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Aviation History
1956
1956 - 1392.PDF
544 FLIGHT THE SOPWITH 1|-STRUTTER ... As noted earlier, the first machine to go to France fitted withthe Vickers synchronizing gear was a Bristol Scout. The first aircraft to be produced with a synchronized Vickersgun as standard equipment was the Sopwith 1-j-Strutter, and the first to join the R.F.C. in the field were the four machinesof "A" Flight of No. 70 Sqn., which went to France on May 24, 1916. They were not the first l^-Strutters to go to France,however; and to set all matters in correct perspective it is necessary to go back to the spring of 1915, when a new two-seatbiplane emerged from the Sopwith works. It was known in the company's works as "the Sigrist bus", having been designed byFred Sigrist. The new machine was powered by an 80 h.p. Gnome rotaryengine which was installed in a fore-and-aft mounting and en- closed in a bull-nose cowling similar to that of the SopwithTabloid. As on the Types 806 and 807 seaplanes and Spinning Jenny, the fuselage had dorsal fairings in front of, between andbehind the cockpits. The wings were of unequal span, and the interplane struts were raked outwards. The machine flew in theearly summer of 1915, and was the subject of many experiments which aimed at varying the position of the centre of gravity.In June 1915 Harry Hawker flew the aircraft to a new British record altitude of 18,393ft.But the most interesting feature of the Sigrist bus—at least as far as this narrative is concerned—lay in the central bracingof its upper mainplane. There was no centre section; the two halves of the wing met on the aircraft centre line and were con-nected to the fuselage by a trestle-shaped cabane. From the upper longerons additional struts ran upwards and outwards tomeet the wing spars: thus, when seen end-on, the bracing structure resembled a letter W. Bracing of identical form characterized the new Sopwithmilitary two-seater which was passed by the Sopwith experi- mental department on December 12, 1915. Just as the origin-ators of the names of the Pup and Camel have remained anony- mous, so has the inventor of the name of the 1-j-Strutter; butthere is no doubt that the aircraft owed its odd title to the wing bracing. The outer struts of the central structure were regardedas interplane struts which had had to be attached to the upper -Strutter with the cranked pillar mounting for the observer's gun -....-.: and partly faired Vickers gun. . .. longerons because they were not long enough to reach the lowerwing. The name l^-Strutter was, of course, unofficial—indeed, it might almost be said that the 1 ^-Strutter founded a kind oftradition by which Sopwith aircraft acquired facetious names which were at first frowned upon officially but became sowidely used that they had ultimately to be accepted. Forty-one years is a long time in the aviation time-scale, andit is perhaps pardonable that the jet age might fail to recognize the fact that, in its day, the 1^-Strutter was a remarkably ad-vanced aircraft. It is as well to remember that, on July 1, 1916, No. 11 Sqn. still had four Vickers Gun Buses on its strength,and that, with the possible exception of the two Nieuport two- seaters which were on the strength of No. 1 Sqn., the onlyR.F.C. two-seaters capable of giving a good account of them- selves in combat were the F.E.Bs and 2Ds. In the 1^-Strutter the Sopwith company provided a two-seaterwith a performance comparable with that of contemporary scouts, and effectively armed with machine-guns fore and aft. It was thefirst true two-seat fighter to see service, the pioneer of a category of military aircraft which included such magnificent machines asthe Bristol Fighter and the Hawker two-seaters. And yet the lJ-Strutter is not one of the best-known aircraft of the 1914-18war. A possible reason for its relative obscurity is that it was so closely followed by the Bristol Fighter that it may have beensomewhat overshadowed by that great aeroplane. Another rea- son is that the War Office were unpardonably slow to order theli-Strutter, doubtless because of their preoccupation with pro- duction of the B.E.2C, 2D and 2E, which, considered as militaryaircraft, compared unfavourably with the Sopwith two-seater. There was nothing unconventional about the li-Strutter'sair frame. The fuselage was a single box-girder composed of wooden longerons and spacers cross-braced with wire and coveredwith fabric; the decking about the cockpits was plywood-covered. In the first bay immediately behind the engine mounting therewere substantial wooden diagonal members, and the outer cover- ing consisted of aluminium panels. Rounded fairings blendedthe circular cross-section of the engine cowling into the flat sides of the fuselage: these fairings were made of light stringersnotched into formers, and they extended as far aft as the rear cabane struts. The engine of the prototype l|-Strutter and thefirst production machines was the 110 h.p. Clerget rotary, which was installed on an overhung mounting within a circular open-fronted cowling. The undercarriage was a plain vee structure made of steeltubing. The lj-Strutter was the first Sopwith type to have the form of wheel attachment which was to characterize the majorityof the company's later products. Each wheel was mounted on a half-axle which was pivoted at its inner end about a point nearthe middle of the spreader bars. The half-axle had limited vertical movement in a slot at the apex of its vee strut and wasrestrained by rubber shock-cord in tension. Thus each wheel was independently sprung.Another feature which first appeared on the H-Strutter but came to be recognized as typically "Sopwith" was the characteris-tically shaped fin and rudder. These components were of steel tube construction. The large tailplane had two wooden sparswhich were cross-braced internally. The mainplanes were of conventional wooden construction,with two main spars and the usual compression struts and internal cross-bracing. The single-bay external bracing incorporateddouble flying wires. The upper mainplane was built in two halves, and its central bracing has already been described: thecabane and half-struts were all of steel tubing of elliptical cross- Standard Clerget-powered V/2-Strutter for R.F.C., showing transparent panels in the upper wing. SpBK^CXXr
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