Sopwith Camel

[john w.]

I have a stereo photo of the above plane, can this be identified please?

John

[MikeW]

It must be a Sopwith Snipe, not a Camel.

Mike

[john w.]

Ok why?

and oops I took it from the photo itself

They lied to me!!!!

Mike can you get any more info on it?

I can scan the photo and put it here.

John

[MikeW]

Ok why?

Because E8015 was not allocated to a Sopwith Camel, wheras the serial number range E7987 to E8286 was allocated to Snipe production.

Two quick recognition points:

- does the fuselage have flat sides or rounded? The Snipe's fuslage was given a rounded section.

- are the wings single bay or double bay? By that I mean is there one set of struts between each upper and lower wing, or two sets of struts? The Snipe had two sets of struts each side.

Just to confuse things, some prototype Snipes had flat fuselage sides and single bay wings, but E8015 wasn't a prototype.

Can't tell you any more about E8015 other than this one would have been manufactured by Sopwiths themselves. No doubt others can tell you which squadron(s) it was attached to.

Mike

[Dolphin]

John

E8015 was a Sopwith 7F.1 Snipe built by Sopwiths in the production batch E7987-E8286 under contract 35A/432/C300.

The machine served in No 43 Sqn RAF where it was flown by Lt E Mulcair and marked 'E'. Lt Mulcair was credited with two victories while flying E8015. A drawing of E8015 as it appeared at Cologne in 1919 is below.

I hope this helps.

Gareth