Wot, no speedo?

[simba]

Recently broke the habit of a lifetime and started to build a model of a Hun scout rather than an Allied one - Fokker DVII - and was intrigued to discover from my references an apparent lack of an air-speed indicator and an altimeter.

Talk about seat-of-the-pants flying! Did the Central Powers makee-do without them, or what?

Simba.

[Dan_San_Abbott]

Simba:
Idflieg did not require an airspeed indicator, most had altimeters, most Fokker aircraft had a tachometer, (they flew by the tach, most racing cars do not have a speedometer, you drive with the tach.) oil pressure gauge, water temperature gauge,(if the engine is water cooled) air pressure gauge, (fuel tank pressure) and a compass. When aircraft had airspeed indicator, they were of the anenometor type and were mounted on a strut.
Blue skies,
Dan-San

[simba]

Thanks, Dan. A bit sparing with the fittings were Idflieg, it seems!

I've seen pics of the anenometer-style ASI drives. I was a glider pilot in me youth, learning on the open-cockpit Slingsby T.10 how to judge airspeed from the sound of the airflow and flare altitude from the appearance of the grass. DH Gipsy Moths had an AS indicator arm on a quadrant scale mounted on a forward interplane strut that gave a rough idea. But to fly a service aircraft without ASI? No way. I lift me hat to the brave Huns - cheers!

Simba.

[Vigilant]

I'm with Simba. If I had to throw everything out of the cockpit the last thing to go would be the ASI!

Vig.