Saturday 2 January 2021

Morane-Saulnier Ms.406, Swiss Users

 
The Morane-Saulnier Ms.406 is a French fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by Morane-Saulnier from 1938 onwards. With more than 1.000 exemplars manufactured, it was exported to many countries, among them, Switzerland.
In 1938, Switzerland bought a manufacturing license for the Ms.406. Two Ms.406H (the letter 'H' in this case stands for 'Helvétique', the gentilic word in French for 'Swiss') were supplied to the Swiss in September 1938 and April 1939 to serve as a pattern for the D.3800 (the name given to the Swiss-made Ms.406). Both this and the Ms.406H held the wing design of the earlier Ms.405, but were powered by the Hispano-Suiza 12Y-31 engine, which was the same one that powered the regular variants of the Ms.406. 
Eight pre-series machines were completed at Eidgenoessische Konstruktionswerkstaette (more commonly known as EKW) with the engines built at Adolph Saurer AG driving a new type of fully adjustable propeller. The original French instruments were replaced with Swiss versions and the drum-feed MAC machine guns were also replaced with locally designed and built belt-fed guns which eliminated the bulges present in the French versions and avoiding the freezing problems present in the French guns. The first EKW D.3800 was completed in November 1939 and those eight pre-production models, were followed by a production order of further 74 aircraft, which by 29th August 1940, were all delivered. In 1942 two additional machines were assembles from spare parts set aside in the original production run. 
During 1944 and 1945 the Swiss managed to shot down various German and Allied bombers that had entered Swiss airspace. By this time, the surviving aircraft were modified with new cooling and hydraulic installations and were also fitted with ejector exhausts. These modifications raised the type to the EKW D.3801 which was, esthetically, identical except for the engine set. At the end of the war the remaining aircraft were used as advanced trainers until the last one was scrapped in 1954.










Sources:
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morane-Saulnier_M.S.406#Swiss_variants
2. https://www.valka.cz/EKW-D-3800-t167652
3. Salamander Books - The Complete Book of Fighters

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