The aces / pilots

The real aces loved their triplanes! Though they had some real problems with them.

The Fokker DrI with its three wings is the most famous plane of WWI.

This didn't change until now and when one speaks about Fokker triplanes today, most of the people think of one of the totally red triplanes of the legendary "Red Baron" Manfred von Richthofen, who scored 80 victories and was the most successful fighter pilote of WWI .

Because of the colourful paint and their stationing in tent hangars, which were deplaced very often and reminded of a circus company, the English ran them down as: " Richthofen's Flying Circus".

Nevertheless, the great number of victories of Richthofen's troup caused great awe among the allied fighters. "Der rote Baron" - "Le diable rouge" - "Red Baron and his flying circus." The pilote of the red triplane and his comrades in the fighter groups created a myth through diligence ( 5 patrols a day ), their flying skills and last but not least an extraordinary plane: the Fokker triplane.

Richthofen himself allegedly said about the triplane: "It climbs like a monkey, but flies like the devil!"

Think of a plane with 241 kg original weight, plus 203 kg extra weight, which adds to 444 kg. This weight had to fight against a 164 kg rotating mass, i.e. propeller with hub 17 kg and circulating motor 147 kg,. Motor and propeller turned into the same direction and created a strong left spin. The short length and the short wing span gav it an extraordinary manoeuvrability. These were the reasons why the triplane was extremely difficult to fly, which the English expressed quite right: "It zig-zags like a fly turned-mad!

Even Richthofen thought that the DrI triplane was too demanding for beginners and took in April 1918 the necessary steps to replace the Fok DrI with Fokker D VII. In May, Jasta 4, 6 and 11already had the new planes. The Fokker triplanes of these Jastas were given to less important fighter groups. Unfortunately, as you can see from many crash photos of Jasta 5, they didn't really get used to the "fly turned-mad".

But many "aces like Jacobs, Löwenthal, MvR Udet, Loerzer and Bäumer continued to fly the DrI triplane and kept one as a substitute.