Landships II

Annoyingly, there is (as yet) no single, comprehensive online resource for zeppelin information and material in the way that Landships and this forum are for Great War AFVs and artillery. However, the following forum is perhaps the start of one:

http://www.airshipmodeler.com/forums/index.php

Despite the 'modeler' in the name, there are sections devoted to the real thing. You'll need to have a good browse, there's much stuff just scattered around.

I've been interested in zeppelins for years and don't recall ever seeing a photo of a bomb bay - which isn't to say that there isn't one somewhere, I just suspect they're incredibly rare!

There's a museum in Paris with a full-size reconstruction of a WW1 zeppelin control car:
http://www.airshipmodeler.com/forums/showthread.php?t=223&highlight=gondola

On the subject of the US aircraft-carrying airships, these were a pair of USN zeppelins, the Akron and Macon. Both carried five reconnaisance aircraft in an internal hanger, which were launched (and retrieved) using a 'trapeze' device. Both crashed at sea during the 1930s. However, in 1937 designs were drawn up for a larger ZRCV (CV was, and remains, the USN designation for aircraft carrier; ZR for Zeppelin Rigid) larger than the Hindenburg and equipped with nine dive bombers slung in a line in recesses along the belly of the hull. Funds were not forthcoming and the project was stillborn.

If you want to find out about British airships, there's a superb site here:
http://www.aht.ndirect.co.uk/index.html

But I've never found anything comparable for the German zeppelins, strangely, and there isn't exactly a glut of books on the subject, either, though I have a few.

-- Edited by Roger Todd at 11:13, 2007-04-12

I agree that it was a 16andabit lb bomb thrown by the twin engined HP 0/400 in summer 1918.
Somewhere I have seen a photo of one of those, chalked on it: " A little hell(p) from the RAF".

Thomas

Back to Zeppelins for a moment ( interesting info on the 1919 plan, Centurion ) I'm
pretty sure I still have a copy of Collier's Photographic History of the Great War
tucked away-I remember it having a photo of one of the motor cars ( the engine nacelles
we'd say now, I think) of a captured/crashed Zeppelin. I'll have to see if I can find it-there
were a number of good Zeppelin photos in, as I recall.

Craig York wrote:

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Back to Zeppelins for a moment ( interesting info on the 1919 plan, Centurion ) I'm
pretty sure I still have a copy of Collier's Photographic History of the Great War
tucked away-I remember it having a photo of one of the motor cars ( the engine nacelles
we'd say now, I think) of a captured/crashed Zeppelin. I'll have to see if I can find it-there
were a number of good Zeppelin photos in, as I recall.

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yes the site i provided has a few pictures of the nacelles of various zeppelins through the line of development.

while waiting for a movie to start today i stepped into a barnes and noble, and they had a book that was about the hindenburg, but it was acctualy more of a history of rigid airships in general leading up to the hindenburg, which is sensable because the hindenburg represented the apex of airship design.

The book "The Zeppelin In Combat" is a very good account of the German Zeppelins in WWI.

As someone else mentioned, I would also reccomend "Battlebags" if one wants to read about the British use of such craft.

One thing that I always found interesting, is it seems that the Zeppelins had a fairly advanced bomb sight mechanism. We all know how innacurate the Zeppelin raids over London were, but this was mostly because the Zeppelins would operate at incredibly high altitudes, and thus even on the clearest night (which was almost non existent) the Zeppelin crews would still have an impossible time of figuring out exactly where they were over British territory. However, I have read many accounts of Zeppelins using bombs to attack enemy u-boats. I have not read of any account where the Zeppelins actually inflicted damage on the vessels they were attacking, but the bombs came extremely close. In one instance, a couple German submarines were on a mission out from Zeebruges, and a bunch of Zeppelins on their way to bomb Britain flew overhead. The submarines launched signal flares to show the Zeppelins they were friendly, but apparently the Zeppelins did not see them, and one Zeppelin changed course and started attacking the u-boats with bombs. The bombs came so close that both u-boats initiated a crash dive to escape. Turns out the captain of the Zeppelin was the uncle of one of the U-Boat captains attacked, and the uncle bought the u-boats crew a large bar-tab worth of drinks later on in appology.

So, while I have not read of any actual direct hits by Zeppelin Vs. Surface Craft, it's apparent that the bombs Zeppelins dropped were aimed in some way. This was not mentioned whatsoever in any of the books I have read. As someone else mentioned, I have never seen a picture of the bomb-bay of zeppelins. Even the defensive machine gun positions in the zeppelins are fairly obscure. There was usually a front-dorsal MG platform with one or two machineguns. In the cone directly behind the control fins at the rear of the airship there was also another solitary MG station. Then, the control car would also sometimes have MGs. Presumably, the engine cars might also have MGs, although I have never seen pictures of this.

The MG's seem like almost useless armaments for a giant explosive gas bag, however they did save the Zeppelins sometimes. In the last Zeppelin raid of WWI, the raid where the Leader Of Airships ship was shot down, the same Briths fighter pilot that shot her down went after the next closest airship, and was only thwarted from downing yet another zeppelin because the defensive fire from this zeppelin actually managed to wound the pilot in the head - a very very lucky shot, or incredible shooting. That pilot managed to land and survived his injuries.

Zeppelins are absolutely amazing things.

It's also interesting to note that the Zeppelin Company is still around - in a way. Apparently the original Zeppelin Company put aside a sort of trust-fund to be used explicitely for new airship development in the future. Well, the Hindenburg blew up, the Graf Zeppelin was dismantled, and nothing further came of the Zeppelin Company - however, that fund was still there, and it could absolutely only be used for further Zeppelin development. So, whence the fund had matured to a sufficient level, Germany re-created the Zeppelin Company, and began building "New Technology" Zeppelins, or Zeppelin NT's. These have the characteristic girder framework, however the framework is simply an internal support to the blimp-style envelope, there are no gas cells as used in the WWI zeppelins, and the skin of the airship when inflated is not fully supported by the internal frame. Thus, it is a semi-rigid airship. The first Zeppelin NT, was called the Friedrichshafen in honor of the old Zeppelin base.

Japan bought a Zeppelin NT and was going to re-create the famous flight of the Graf Zeppelin from German to Japan, however Russia did not grant fly-over rights, and the Zeppelin NT was transported by cargo ship to Japan.

These Zeppelin NTs function in the dual Advertising/Joyride venture, where they operate several sight-seeing flights a day, all while being a giant billboard at the same time. It's important to remember that some of the first zeppelins were not combat aircraft, but actually passenger joyride aircraft ! ! ! So in a way, zeppelins have come full circle.

---Vil.

Edit:
Another great book with a lot of interesting photographs is the little coffee-table book "Airshipwrecks" by Len Deighton and Arnold Schwartzman. It doesn't have a great deal of information, but a wealth of very cool photographs. The wrecks of most of the more famous airships, along with incredible photographs. A zeppelin with its back broken and the rear gas cells ruptured - but the front structure and cells intact, so the zeppelin looks like it's rearing up out of the ground like some colossal worm beast. Another that I find ridiculously amusing, is a grainy photograph of men repairing the Graf Zeppelins envelope while on a trans-atlantic crossing. They are thousands of feet in the air, and walking on top of the zeppelin, and one worker can be seen sitting at the far edge of the zeppelin, dangling his feet over the side!!! Boy that would have to be the scariest thing in the world.

-- Edited by Vilkata at 09:01, 2007-04-25

Zeppellin company made fantastic plane - Zeppellin StaaKen R.VI.
Ukrainian company Roden made fantastic model of plane - Zeppellin StaaKen R.VI. in 1/72.
Russian M-hobby magazine made fantastic article about the model of plane - Zeppellin StaaKen R.VI. in 1/72.

Shortly:

Every plane cost 560000 imperial marcks. Length - 22,1 m, Wing-span 42,2 m, max weight - 11848 kg. Produced by "Zeppellin" Co, "Sutte-Lanz" & "Albatros and Aviatik" (may be mistakes - I translate from Russian). Were bilt 17 planes + 1 plane with floats for fleet (but it was distroied during the testings) last, 18th plane was not completed till armistice.

No any planes were killed by enemies, but some had technical damages. One plane was an actor in SF film "Die Herrin Del Welt". One plane was pass to Hetman Skoropadskiy (Ukrainia), but killed by Polands. Other planes distroed accordance with armistice.

-- Edited by Aleksandr at 00:03, 2007-04-27

Centurion wrote:

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Zeppelins were not 'explosive gas bags'. The gas cells were not under positive pressure but maintained at normal air pressure. This meant that even if holed by quite a few bullets gas leakage was very slow and air did not get mixed with the Hydrogen to create an explosive mixture. An incendary bullet in the midle of a large gas cell will not cause an explosion, (a standard school chemistry demo used to be to take a gas jar full of hydrogen, move the ground glass seal enough to plunge a lighted spill into the gas - the spill would go out in the absence of oxygen. Repeat the experiment but allow the hydrogen to mis with air and one got a satisfactory bang). It at first proved quite difficult to shoot down a Zeppelin. What sealed their fate was to use a mixture of ball, Buckingham (or other explosive round) and tracer. The  ball perforated the gass cells, the Buckinham rounds dispersed gas into the air and the tracer ignited it. The Zeppelin then burned rather than exploded. There was an answer that British engineers devised but the Germans either did not pick up or implement. This was to vent exhaust gas from the engines into the space between the outer skin and the gas cells so that even if the latter were quite badly ruptured the hydrogen would mix with the inert exhaust gas and could not burn.
Before anyone quotes the Hindenberg recent research suggests that the initial fire was  not the hydrogen burning but the hull that had been coated with a new form of varnish/sealant. Analysis of preserved fragments show that this had the same composition as is today used in the solid fuel boosters on the shuttle! Once the gas cells were ruptured then the gas burned but most went straight up into the air.

BTW the Graff Zeppelin made a cameo appearance right at the beginning of WW2 when shortly after the outbreak in 1939 the Graff Zeppelin was used for ELINT flights in the North Sea to try and determine if Britain was really developing RDF

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this is true, this also explains why the hindenburg didnt explode, it just burned realy fast. If it had been the hydrogen it would be several large blasts with burning afterwards. The varnish used a form of aluminum, which is used in thermite, high explosive bombs, napalm, and other things like the rocket boosters you mentioned, normaly you can use it in paint and varnish while keeping it inert which they do quite a bit, but because this was early on, the mixture wasnt fully inert.