I’ve been very lucky to be able to work with the real deal, a full scale flying DR 1 with LeRhone rotary engine and a Fokker DVII currently on static display. I have been working on improving the accuracy of the Spandau installations on both these fighters (which are always pathetic on full scale reproductions and even museum restorations of original DVII’s). After much study, I have the installations down pat but not even large scale modelers or companies seem to understand how these guns worked and were installed, even though, in the case of Fokker aircraft produced after the Eindecker, have a significant impact on the visual detail. As for the aircraft with the MG’s more buried in the upper decking, even though the lower portions of the guns are generally covered, to properly appreciate the models you have to know what you are looking at. Some of you may know, and in the smaller scales up to 1/48th, it’s not quite as big a deal, but with the proliferation of the 1/32nd scale WWI aircraft (which are just awesome) the devil starts to get into the details. I hope the following will deepen your appreciation of what you are building and in the cases of the Fokkers give you the proper detail:
First, for those of you showing the ammo belt detail of the “Spandaus” (the fixed forward firing MG’s used by all German aircraft), these guns, be it the early LMG 08 or the later LMG 08/15 used narrow “two hole” Parabellum machine gun belts, not the wider “three hole” belts as used on the guns used by the German infantry. Secondly, when the guns fired and the belt fed through the gun, the empty portion of the belt went into a tube or closed chute attached to the upper side of the receiver and were guided down into the aircraft into containers. This was an obvious necessity to prevent the belts fouling the aircraft. One exception was the Fokker Eindecker which had an open system with the belts still going down into the aircraft but the belts were blocked from the slipstream by a barrier, an arrangement not continued with faster and more manueverable follow on aircraft where the closed system worked much better. The spend cartridges, separated from the belt during the operating sequence in the receiver, were ejected forward through a simple round hold in the receiver under the barrel. In most cases these guns had a tube running from the front of the receiver allowing the cartridge cases to flow forward and downward and eject out the bottom or side of the aircraft fuselage. Empty cartridge cases were never kept in the aircraft. In the Fokker Eindecker this tube (or tubes for multiple gun variants)led forward at a downward angle to near the firewall where the cases fell out under the open bottom of the fairings that continued the cowling on the side of the aircraft. This was the most common method of ridding the spent cartridge cases out of WWI German aircraft. Oddly, Fokker, who mounted his guns a bit higher than other manufacturers, dispensed with the tubes after the Eindecker and had simple (and visible) open trays directly in front of the open hole in the front of the receiver attached to the guns and sitting on top of the curved decking. As the cartridge cases were ejected from the receiver they struck the side of the trays and then were guided out of the open side of the trays onto the curved portion of the decking where they tumbled down into the slipstream on either side of thecockpit, the cases being in full view of the pilot in the cockpit. These trays had extensions and a rear lip that tended to keep the empty cases out of the cockpit. Herman Goering as modelers know who have built his DR 1 and DVII had deflectors put on this aircraft either to stop the distraction of the tumbling cases in front of him or perhaps help keep the cases out of the cockpit while firing at certain flying attitudes. Additionall, at least on the Fokkers, the belt tubes or chutes had hatches on top to allow the belts to be pulled through the guns when being initially loaded and then fed down into the chutes. Larger scale modelers in 1/32nd and up could materially improve their aircraft by adding these trays. If you want to see what the trays looked like, simply look at the film of Australian officers holding MVR’s machine guns and you will see the empty cartridge trays attached to the front lower portion of the receive and also the empty belt tubes attached to the left side of the gun. The Parabellum belts were 30MM and the inside diameter of the tubes were 40MM to allow the belts to flow through and down. I am hoping to have our full size Fokker DVII MG installation modifed with the empty belt chutes and empty ammo trays this year. While most quality scale models have crude representations of the empty belt chutes (I think that a lot of manufacturers don’t understand the purpose and don’t get the shape right on the Fokkers), so far I have yet to see one that has added the essential and visible empty cartridge trays. There is one crudely done animation that correctly gets the process of how the cartridges are ejected on the DR 1 (and DVII) correct and of course there are many videos of ground gun MG 08 and LMG 08/15’s showing the forward and forceful ejection of the cartridge cases. Don’t take my word for it, do your own research, there are plenty of pictures on the internet showing the two hole belts, Gontermann’s crashed DR 1 shows the top of the belt tubes and the little hatches, etc, etc. Right now a lot of large scale Dr 1’s and DVII’s are looking quite naked…
Interesting post. Maybe it is best to work it into an reference article with some pics. This way your information is better retriveable. Furthermore, our resident WWI boffin is StephenLawson. He also writes for Aeroscale and reviews products for several manufacturers. So he might be able to help you with getting you information to manufacturers.
I’m not much of a reference article writer. I authored a couple of reference books in my life but have so many projects going on (including that pesky day job) that all I can try to do is to give my betters (you talented folks) the opportunity to get it done. I did recently write a paragraph in Wiki NG 08 page on this subject but it needs links to the pics. On the Wike MG 08 page there is a photograph of an LMG 08 using the two hole belts and I did add the language pointed that out. Gontermann’s DR 1 wreck photo shows great detail of the belt tubes and MvR’s funeral movie on Youtube shows his mgs. I did not mention that MvR’s machine guns used an interim type field installed cocking/charging pull handle but this can also be seen on MvR’s machine guns. He used a curved pull handle but most appear to be straight. One person argued that his pull handles were bent in the crash but if you look closely you can see they are undamaged. Most of the interim type pull handles appear to be straight, with them the pilot only had to grab the handle and move it only a short distance in the cramped cockpit. It would be fun to build a stand alone machine gun “egg” showing the whole twin mount system including the belts coming out of the tubes into their containers…but it again, that takes time and talent which I do not have.
Williams bros makes some fairly nice 1/4 and 1/6 Spandaus that could be modified. One of the things that got me frustrated was a very well done DVII book with a 3D type image of the machine gun installation but they missed those trays! The Smithsonian is sending me pictures and measurements of the tray that I will be glad to pass on as soon as they come in. I notice not put the trays on their DVII but when I asked if they had one they looked and ran across. One of the reasons these trays are not well known is that when the MG’s were removed by the allies they were discarded as they were attached to the MG’s. Most of belt tubes/chutes were also discarded but they are pretty obvious in photos although so many people made the wrong assumptions early on. Even a recent Wingnuts review of a Pfalz DIII where Wingnuts when to great trouble to show the belt tubes and their containers (although they missed the tube coming out of the front of the receiver for the spent cartridge cases), the reviewer said the tubes and containers were for empty cartridge cases. I can only hope for now that some talented folks in the scale modeling field will take up my suggestion. I will be glad to help with information. If you look at pictures of the Broome County DVII, the most original of all surviving DVII’s you can see the chute as it comes out from under the empty belt chute on the left side.
By the way, I did write Wingnuts… I think they are working on a DVII right now and I hope maybe they might decided to make a better LMG 08/15 installation.
If one will look closely at DVII 8417/18 O.A.W. at Hendon you can see the end of the tray coming out under the ammo feed. Note the pointed effect of the raised sides that guided the tumbling cartridge cases out from under the ammo feed into the slipstream which appear to have put the rounds in a direction running down past the cockpit coaming and clearing the aircraft well under the horizontal tail surfaces. Up under the ammo feed the tray represented more of a bowl. It is possible that the shape of the O.A.W. trays were a bit different than the Fokker trays. Even in this small but clear view you can see the trays were not invisible but do not show up well unless the photo is very clear or close.
A pic of the same aircraft on the left side has a somewhat better angle to view the tray coming out from under the MG. If you look carefully you can see the bowl shape going up under just foward of the front of the Spandau receiver. What is missing from this aircraft is the belt tube/chute coming out from the left upper side of the machine gun and then curving into the fuselage. The hole the tube went into is is not present, either covered or there is a replacement piece of decking here. When these aircraft were brought back to the allied countries the first thing to go were the machine guns. Again, I haven’t yet found an original surviving DVII that has gotten the installation completey correct yet but I am still looking.
“Hi my name is Hoodoo and I’ve not posted in 8 months, and two years before that. I thought I’d share a rant about some minutiae detail in a subject probably 1 in 10000000 modelers will tackle.”
Hey dude I think you meant to post this in ARC. LOL. Just some friendly razzing. Don’t go bonkers on me.
I resemble these remarks. I do realize that modelers never sweat the details. We are in a new world were modelers have much more impact on the study of history though. With the net we have a much broader impact…and those magnificent modelers in reviews and the like are teaching history in way never before imagined with huge impact. I am a former aircraft builder, I started buidling when the Monogram SBD and Helldiver toy like kits came out and Aurora was making those monstrosities like their red Me-109. I am now trying to build some warships to go with my book and it’s a nightmare getting back in the game…However, as I have been playing with full scale WWI airplanes (models in a sense except that people fly in them) and have noted some magnificent WWI kits in 1/32nd scale coming out I figured this might be a good time to “rant” about something that has been overlooked for too long, even though it seems minor to some (I am into the guns as a modeler, military history buff, and also once a “gun nut”)… Not that many years highly inaccurate markings were being put on WWI models, now you see arguments if your lozenge pattern camoflage on Germans or the colora of Se-5’s or the shade of Brown on Spad XIII’s are the wrong shade. WWI modelers are getting more and more detail oriented and the scale is growing (1/48th was too small). I have a couple of buds who volunteer at the museum who are buidlng some of the 1/32 scale WWI kits and they rag me also about my fixations, but they are coming around. I think if I can get some modelers on board building in the detail we can also get some museums to wake up and get their exhibits more accurate. Modelers, museums, historians (and wannbes like me) are starting to make significant contributions to not revisionism, but correcting errors of the past. Now why one would be fasinated with history and modeling, well, the older I get the more I wonder as soon I will be only history (and pretty quickly forgotten) but at the time I go out I want to think that I contributed something…so there.
Hoodoo, you sound more like an Armorer than a modeler Having been a machine gunner myself once upon a time I do know the difference between disintegrating and non disintegrating metallic links and cloth and metallic belts. And I do know that if links are not the correct type you have just so much dead weight, and not an functional machine gun- not a good thing in combat. But until you get into large scale planes in 1/32, 1/24 etc, would that sort of detail as to link types and number of holes be visible? Of course the charging handles and ejection chutes are much more prominent things easily seen in 1/48. But I am glad that this sort of technical knowledge is here for us for those who care to find that level of detail.
Yeah…images, schematics, pictures, URL links referring to your information would be much more helpful to those of us who know next to nothing about your post - but are interested to learn.
Show us what you’re talking about so we can all understand…maybe you’ll really create a spark in some of us - give it a go.
I tried using the links to get yall the pics but the links were absurdly long. I will see what I can do.
I have a Williams bros 1/6 LMG 08/15, I can try to build up something from that. I kind of hope some of my betters with more knowledge and talent than me would take it from here.
I also realize that 1/32nd is the mimimun for WWI kits to worry about this sort of detail.
I presume I cannot post pics on this thread? I have some (public domain). Might make for some interesting info, even for non-world war I modelers. How do I get in touch with Mr. Lawson?
Sure you can post pics. Just use rich textformatting when replying and insert the pics you have hosted. The is a special "insert picture"button (it is a pictogram).
As for mr Lawson, you can send him a pm via this forum (his user name is StephenLawson)
The forum software shortens the links after you post them…
OR
You can upload the photos to your own photo-hosting site, then post the pictures here yourself using the links provided in the “properties” of your photos and then use the “insert picture” function…
Having been a machine gunner myself once upon a time I do know the difference between disintegrating and non disintegrating metallic links and cloth and metallic belts. And I do know that if links are not the correct type you have just so much dead weight, and not an functional machine gun- not a good thing in combat. But until you get into large scale planes in 1/32, 1/24 etc, would that sort of detail as to link types and number of holes be visible? Of course the charging handles and ejection chutes are much more prominent things easily seen in 1/48. But I am glad that this sort of technical knowledge is here for us for those who care to find that level of detail.