By: Kenneth - 26th March 2009 at 07:57
… high up on the Vehner moor in Austria, between Osnabruck and Oldenburg
Osnabrück and Oldenburg are in North Germany, close to the Dutch border…. where it’s pretty flat!
By: Arabella-Cox - 26th March 2009 at 07:37
It is indeed the Fa223. the photo is one used in the AFEE report (Res 20) on their example (first helicopter to fly the channel) which unfortunately crashed at RAF Beaulieu before a full flight test evaluation could be carried out. The report is full of technical details, sectional drawings of the drive and rotor heads etc.
The tractor seats are described as troop seats, and yes they were attached to the undercarriage:eek:
By: Bager1968 - 26th March 2009 at 04:11
It had interesting potential:
yes from Wiki, but I had seen this info in a book in the 1970s:
In the spring of 1944 a Dornier Do 217 crashed high up on the Vehner moor in Austria, between Osnabruck and Oldenburg, and it was decided to send the V11 to recover the wreckage. Unfortunately the V11 ended up crashing nearby before it could attempt to lift the Do 217’s remains.
It was then decided to attempt to recover both using the V14. Flown by Karl Bode and Luftwaffe helicopter pilot Helmut Gerstenhauer, the operation was begun on 11 May 1944. A small team of Focke-Achgelis men and a Luftwaffe recovery company had already dismantled the V11, and the V14 made 10 flights carrying loads beneath it in a cargo net and setting them down where they could be loaded on to road vehicles. All the major parts of the V11 and the Do 217 were retrieved and much useful experience was gained.
Following this, the Air Ministry decided to evaluate the helicopter’s potential as a transport in mountainous regions, and the V16 was assigned to the Mountain Warfare School at Mittenwald, near Innsbruck, with the V14 as a backup. The objective of the tests was to see how the Drache would perform as a general-purpose all-weather transport, and numerous landings were made at altitudes of over 1,600 m (5,200 ft) above sea level, plus experimental transportation of artillery guns to mountain troops. When the trials ended in October 1944, a total of 83 flights had been made, with a total flying time of 20 hours.
By: ian_ - 26th March 2009 at 00:58
I bought the excellent “helicopters of the third reich” book as one of those presents to yourself christmas treats (half price in Ian Allen) The same photo is quoted as a modified BMW 301 in an Fa223. One can only hope the seats were not for opperational use. What particularly attracted me to the book was an account, with photos, of the excavation in the 80s of lumps of an Fa223. The crew had destroyed and then buried it to prevent it falling into allied hands. A story too good to be true! I wonder where it is now.
By: pogno - 25th March 2009 at 23:43
Could it be a Focke-Achgelis Fa 223, although the purpose of the tractor seats is a puzzle, they seem to be attached to the undercarriage cross beam. The rotor drive shaft is going out of the top left corner of the picture.
See link to the French version http://www.eads.com/xml/content/OF00000000400005/3/29/623293.jpg
Richard
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March 25, 2009 at 8:23 pm