Aircraft Failures in WW1

[Elfen]

At the mad scientists meeting in NYC, we were talking about private AC failures, and noting on the death of JFKjr; according to the info, he was in a decending tight circle when he (the pilot at the time) noticed his altimeter spinning downward fast, but was unaware of the spin he was in. Instincts told him to do what comes normal- Pull back on the stick (in his case- yoke). This created a conflict of forces acting on the aircraft, creating a tighter circle to spin in and to make a long story short, his wings broke.

I've been reading the various failures in WW1 aircraft, but besides hard dives (some Nueports and Albatrosses) and material failures in the wings (Dr.1's and E.7/D.8's), have there ever been failures due to pilots putting extreme pressures on their crafts?

[Mark]

Wasn't it in Sagittarius Rising where someone pulled the wings off an SE5a by diving too hard and pulling up too abruptly? It was at the home field IIRC and he was hot dogging.

My opinion has always been that Va was probably about stall speed +20 mph <G>. You certainly do not read of abrupt control movements to evade attack like you do with WW2 techniques.

[Mark]

Also, in "No Parachute" by Arthur Lee they had a song that went something like "Heavy Handed Hans Ham Handles Handy Halberstadts"

[Old Man]

I have seen an R.F.C. training poster warning against unnecessary loops, illustrating a machine suffering fractured longerons while engaged in one. So it was certainly something people worried about.

[Vin]

The eindekker. Immelmann was supposed to have shot off his own propellor.

The infamous Clayton and Shuttleworth Triplanes.

F=MA

[Taz]

Elfen- The later thin-winged Fokker M series including the Fok D.I-D.V were banned from the front because of structural weakness in 1917. The Halberstadt D types were very structurally strong, despite their delicate appearance, especially the tail surfaces. McCudden commented on never having seen an aircraft descend so steeply and rapidly and then pull out safely.

The wings did pull off a few subcontractor Sopwith Triplanes with substandard bracing wires. The French pilots were reportedly scared to death of their Triplanes.

Taz
Terry Phillips

[timjnf]

The cause of the break-up of the aircraft in the JFK Jr accident and the wings coming off as a result of pulling up too abruptly from a high speed dive are the same... excessive load factor (load factor = Lift / Weight and is measured in g forces).

Load factor, in these examples, is created by up elevator increasing the amount of lift produced by the wings. All components of the airframe have a limit to the amount of force (weight or load) that can be applied before they break. Above a certain airspeed the wings can generate enough lift that the resulting load factor exceeds the airframe strength.
A very common point of breakage is where the wing attaches to the fuselage, or where the horizontal stab attaches to it, but depending on how the aircraft is loaded (how close it is to its maximum weight) it is possible to have some other component fail before the wings even get close to failure. The engine mounts for instance.

This created a conflict of forces acting on the aircraft, creating a tighter circle to spin in and to make a long story short, his wings broke.

There is no conflict of forces, merely too great of a load factor for the airframe to withstand.

The conflict (in the case of an accident like JFK Jrs) is with the pilot's senses, and the pilot relying on his senses rather than his flight instruments.
One must use all the flight instruments, not just one or two, to make sense of what is going on. Flight training is supposed to cause your reactions to be different than instinct, and instrument training teaches you to properly read and interpret the flight instruments and base your reactions off that interpretation so that you don't wind up in JFK Jrs predicament. JFK Jr was not instrument rated, if he had been he'd probably be alive today.

[Barrett]

JFK Jr died of the primary Kennedy trait: arrogance.
Perhaps he assumed that his pedegree would keep him from harm. Perhaps he thought that because he had an airman's certificate, he was immune from the perils of Lesser Mortals.

In any case, he squandered the hard-won knowledge passed on to later generations by the GW airmen. Those who ignore that precious treasure do so at their own peril.

Hey, alot of us on here aren't from the US and don't care about your politics, prejudices or WHY. Do me a favour, at any rate, take it to off topic, please.

F=MA