In November, 1914, the Japanese surrounded the German outpost of Tsingtao, China. Aviator Gunther Pluschow was ordered by the Governor to escape capture to Germany.
Pluschow flew out of Tsingtao in his Rumpler Taube monoplane on a cold morning, amidst heavy anti-aircraft fire from the surrounding hills, swarming with Japanese soldiers. With a packet of secret documents, he aimed for Hai-Daschou. He landed there, burnt his Rumpler ‘Taube’ (Pigeon/Dove), and set off on foot.
With the aid of helpful Chinese, he made his way to Shanghai, to the U.S., and thence to Gibraltar, where the British arrested him.
In fact, an Austrian invented the Taube monoplane that Pluschow flew and served the Germans early in World War One.
The Taube was yet another development of 1912. This plane was so called because the wings are swept back and curved up at the tips like those of a dove. The builders were Wels and Etrich, of Austria, in 1908.
In Austria, the progress of aviation during the years 1907-10 were closely bound up with the efforts of Igo Etrich and his associate, Herr Wels. In the early years of the century, they began experimenting on lines laid down by the Austrian aviation pioneer, Kress, more or less contemporaneous with Maxim, Langley, Reuard, and Lilienthal. In 1906 they experimented successfully with a glider at Oberaltstadt, Bohemia. After having built many experimental machines at a time when motors were the cause of so much trouble to prospective aviators, Etrich and Wels finally evolved a somewhat successful type of monoplane in the early part of 1908.
This machine, named by them the “Etrich-Wels III.” was substantially the same as the type shown here, except that it was equipped with a front elevation rudder which was later discarded.
During 1910, along with the progress elsewhere, Austria, represented by the Etrich IV. and the Warcholovski biplane (also designed by Etrich), jumped to the fore. Illner, one of the best Etrich monoplane pilots, flew from Steinfelde to Vienna across country on May 17, 1910; made an 80-kilometer cross-country flight on October 6th, 1910; flew from Vienna to Horn and back, a distance of 160 kilometers, four days later; and in the last week of the same month made a magnificent duration flight of over two hours. Aman flew the Etrich well in France, and at Johannisthal (Berlin) the Etrich-Rumpler made an excellent showing. The Etrich was so successful that the Austrian Minister of Air ordered twenty of them for the army. This machine was designed to be inherently stable, and it was successful to a great degree. If it had altitude enough it generally succeeded when falling in recovering its proper position before striking the ground. Other builders had striven for inherent stability, but had failed to get beyond a certain point.
As Etrich abandoned his patent, at least 14 companies later produced in Germany as the LE-3, informally ‘Taube,’ including Aviatik, Rumpler, Albatros, Gotha (shown in the picture), and DFW. While it was still in service at the onset of the war in 1914, it was soon outclassed.
Top Speed: 51 m.p.h.
Engine: Daimler four-cylinder 65 horse-power
Wingspan: 46 feet
Weight: 1100 pounds
Specifications from “Monoplanes and Biplanes,†by Grover Loening, 1911
The Frame
The frame of this machine is quite original. The main bracing of the plane consists of a single panel of wire trussing and struts, very much as on a biplane, and placed laterally under the main plane. There is a central fuselage, and central struts as well as large struts at the outer end of each wing from which the plane is braced by a great number of wires. The entire construction reminds one of the old Lilienthal machines, and is in fact a distinct development of them, Etrich having the distinction of possessing one of these famous gliders. It is evident in the frame work and construction of the entire machine that the structure of a bird’s wing has been very carefully studied, many features of the ribs, etc., resembling the feathers of a bird. Steel tubing and fine wood and cross-wire construction is used profusely throughout the frame.
The Main Wing
The plane is shaped like a bird’s wing and is tipped up at the rear ends, a device for stability that was suggested by Victor Tatin as well as by Lilienthal and that is also used on the Pischof monoplane. The halves are at a small dihedral angle as well. The sectional curvature is of the well-known Lilienthal bird-like form. The spread is 46 feet. the maximum chord is 9% feet, and the area 344 square feet. The ends have a depth of over 12 feet.
The Elevators
At the rear is a very bird-like tail, the trailing edge of the horizontal empennage being moved up or down for ascent or descent. The control is by means of a column which is pivoted to move backward and forward, a forward push turning the tail down. etc. The rear horizontal empennage and tail is 14 feet long by 11 feet wide.
The Direction Rudder
Two triangular surfaces are used, very much resembling the Antoinette. Rectangular surfaces are also sometimes used. They are operated by the two foot pedals. To turn to the right, for example, the left pedal is pressed down and the right up. This turns the rudder and at the same time turns the front wheels out to the left. The opposite control has also been employed occasionally, i.e., the right pedal pressed down for a turn to the right.
Roll Control
Warping of the wings is used for transverse control; the mechanism accomplishing it consists of wire and pulley connections to the steering wheel mounted on the control column. By turning the wheel clockwise, the left side is turned down and therefore lifts up, while the right is turned up and therefore sinks. The entire rear edge of the wing is flexible. The warping alone, however, is not supposed to be entirely responsible for the lateral movement. The rear turned-up ends are so curved that when warped up considerably, they form a pocket, very much like the blade of a turbine, which catches the air, and plows down that side. The other side then flies around and due to its higher speed and consequent increase of lift, cants up greatly. The result is that turns of such sharp curvature can be made, that the machine appears merely to pivot around the inside wing.
Tail
The bird-like tail has vertical and horizontal empennages. The entire body is enclosed and shaped fusiform, adding still more to the bird-like appearance.
Propulsion
Formerly a Clerget four-cylinder 50 horse-power motor, mounted at the front as on the Antoinette, was used, but of late both Rumpler eight-cylinder 55 horse-power and Austrian Daimler four-cylinder 65 horse-power motors have been used. The propeller is a Chauviere, 7.2 feet in diameter, 4 feet pitch, and rotates at 1,400 r.p.m. The
Landing Gear
The mounting chassis resembles somewhat the Bleriot. On the newest machines a large front skid has also been fitted. There is a small skid at the rear. The seat is placed about in the center of the main plane, and is well protected from the exhaust, slip stream of the propeller, etc.
Speed, Weight, Loading and Aspect Ratio
The speed is 51 miles an hour. The total weight in flight is 1,100 pounds; 20 pounds are lifted per horse-power, and 3.2 pounds per square foot of surface. The aspect ratio is 4.72 to 1.
Etrich Taube Monoplane.
Specifications from “Practical Aviation,†by Charles Hayward, 1919
The Etrich monoplane was the forerunner of the Taube (dove) generally used in the German aviation service until the Germans captured a Moräne monoplane, copied it in large numbers, as the Fokker E.III. The front part of each wing was rigidly constructed of webbed ribs built over three longitudinal spars, of which the forward one formed the leading edge. These sections were double surfaced, that is, covered on both sides with a rubberized fabric. Behind the rear beam extended bamboo continuations of the ribs which were covered with a single … fabric and formed a flexible trailing edge.
The flexible wing tips were turned up at the rear within and so gave both wings an effective negative angle of incidence. It is to this feature that the Etrich Gnome owed its pronounced degree of inherent stability. Lateral balance was maintained by raising either wing tip by means of a cable which, passing over a pulley situated at the top of the king-post, divided up into eight wires connected to the flexible extremities of the wing. A cable passing over the lower end of the king-post lowered the opposite tip a corresponding amount.
Enormous strength was imparted to the wing by a bridge-like structure of steel tubing, which embraced the middle-wing spar and was attached below the under surface.
A small wheel mounted at the lower extremity of the kingpost protected the wing tip from contact with the ground. The bird tail was pivoted in one unit about a horizontal axis, the rr;ir portion of this tail forming the elevator, which was controlled by warping the horizontal tail plane. Two small, triangular, vertical rudders, one above and the other below the horizontal tail plane, were hinged to the rear edges of two triangular stabilizing fins and were operated by pedals in front of the pilot’s seat. Elevation and lateral balance were controlled by a hand wheel placed on the top of a vertical column.
The chassis is similar to that of the Bleriot with the addition of a movable central ash skid which was controlled simultaneously with the rudder by a pedal. The wheels were pivoted so that the machine might be steered when on the ground. The fuselage was a fish-shaped structure of four longitudinal wood spars cross braced by wire guys. From the engine bed, which was mounted at the forward end, the body deepened awl widened in the vicinity of the pilot’s seat, from which point it gradually tapered, still preserving its triangular section, until the tail was reached, where it terminated in a vertical line. To avoid internal disturbance in the air discharge, the body was covered forward with aluminum sheeting and aft with fabric. The radiator was an inverted V suspended above the passenger’s seat, its height above the motor securing effective thermosiphon circulation in case the centrifugal pump became deranged. The Etrich machine. was fitted with a 60 h.p. four-cylinder … early types of the same make were a 120 … plane and a 60 h.p.p. racing machine.