Henri Farman Type 20 in Wellington

[ZacYates]

Hi all,
I was perusing the NZ Civil Aircraft blog today and I made a pleasant discovery: there's a Farman biplane on public display in Wellington! nzcivair.blogspot.co.nz/2015/04/aircraft-at-sir-peter-jacksons-great.html

Along with an (presumably repro) Albatros D.V/D.Va top wing, a large scale model gun, and several other artifacts, the poster suggests the Farman is a TVAL static build rather than the original Sir Peter obtained from the RAF Museum a while back.

How long until we see a flying Farman or four? I remember liking the Farmans and early Caudrons as a child, so it's very exciting to see this one.

Has anyone here been to this exhibition and seen it, or have any more info?

[nuuumannn]

Interesting to see, but it's not a Henri Farman Type 20 or HF.20; its a Maurice Farman MF.11bis. The tapered booms holding the tailplane and twin rudders are the giveaway here. The Henri Farman HF.20 had a single fin and rudder and its tailplane bracing struts were not tapered to the same extent. Here's a good picture of an HF.20:

p159.phpnet.org/lzdream/marine/allemagne/konigsberg/hf20.jpg

The MF.11bis was an improvement over the original MF.11 Shorthorn in that the undercarriage was altered in design and a new control car was fitted with the observer at the front with a better arc of fire. The Vintage Aviator received a (Henri) Farman F.40 from the RAF Museum, so that aircraft in the exhibition isn't based on it. It'll be neat to see one of them flying, though.

[ZacYates]

You must be the mysterious Anonymous who posted similar info on NZCA? Thanks for the heads-up. For my money the Shorthorn (11) is a more attractive machine than the 20, and the 40 is even less attractive!

[nuuumannn]

Yep, I don't have a stalkbook account, nor do I tweet, so, when it comes to sign-ins, anonyme it is. I did some reading about the HF.20 whilst I was writing my articles on the Dardanelles aviation scene and found out it was a bit worthless as a war machine, being significantly underpowered, and often with a useful load would not get airborne at all in the high temps in the Aegean. The Farman F.27 was a superior and more hardy aeroplane, having a welded steel tube fuselage. Maurice Farmans were very good aircraft and extensively used throughout the war for training, as a warplane, they were useful to begin with - examples served with 3 Sqn RNAS in the Aegean, but became obsolescent pretty quickly as a result of high drag and low performance in the face of more advanced machines becoming available.

[Peter Lewis]

Having taken in the latest live theatre performance of "All Our Sons" on the Maori involvement in WW1 at the Circa theatre on Friday night, we visited the two Wellington museum displays on the Sunday.

At the War Museum (ex-Dominion Museum) the first area gives an overview of the political and social backgound to the years 1914 - 18.
This is a permanent display that will remain in place for the next few years.

As discussed above, among the artifacts to be seen are the Maurice-Farman - rather badly placed for photography



and the Albatros wing, in the section devoted to the use of camoflague



As you can see. there are a few other paintings and photographs of aerial activity within the various dioramas.

The rear area of this museum is devoted to the New Zealand involvement in the war.
This display will change year by year. At this time, the year is 1915 and the display is pretty much all Gallipoli. As such, there is no aviation content.

Next year it will change to 1916, and there may be something regarding the aviation scene then or in later years.

We went on to Te Papa after lunch, and the emphasis there in the Great War display is mainly on the personal stories.

Well worth a wet day in Wellington to see both presentations.

[suthg]

Nice pics Peter - raining - but not WINDY?