Nieuport 12The Nieuport 12 (or Nieuport XII in contemporary sources) was a French sesquiplane reconnaissance, fighter aircraft and trainer used by France, Russia, Great Britain and the United States during World War I. Later production examples were built as trainers and served widely until the late 1920s. To improve the performance of the Nieuport 10 a re-engined version was developed as the Nieuport 12 with a significantly enlarged upper wing.
1915 in aviationThis is a list of aviation-related events from 1915: The United States Navy establishes a lighter-than-air arm, charged with the operation of airships and of kite balloons to be towed behind warships. By the end of World War I, four of its battleships and six of its destroyers will have operated balloons. The United States Army forms one company of the 2d Aero Squadron for service in the Philippine Islands. January 6 or 15 – The German submarine U-12 departs Zeebrugge with a Friedrichshafen FF.
Nieuport 11The Nieuport 11 (or Nieuport XI C.1 in contemporary sources), nicknamed the Bébé, is a French World War I single seat sesquiplane fighter aircraft, designed by Gustave Delage. It was the primary aircraft that ended the Fokker Scourge in 1916. The type saw service with several of France's allies, and gave rise to the series of "vee-strut" Nieuport fighters that remained in service (latterly as trainers) into the 1920s. The Nieuport 11 is a new much smaller aircraft based on the general configuration of the Nieuport 10, but designed specifically as a single-seat fighter.
Nieuport 16The Nieuport 16 C.1 (or Nieuport XVI C.1 in contemporary sources) was a French World War I single-seat sesquiplane fighter aircraft, designed by Gustave Delage as a development of the Nieuport 11 with a more powerful engine. The Nieuport 16's service life coincided with the period when the first air-to-air rockets, the Le Prieur rocket, were used most frequently, and the type has a closer association with them than any other aircraft. The Nieuport 16 was an improved Nieuport 11 developed in 1916, with a strengthened airframe powered by a more powerful Le Rhône 9J rotary engine.
NieuportNieuport, later Nieuport-Delage, was a French aeroplane company that primarily built racing aircraft before World War I and fighter aircraft during World War I and between the wars. Originally formed as Nieuport-Duplex in 1902 for the manufacture of engine components the company was reformed in 1909 as the Société Générale d'Aéro-locomotion, and its products were marketed to the aviation industry, including ignition components. During this time they built their first aircraft, a small single-seat pod and boom monoplane.
BiplaneA biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While a biplane wing structure has a structural advantage over a monoplane, it produces more drag than a monoplane wing. Improved structural techniques, better materials and higher speeds made the biplane configuration obsolete for most purposes by the late 1930s.
Vickers machine gunThe Vickers machine gun or Vickers gun is a water-cooled .303 British (7.7 mm) machine gun produced by Vickers Limited, originally for the British Army. The gun was operated by a three-man crew but typically required more men to move and operate it: one fired, one fed the ammunition, the others helped to carry the weapon, its ammunition, and spare parts. It was in service from before the First World War until the 1960s, with air-cooled versions of it on many Allied World War I fighter aircraft.
Nieuport 17The Nieuport 17 C.1 (or Nieuport XVII C.1 in contemporary sources) was a French sesquiplane fighter designed and manufactured by the Nieuport company during World War I. An improvement over the Nieuport 11, it was a little larger than earlier Nieuports and better adapted to the more powerful engine than the interim Nieuport 16. Aside from early examples, it had the new Alkan-Hamy synchronization gear, permitting the use of a fuselage-mounted synchronised Vickers gun firing through the propeller disc.
Fighter aircraftFighter aircraft (early on also pursuit aircraft) are fixed-wing military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat. In military conflict, the role of fighter aircraft is to establish air superiority of the battlespace. Domination of the airspace above a battlefield permits bombers and attack aircraft to engage in tactical and strategic bombing of enemy targets. The key performance features of a fighter include not only its firepower but also its high speed and maneuverability relative to the target aircraft.
Lewis gunThe Lewis gun (or Lewis automatic machine gun or Lewis automatic rifle) is a First World War–era light machine gun. Designed privately in the United States though not adopted there, the design was finalised and mass-produced in the United Kingdom, and widely used by troops of the British Empire during the war. It had a distinctive barrel cooling shroud (containing a finned, aluminium breech-to-muzzle heat sink to cool the gun barrel) and top-mounted pan magazine.
