Wednesday 4 October 2017

Amiot 150

The Amiot 150BE was an hydroplane designed to perform bombardment and reconnaissance mission (hence the BE that stands for "Bombardement Exploration"). The prototype, that was an hybrid between an Amiot 142 and 143, it had the nose turret of the 142 as well as the open dorsal turret but it was powered by the same Gnome & Rhône 14K radial engines of the Amiot 143 delivering each of them 740hp of power and it was also armed with the same MAC 1934 machine guns in the  nose, dorsal and two in the ventral posts.
The prototype flew for the first time in Cherbourg on 18th September 1937 with the single tail of the Amiot 143 and the floaters that made it, obviously, a seaplane. Due to the floaters, the maneouvrability was vastly reduced, and, looking for a way to improve it, it was decided to modify the tail and make it double. The modified twin-tailed prototype, flew for the first time on 3rd June 1939 but due to a hard landing it was heavily damaged and any further development was abandoned.










Sources:
1. https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiot_143 (translated)
2. http://www.airwar.ru/enc/bww1/a150.html (translated)

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