SB Lighter Than Air

[ezgo394]

Great work Craig!

Kashmir has to be my favorite song from Led Zeppelin. It's 8 minutes long, yet its still not long enough. That's one of those songs I can listen to over and over without getting tied of it.

[CraigH]

ZR France, La Republique (1908)

The French Sugar Firm "Lebaudy Frères" built a series of semi-ridged airships, Le Republiqueand her sister ship Liberté being examples. These ships were sold to the French army for use in reconnaissance. The design was successful enough that Russia and Austria each purchased examples.

Note: I'm not certain regarding the balloon color. It's sort of an "average" based on period colorized post cards and a modern reproduction of the ship.


ZR Germany Schutte-Lanz SL-22

Schutte-Lanz was the leading competitor to Zeppelin in developing and manufacturing ridged airships. Schutte-Lanz initially focused on the use of laminate wood construction for framing (rather than aluminum) but adhesive technology of the time tended to fail with moisture.

The company was highly successful with several other airship innovations. They developed better streamlining than Zeppelin, had the first fully enclosed control cabs, developed Germany's first cruciform aft control surfaces, and plumbed the venting of hydrogen in ducts (highly reducing the the extreme hazard of uncontrolled hydrogen within the ship). Holding the German patents on these innovations they were able to bar Zeppelin from these critical design elements until the rights were seized by the government at the start of WW 1.

Enter the FIRST real combat zeppelins:

ZR, Germany, Zeppelin M Class (1914)

ZR, Germany, Zeppelin M Class- Improved (1914)

The Zeppelin M Class were the first airships that were successful as ridged military airships. These were the early ships capable of both extended maritime reconnaissance and able to carry out strategic bombing.

Keep in mind that fixed wing aircraft in the first couple years of the war did not have either the range or payload capacity to preform this function.

CraigH

[Garlicdesign]

Hello Craig

Words would fail me, If I was not as talkative as I am...

just fantastic.

Greetings
GD

[emperor_andreas]

Very nice work!

[Hood]

Really great work as usual.

[eswube]

Fantastic drawings!
It seems we have now A King of Airships.

[DG_Alpha]

Just like other ones, fantastic work!

[maomatic]

Excellent work!

[Novice]

Fantastic work, on par with other works by you, Craig.
Well done, the true master of Airships

[KimWerner]

Fantastic thread with great drawings and informative history