Lt. Voss's Triplane

[Desdichado]

A friend of mine made this for me for Christmas. I picked the kit up on ebay for a few pounds and it now has pride of place in my office. Hope you like it.

[Dolphin]

Mate

It's certainly a lovely model of a Fokker Dr.I but, alas, it isn't Ltn Werner Voss's aeroplane, as Voss only flew the pre-production F.I triplane, not the later Dr.I. The wooden skids under the lower wingtip weren't fitted to the F.I, but were fitted to the Dr.I (see below) when it went into production, after it became apparent that the triplane had a tendency to dip a wing while taxiing and when landing. Only two F.Is were flown in action: 102/17, in which Voss was killed, and 103/17, used by Manfred von Richthofen, and in which Ltn Kurt Wolff was killed in action on 15 September 1917.

Regards

Gareth

[squirrel]

Regardless of the accuracy, I remember building this kit years ago and it was one of the few WW1 kits at that time that fitted together without too much fiddling, filling and sanding.

Not an easy paint job to get right either.

[Desdichado]

Mate

It's certainly a lovely model of a Fokker Dr.I but, alas, it isn't Ltn Werner Voss's aeroplane, as Voss only flew the pre-production F.I triplane, not the later Dr.I. The wooden skids under the lower wingtip weren't fitted to the F.I, but were fitted to the Dr.I (see below) when it went into production, after it became apparent that the triplane had a tendency to dip a wing while taxiing and when landing. Only two F.Is were flown in action: 102/17, in which Voss was killed, and 103/17, used by Manfred von Richthofen, and in which Ltn Kurt Wolff was killed in action on 15 September 1917.

Regards

Gareth

Gareth, you're right but the DR.1 was the only available kit. I've always admired Ltn. Voss and I wanted to have the plane decked out in his colours.

[Dolphin]

Dare I suggest that you could have left off the skids and filled in the holes . . .

There are some other minor differences between the F.I and Dr.I such as cowling and horizontal stabilser shapes, but they're the most obvious.

Cheers

Gareth

[bantamforgot]

Your thread reminded me that somewhere I had a box of of old kits from decades ago, must check what they are , I know there are some ww1 planes amongst them, I remember the Gotha being one, must look for them.

Colin

[centurion]

As a one time maker of WW1 aircraft models - nice one. One nice thing about modelling the Triplane is that it has almost no rigging.

[tcrean7828]

Just a minor correction:

Ltn. Kurt Woff and Rittmeister Manfred von Richthofen flew F.I 102/17 while Ltn. d.R. Werner Voss flew F.I 103/17.