Late War Lozenge Question

[trackpad]

Hi, Everyone,

This has got to be well nigh the pickiest question in the entire known universe.

Several Fokker DVII's are known to have been completely overpainted, either at the factory or in the field. Goering's all-white aircraft, his red/yellow mount, Jasta 18's red/white aircraft, and so on. The question is: is there any way of finding out, more or less certainly, whether five-colour or four-colour lozenge was used to cover a given airframe, knowing only the serial number? The reason for the question is that the reversed lozenge pattern can be seen on the cockpit interior fuselage, albeit somewhat faded as has been discussed elsewhere. This begs the question, of course, of how you know the serial if it has been painted over. Before and after photos might do it, or factory-finished a/c having the serial showing. TIA for any information on this highly important, even vital, question!

[StephenLawson]

Greeting Trackpad;

First you have to have good references to know the hallmarks of a particular production batch. So even if the serial happens to be painted over you can at least get the manufacturer and which production batch an airframe belongs to.

I know Dan San Abbott has posted the information on which Fokker Schwerin batches had which lozenge camouflage was used on them. This again comes from photographic references. Dan has at one time or another seen most of what we have available in the public domain and what is in priovate hands today.

Then you have to have access to unit records. combat logs and etc. One such record is the collected works of Rick Duiven on the Jagdstaffeln. Good references, photos and records are vital to this kind of study.

[trackpad]

Hello, Stephen,

Thanks for your kind response.

I may have to use a largish dose of artistic license then, as I do not have many references that can pin down the type of information you list and I cannot expect those members with much more experience than I to do a detailed search for this information. For example, I have a couple of 1/72nd scale DVIIs, and the Blue Rider sheet of five Jasta 18 DVIIs. Each of these is done in a red/white overpaint scheme, so I am looking for a rough and ready, down and dirty, more or less accurate method of determining which type of lozenge (four or five colour) to use in the interior of the cockpit. So, if I can get a clear read on one or two of these, fine. If not...well-l-l...let's not look TOO closely at the cockpit!

[StephenLawson]

Anthology 1-3 from Windsock Alb. Pub. Ltd. Or Dan San Abbot may have a multiview drawing concerning just the J.18 aircraft your looking for.

[Dan_San_Abbott]

trackpad:
I have identified all the Fok.D.VII varinants built by, Fokk, Albatros and OAW.
If you can describe which Fok.D.VII you want to do, I have three view drawings of most of Jasta 18 D.VIIs. descibe Iwhich one and I'll tell whether it was covered with 4 or 5 color fabric. Describe its markings in detail.
Blue skies,
Dan-San

[Dan_San_Abbott]

trackpad:
I have identified all the Fok.D.VII varinants built by, Fokker, Albatros and OAW.
If you can describe which Fok.D.VII you want to do, I have three view drawings of most of Jasta 18 D.VIIs. descibe Iwhich one and I'll tell whether it was covered with 4 or 5 color fabric. Describe it markings in detail.
Blue skies,
Dan-San

[trackpad]

Hello, Dan San,

I'm interested in the Fokker DVII (OAW) piloted by Leutnant Gunter von Buren, Jasta 18. His is one of five schemes on the 1/72nd scale Blue Rider sheet. The aircraft was "red overall with white rear fuselage and tailplane," the colour demarcation line running vertically just behind the cockpit, meeting the rearward vertical portion of the pilot's foot step.There is a large black raven on the white fuselage, centered slightly above the thrust line, with four raven "chicks" below it, three to the rear and one just forward of the talons of the larger raven, all facing forward. Standard national markings are provided.

Also, by chance, would you know which lozenge pattern the "Goering aircraft," DVIIF 5125/18, was covered in? I thought that it might have been covered in CDL, to make the overpainting easier, but I gather that lozenge was used. Thanks very much for your help!

[The PIPE]

Dear Trackpad:

The PIPE here....and Dan-San provided me. many years ago, with a black-and white sketch of von Büren's aircraft, detailed even down to the detail of where the SEAMS of the FOUR color, also known as the "Knowlton" pattern from the well-known D VII preserved in that suburb of Lac-Brome, Québec, were located on the airframe !

I've got a 30% completed, scratchbuilt 1/6th scale D VII for RC Scale flying in my hangar, complete with an Enya 60-4C four stroke engine already in its nose, and I had decided on doing von Büren's aircraft, long, LONG ago, especially as the documentation Dan-San sent me even showed extra COOLING openings made in the upper cowl panels...a GREAT addition for keeping a model engine (even the 4-strokes I exclusively use) nicely cooled off in flight!

Then very late in the 1990s I became involved in the Red Baron II/3D community, and very amicably encountered one JENS KLANK , currently living in Monchengladbach, Germany. He operates the website at Biplanes.de - Die Oldtimer Community in Deutschland (the ENGLISH language "startpage", and I helped him with the English language text of it)...and when Jens sent photos of himself to me, I thought to myself, "I'm SURE I spotted that face somewhere before"...

...well, from my surfing of the Internet, I HAD found a good photo of von Büren, and THAT was the face I'd seen before...the resemblance of Gunther von Büren and Jens to "each other" was QUITE remarkable !

So...when that Fokker D VII of MINE (as well as, possibly, a quarter scale one that I would do in the future) is finished, it would HAVE to be in the colors of von Büren...as I've already got the documentation, and because I could say there's a "kleine JENS" in the cockpit for a pilot figure, as I'm seriously thinking of using Jens' photos (with his permission, of course!) to sculpt a "somewhat" accurate likeness of von Büren for the "person in the 'pit"...

...and that's even where Jens HIMSELF loves the AVRO 504 more than any other WW I era aircraft....!!!!

Yours Sincerely,

The PIPE....!

[trackpad]

Hello, PIPE,

Thanks for this information and story, and for the link to Jens' website. There are some really fine photos there, as I found out this morning. Somewhere, I have a photo of me sitting in an Avro 504, so I must track it down and post it on the Jens site!