight I'll take another look at #112.

What I still find a bit strange is that all sources state that the bombs were 10 kg size. That would seem to make them Carbonit type, since the PuW bombs started at 12.5 kg. But it seems that the Carbonits were normally stowed vertically -- either in internal magazines or hung by their tails like I mentioned previously -- meaning that the LVG C.IV would have to have internal bomb tubes big enough to hold the large-diameter Carbonits (if they were indeed 10 kg size). This is what I was originally looking for in WS #112, and didn't see. One other thing I wanted to evaluate tonight was whether a tail dragger like the C.IV could take off with externally mounted Carbonits hung by their tails under the fuselage. This seems unlikely -- the configuration worked with the MFA floatplanes that have a horizontal stance, but would be dangerously close to the ground (if they fit at all) on a tail dragger. External bomb racks seem to make the most sense, but then they'd have dropped 12.5 kg bombs, not 10 kg (picky, picky!!!)

Taz · 10 September 2007, 08:06 PM

Patrick- As far forward as the bomb racks were, it might have been possible to fit the bombs vertically as long as the racks/attachments could accomodate them. Does not sound too stable in the airstream, though. Crew chiefs were pretty adaptable, and a lot of jury rigging was done at the unit level, so possibly they were carried horizontally. The Foster mount started out as a local modification, and ended up being universally adopted.

At this point lots of speculation. Carrying 60 KG of bombs in the rear cockpit (132.24 lbs, to split hairs) was probably not feasible or smart. Plus possibly all the sources are wrong and they were early PuWs and nobody knew what they were.

Taz
Terry phillips

Patrick · 10 September 2007, 10:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Taz

At this point lots of speculation. Carrying 60 KG of bombs in the rear cockpit (132.24 lbs, to split hairs) was probably not feasible or smart. Plus possibly all the sources are wrong and they were early PuWs and nobody knew what they were.

I agree completely about carrying loose bombs; in fact that's what got me thinking about this originally.

Peter Grosz mentions uncertainty about whether the London raid was a glory trip thought-up by Ilges and Brandt, or whether there was a higher level of strategy and planning involved. My first thought is that the more carefully prepared the plane was, the more people were involved, and the greater the likelyhood that the raid was authorized at some higher level than a pilot/observer scheme.

Following up on this, even at a glance, you get the feeling that loading six bombs around the feet of the observer and taking off was probably not a workable plan; there are way too many ways for it to go wrong, not to mention that throwing them over the side from 13,000 feet seems like a wasted effort if you're actually trying to hit a specific target. So that leads to more questions about how the plane was rigged for this raid.

I reviewed all the photos in WS #112 again and caught both instances of fuselage-mounted PuW racks. (Amazing what you can learn if you read the captions!) So, the LVG C.IV definitely could carry horizontally-hung PuW-type bombs.

Now, here's a couple of photos from Alex Imrie's book German Bombers of World War I. First, a closer look at the PuW rack itself:

Imrie's caption for this photo emphasizes that not only did PuW come up with the new-style bomb, they also developed this standard "hardpoint" rack that could be mounted to the fuselage of B- and C-series planes at the CG. As you can see, the rack has four positions and a 12.5 kg bomb is fitted at the right. Imrie identifies the larger bomb to the left as a PuW incendiary.

This rack appears in other photos of C-type planes, always with four bombs. I'm going to assume Imrie is right and this is a standard-issue part, not a jury-rig or one-off. Now, it could be possible that a mechanically apt armourer could modify the rack to hold six 12.5 kg bombs; if so, it would be great to find a picture of this configuration. I've got a picture of a Gotha G.V showing two- and three-position PuW racks; the three is mounted under the fuselage and the twos are on the wings on either side giving a total external capacity of seven bombs. But those are big boys, 50- and 100 kg size. If the 12.5 kg bomb racks were also available in one- or two-position configurations, no rack modification would be necessary -- just some mechanical work to get everything mounted and the control wires run into the observer's cockpit.

So, it does appear that six racked 12.5 kg PuW bombs could have been used on the London raid.

Now look at this pic:

Another shot form Imrie's book, it shows an LVG B.I with 10 kg Carbonit bombs hung from the fuselage. I was starting to wonder if this configuration was even do-able on a tail dragger; yet here it is. My references state that the 10 kg Cabonit had a max length of 545 mm and a max diameter of 174 mm. Not so big after all . . .

So, our speculative choices are:

1. Six 12.5 kg PuW bombs, rack mounted under the fuselage and possibly extending onto the wings. This implies that every account where the bomb size is mentioned got it wrong -- mistaking the 12.5 kg PuWs for 10 kg. Imrie says the PuWs came available in July of 1916; the raid was in mid-November. Is it really possible that several months pass and people still don't know the size of the bombs they're using? Also, it would be good to see some evidence of six 12.5 kg PuWs hung beneath anything, just to see the rack configuration used.

2. Six 10 kg Carbonit bombs hung by their tails from the fuselage. We know the MFAs had access to the 10 kg Carbonit because there are pictures of floatplanes rigged with them for anti-ship duty. And accounts of the London raid that refer to the bomb size always state it as 10 kg.

I'm leaning towards the Carbonits again, but it's clear that either configuration is possible for the LVG C.IV.

Taz · 11 September 2007, 07:50 PM

Patrick- Based on the evidence and documentation, I think you are right and there could easily have been 6 Carbonit bombs hung vertically under the fuselage. Reconnaissance and Bomber Aircraft of the 1914-1918 War states there was a 10 kg Prüfanstalt und Werft der Fliegertruppen ( P.u.W.) bomb available, but this info comes from 1962. Your 12.5 kg figure is probably based on a little later infomation. This book also has a good photo of the squatty Carbonit bomb, which shows it was not too long, and would not take up too much space vertically.

Taz
Terry Phillips

Patrick · 11 September 2007, 10:47 PM

Terry, for some reason I originally thought that the PuWs started at 10 kg too, but the refs that I have (Alex Imrie published in 1990) all say that the series started at 12.5 kg, and backs this up with pictures of the various sizes. Can't find a single reference to a 10 kg PuW, so I'm going with 12.5 kg as the smallest. The 12.5 kg PuW was reported to be a more destructive weapon than the 10 kg Carbonit it replaced; assuming Carbonits were used, that's consistent with the London raid damage reported in The Sky On Fire, which was very minor indeed (a cracked cobblestone?!).

I did a little more reading on externally-mounted Carbonits; Imrie gives a good description accompanied by pictures of the bomb suspension/release system -- it's stupid-simple and could easily be fabricated from stock items in a frontline repair hangar. It's basically a strap of soft steel about an inch wide with a loop to hold the bomb at it's tail brace. The loop is formed so that a pin holds the end of the strap where it meets the straight body of the strap. The pin is attached to the end of a bowden cable that is led up to the edge of the observer's cockpit, and then mounted to a lever that has a 180-degree throw. Mounting the system is a matter of bolting the strap to the lower frame of the aircraft, and mounting the levers around the observer's cockpit (some pictures show the levers mounted to a piece of pipe with L-brackets at either end that could be mounted at the observer's cockpit with a few screws). To release the bomb, the observer simply threw the lever through the full 180-degree swing, pulling the pin completely out of the strap -- the weight of the bomb pulled the loop straight and it was away. One other thing, the arming propeller on the Carbonit was blocked with a piece of rod that was also mounted to the lower airframe; when the bomb fell, it came off the rod and the propeller was free to spin, arming the bomb. Later versions of the Carbonit didn't even need that; the bomb was equipped with a disk that was lightly spring-loaded and held the propeller as long as the bomb was attached to the plane. When it dropped, the disk moved up and the prop could spin.

It may have been a bit hairy at takeoff, but the Carbonits fit well to the other known facts.