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Braunschweig LF-1 Zaunkönig

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The Brunswick LF-1 Zaunkönig was a STOL single-seat light aircraft designed in 1939 by Prof. Ing. Hermann Winter as a fool-proof aircraft for learner pilots to experience solo flight.

Design and construction

The aircraft was designed by Prof. Dr.-Ing. Hermann Winter and his students of the Technical University of Brunswick, Lower Saxony, Germany.[1] Winter was a former chief engineer at Bulgarian Company DAR there he create a line of airplanes DAR-1, DAR-1A, DAR-2, DAR-3, tri motor DAR-4, DAR-5, DAR-6 and DAR-7. Winter design also few gliders for Bulgarian Army. After returning from Bulgaria Winter work at Fieseler which was famous for the Fi 156[citation needed]. LF stands for Langsames Flugzeug, in English: "slow aircraft".

It was a parasol wing monoplane with a high-set tailplane.

The aircraft's wingspan was 26 ft 5 in (8.05 m), its length 19 ft 11 in (6.07 m). Maximum take-off weight was 776 lb (352 kg). Equipped with a Zündapp Z9-92 delivering 50 hp (37 kW), it needed an airstrip of 100 m (330 ft) long to operate. Using maximum flap, its stall speed was 50 km/h. Cruising speed was 53 mph (85 km/h).[2]. Designed as a proof-of-concept for a 'fool-proof' training aircraft, the Zaunkönig was intended to be flown by novice pilots with only an hour's ground instruction, the hour being reduced to five-minutes to those who had flown sailplanes. The result was an aircraft that was both unstallable and unspinnable.[3]


The first prototype the LF-1 V1 was constructed in 1940 and made its first flight by Winter himself in December 1940. Test flights came to an end when, in November 1942, a part of the wing ruptured and the aircraft crashed. A second prototype, the V2 was built in 1943 and received the registration D-YBAR. This example was tested for military applications. At a certain time it was even armed with a Panzerfaust 100.

Post-war history

D-EBCG Fly by

The Zaunkönig registration D-YBAR was taken to the Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE) at Farnborough for slow flying tests; given the British serial VX190.[1], where amongst others, it was flown by Eric "Winkle" Brown CO Aero Flight, the aircraft also being soloed by the then-head of the RAE Aerodynamics Section, Handel Davies, whose previous experience was as a pupil in a dual-control Miles Magister, after a half hour of ground instruction.[3] It was sold to a British private owner in June 1949 as G-ALUA, and then to the Experimental Flying Group and to the Ultra Light Aircraft Association, subsequently in 1974 to an Irish owner, being registered EI-AYU, returning to Germany, in 1976, as D-EBCQ. As of 2008, it was preserved in the Deutsches Museum collection at Oberschleissheim near Munich.

Encouraged by the positive British reviews Prof. Ing. Hermann Winter decided to build a third LF-1. The construction started in 1954 and it was the first new aircraft in Germany after the war to receive a certificate by the Luftfahrt-Bundesamt (LBA) in Braunschweig and the code D-EBAR. Winter envisioned the Zaunkönig as a People's Aircraft affordable for all (for a price of around DM 6,000). On 28 April 1957, the wartime Luftwaffe fighter ace Heinrich Bär was conducting a routine flight check in the D-EBAR. Bär put the aircraft into a flat spin, the final manoeuvre in the test process at Braunschweig-Waggum. The aircraft spun down to 50 m (160 ft) then, unable to regain control, it crashed and Bär received fatal head injuries.[4][5][6] The aircraft was damaged beyond repair and written off.

At the time a fourth LF-1 V4 was already under construction and it flew a few months after the fatal accident with the V3. It received its certificate in 1958 and the code D-ECER. This aircraft flew for some years in Germany until grounded after the death of Prof. Ing. Winter in 1968. It was restored in 1980 and flew until 1999 as D-EBCG and as of 2008 preserved in the collection of the Internationals Luftfahrtmuseum Manfred Pflumm near Villingen-Schwenningen.[7]

Specifications (LF-1)

Data from [citation needed]

General characteristics

  • Crew: 1

Performance


References

Notes
  1. ^ a b Jackson 1973, p. 369
  2. ^ Green 1965, p. 79
  3. ^ a b Brown, Eric RN Wings On My Sleeve Orion books, 2006 ISBN 978-0-297-84565-2 p.157-158
  4. ^ Kurowski 1996, p. 122.
  5. ^ Berger 1999, p. 14.
  6. ^ Helden der Wehrmacht 2004, p. 148.
  7. ^ Ogden 2006, p. 201
Bibliography
  • Green, William (1965), The Aircraft of the World, Macdonald & Co, ISBN none {{citation}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help)
  • Jackson, A.J. (1973), British Civil Aircraft since 1919 - Volume One, Putnam & Company Limited, ISBN 0-370-10006-9
  • Ogden, Bob (2006), Aviation Museums and Collections of Mainland Europe, Air-Britain (Historians) Ltd, ISBN 0-85130-375-7

External links

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