Halberstadt D.II (oz1929)

About this Plan

Halberstadt D.II. Scale German WWI biplane for control line. Scale is 1/12.

Quote: "Although rather flimsy looking, the Halberstadt was one of the WWI's toughest fighters and could withstand very high G loads. Our .29 powered controliner is a solid semi-scale performer. Halberstadt D-II by Walter Musciano.

This is the Halberstadt D-II flown by the Baron while a member of the famous Kampfeinsitzerkommando Vaux in 1916. Baron Ernst von Aithaus made the plane famous. With it he won his Blue Max. He was so skilful that pilots thought him reckless!

WHEN the Fokker Eindecker proved obsolete in the spring of 1916 the German high command feverishly sought a replacement from three aircraft firms: Hal- berstadt, Fokker, and Albatros. The Halberstadt design was the first to reach the front in early 1916 followed by the Fokker D-7 and then the Albatros. The latter eventually overshadowed its competitors. The Halberstadt biplane fighters ranged from the D-I to the D-IV but the most popular seems to have been the D-II which was flown by such famous aces as Wintgens, Buddecke, Boelcke, von Richthofen, Berthold, and von Althaus.

The D-II was flimsy looking, but extremely rugged in the air and could with stand prolonged dives which is something that many of the designs of that period could not. Powered by a 120 hp Mercedes liquid-cooled, six-cylinder engine the D-II attained a speed of 90 mph. Normal armament consisted of a single Spandau machine gun mounted atop the fuselage, however many flyers used two guns.

Like many early German planes, the Halberstadt D-II left the factory with wide variations. Exhaust stacks, ailerons, inspection panels varied in shape from batch to batch. Our one-inch-to-the-foot, control-line model duplicates one of the D-II fighters flown by Ernst von Althaus when he was a member of Kampfeinsitzerkommando Vaux. Engines from .15 to .23 can be used. This design has a rela tively long tail-moment arm which tends to eliminate sensitive controls but will probably make the model balance tail heavy. The fuselage rear and the tail surfaces should be lightly constructed. A heavy, but not too powerful, engine will also help.

The full-size craft had no stabilizer or fin; the entire surface was movable. This may be troublesome for the novice with excessive sensitivity of the controls, therefore an enlarged non-scale tail, with conventional elevator stabilizer configuration has been illustrated for those who are interested only in stable care-free flying. Since this project is aimed at the more experienced modeler we will describe only the unusual aspects of its construction.

Construction. The upper wing is one piece. The plywood joiner is cemented to the leading edge pieces, automatically forming the correct dihedral..."

Update 05/10/2018: Added article, thanks to davidterrell80.

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