Hanriot HD.1 - Italian users, part three

We couldn't finish the year without finishing the series of entries dedicated to this excellent French fighter, so here it is, the last entry for this airplane. Happy new year everyone!

The Hanriot HD.1 was supplied in small amounts to the Italians who liked the design so much that they started to manufacture it in large quantities and used them to replace not just the already aging Nieuport but also some SPADs S.VII.
They considered it to be the best fighter they had flown, being even better than the SPAD S.XIII becoming that way the standard Italian fighter. In fact 16 of a total of 18 squadrons were equipped with the Hanriot HD.1 by November 1918.

The Squadrons covered in this entry are:

• 70 Squadriglia
• 76 Squadriglia
• 78 Squadriglia

Hanriot HD.1 - Italian users, part two

We keep going with more Italian users for this fighter.

This time, we are covering the next squadrons:

• 70 Squadriglia
• 76 Squadriglia
• 78 Squadriglia
• 82 Squadriglia
• 85 Squadriglia

We know that some of them are repeated, but they were worth it because the paint schemes are different.

Adamoli-Cattani

Another entry, this time featuring a new Italian airplane .

Designed by Adamoli and Cattani (two Italian entrepeneurs) in 1918 it was intended to be the smallest practical biplane in the world fitted with the most powerful engine available back then, the 200hp LeRhône M.

They manage to design a conventional looking airplane, except for the hinged leading edges instead of the conventional ailerons, hence the lack of wires around the fuselage, except for those going from the vertical stabilizer to the horizontal stabilizers.
The Turinese Farina Coach building and Moncenisio offices completed the prototype.

Once the prototype was completed, the testing at the ground revealed that the engine, as it was installed, could only work at the 80% of it's capacity making it greatly underpowered. Testing continued until the end of the Great War when a new fighter aircraft wasn't needed no more.

Hanriot HD.1 - Italian users, part one

Merry Christmas!. We keep going with the Italian users for this fighter which, as we said previously, it was widely employed by the Italian Corpo Aeronautico Militare (Military Aeronautical Corps).

The fighter squadrons (Squadriglia) covered in this entry are:

• 70 Squadriglia
• 76 Squadriglia
• 78 Squadriglia
• 80 Squadriglia
• 81 Squadriglia
• 85 Squadriglia

We will write about the performance during the war later.

SPAD SA Series - Foreign Users

Today we bring you a new French airplane which, despite not being the best that France offered during the war, it achieved some renown when piloted by Russian hands.

The SPAD SA. was a tractor biplane of unorthodox design which, in order to achieve a forward firing airplane (don't forget that when this airplane was designed, neither France nor any of the entente countried had the synchronized machine gun technology) , placed a machine-gun equipped nacelle in front of the pilot placing the engine between the pilot and the gunner.

In foreign service it was offered to Italy, who rejected it and to Russia, where they received some field modifications like the replacement of skis instead of wheels. Although the Russian spectatives for this airplane were low (since the word spad in Russian means 'Slump' or 'Plummet') at least two crews achieved some success with this airplane. In november 1916 one aerial victory was claimed by the 2nd Lieutenant Vladimirovich and his gunner Bashinskiy.
It's also known that at least one served with the Bolsheviks during the Russian civil war before it was retired for being obsolete.

Ansaldo SVA - Floatplanes, Fourth Entry

We continue with the Ansaldo SVA, with it's penultimate entry dedicated to the floatplane sub-variants of the SVA.

The ISVA was the floatplane variant of the SVA.5. It was the ansaldo's response to the DTAM's (Aeronautical Command HQ) decision that the company should confine itself to build seaplanes. The idea was first conceived in February 1917 and by May, Ansaldo enlisted the Maggiore (Major) Alessandro Guidoni to design the floats.

It was first tested in Venice in December 1917 and it was soon followed by a second official series, which change the series name from ISVA to Am (which stands for Ansaldo marino - Naval Ansaldo) in January-February 1918. The naval pilots found it often to be heavy, and difficult to maneouvre both in the air and when taxiing on water.

Some of them served embarked in the seaplane tender Europa during 1918 for operational testing purposes.

A second batch of airplanes were made and these featured some floaters copied and modified from the Sopwith Baby, derived from the Ansaldo's experience in building the Baby under license. However it is not known if those exemplars performed better or not because there's not handling information about them.