Talk:Nieuport 23

Merge:

• The Nieuport 23 was a fighter aircraft produced in France during the First World War.[1][2]

so far so good, but a bit brief.

• It was a development of the Nieuport 17 intended to address structural weakness of the earlier type, and most were produced with a lighter version of the Le Rhône 9J engine that powered the Nieuport 17,[3] offering a better power-to-weight ratio.

Utter nonsense. Both 17 and 23 used the same engines, two different versions of the Le Rhone, the latter developing slightly more power but wasn't significantly lighter, and both types used whatever was available.

• Internally, the main difference between the Types 17 and 23 was a redesigned wing spar in the upper wing.[3]

Nope - spar was the same, but the packing pieces around the spar were redesigned, as a result of having to change the rigging. In addition the oil, fuel and ammunition were rearranged. It is OR as it hasn't been published, but the undercarriage legs were also slightly longer on the 23.

• This, however, did not prove satisfactory, and when the fighter displayed an unacceptably high accident rate due to shedding its wings in flight,[4] the Général chef du service aéronautique ordered that either additional reinforcement be added to the wings or that the type be withdrawn from service.[3] One hundred and fifty new sets of wings were ordered to keep the type flying.[3]

The upper wing was never a problem, and it was withdrawn as it had become obsolescent and was being replaced by the Nieuport 24, which in turn was replaced by the SPAD VII. The

• External differences included better streamlining of the forward fuselage[5] and a synchronised machine gun mounted on the upper fuselage and firing through the propeller disc.[1][3]

Both of these "changes" were from the N.16, not the 17, which was almost entirely identical, especially the weaponry.

• Nieuport 23s ordered for Britain's Royal Flying Corps nevertheless were fitted with machine guns that fired over the top of the upper wing, in the way that the Nieuport 17 had been armed.[3]

The RFC used the 17 and 23 interchangeably, and armed them the same as a result of problems of the French supplying enough interrupter systems, and there may have been problems with the British systems.

• A photograph published in the Osprey book about German squadron Jasta 18 shows a crashed Nieuport 23 (No A6678) which had been piloted by Lt J R Anthony of Royal Flying Corps (RFC) No 1 Squadron over the Western Front. This machine was shot down from an altitude of 5,200 metres on May 25, 1917, but managed to force land beside a German flak battery. Anthony was fatally wounded while his machine was captured, minus its rudder, which was taken by the victorious German pilot. This individual RFC Nieuport 23 shows a top-wing Lewis gun had been fitted but it is unclear if the Vickers gun on the cowling had been retained. This Lewis is on a fixed top-wing mount and not the sliding Foster mount popularised on the later SE5.

Irrelevant and NPOV and disproportionate and possibly OR.

• Historians have found it difficult to identify how many of each Nieuport type were operated by the RFC as its surviving records tended to only specify 'Nieuport scout'. Thus an unknown proportion of various Nieuport models including the Nieu 11, 17 and 23 were issued to squadrons.

Nonsense, the RFC operated no Nieuport 11s at all (that was the RNAS), and the while the 17s and 23s were treated interchangeably, this was because they were essentially the same design.

• Individual Nieuport types are best identified from surviving photos rather than archives.

More nonsense as photos rarely show the details that can be used to differentiate them.

• Some Nieuports were retained by later RFC squadrons as personal aircraft, Such pilots included Billy Bishop VC and Albert Ball VC.

Neither Bishop nor Ball retained personal aircraft. Pilots were assigned specific aircraft, and they were unusual in having some small degree of personalization in their paint schemes but that doesn't make them personal aircraft.

• The Nieuport 17bis flown by French ace Charles Nungesser was later converted to a Nieuport 23 standard.

Not likely - Nungesser flew a large number of Nieuports, including a 17, a 17bis and a 25. None had been converted to a 23, especially not the 17bis which was structurally much different from the 17 or 23.

• TheSome 49 Nieuport 23s were purchased by the USA in April 1918, probably for use as advanced trainers for pilots due to fly the later Nieuport 28.

Not "probably" at all, the USAS purchased a large number of older designs as trainers, including Nieuport 17s, 21s and 23s.

• A trainer version was produced as the Nieuport 23 École (or Nieuport 21/23) with an 80 hp Le Rhône engine.[3]

The 21 was not a 23 and differed more from the 17 and 23 then those two types did from each other. While it was intended as a trainer, it saw more use as a combat aircraft. The trainers DID have 80 hp Le Rhône engines.

• A Nieuport 23 is preserved at the Royal Museum of the Armed Forces and of Military History in Brussels.[6]

Finally a statement that isn't factually incorrect. That makes two whole lines that do not contain some factual inaccuracy or irrelevant POV.

Missing from the article is any sense of balance. All there are, are negatives, mostly exaggerated or misconstrued. Overnight this design made every other fighter in the world obsolete. (Not mentioned.) Its climb rate was so good that even when it was obsolete it was still a dangerous opponent, and it was only with the introduction of the 1918 thick wing fighters that it was finally unable to compete.This page has nothing to offer, nothing to work from, and is a pointless duplication of the much more substantial and far more accurate Nieuport 17 page (although it too needs work). NiD.29 05:15, 6 September 2015 (UTC)