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Albatros Productions |
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Windsock DataFile 104 The Taube At War by P.M. Grosz |
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Reviewed By Orlando Reyes, #6399 |
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I have to admit that I always have had a soft spot for this aircraft. I was fascinated by this aircraft wing configuration and from the day I first saw a profile of the aircraft wanted to build one. Now that I have some working drawings, I may do so, although I know that at this time there are a couple of kits available on the market. Now, that you know how I feel about the aircraft, lets continue. This is the 104th Datafile by Windsock. It contains 40 pages, all of them packed with information. The front and back inside covers have five (5) color pictures. One of the pictures is from a 1911 aquatint postcard. The additional four (4) photos are from a restored Jeannin Taube A.180/14 currently located at the Deutsches Technik Museum in Berlin. This particular machine is one of the few known survivors from the original pre-World War II Deutsche Luftfahrt Sammlung, also in Berlin. The front cover has a beautiful color rendition by Russell Smith, while the rear cover has the side and top views of Rumpler Taube 4C as done by Bob Pearson. Between the covers you will find 102 pictures, a full set of drawings in both 1/72 and 1/48 scale, and two additional line drawings. The aircraft was designed by an industrialist and inventor named Igo Etrich. He based the Taube on the drawings made by Professor Friedrich R. Ahlborn of the leaf of the Zanonia macrocarpa plant. This particular plant is a climber from Java. This design made the aircraft very stable that it literally flew itself. It was superbly suited as a trainer, and in that score many future German pilots got their first experience of life in the air. Of course, by the time the war broke the design has been not changed or improved and thus it was obsolete less than five (5) years after been built. Nevertheless this aircraft was used in combat due to the great deal of losses of front line aircraft. It is interesting to note that 591 aircraft were built between 1911 and 1916. Also, there were 16 different manufacturers of this particular aircraft, the most prevalent being Rumpler (134); Jeannin (113), and Fokker (112). I found the booklet enjoyable, full of information and interesting. If you are interested in learning about a little known aircraft, I will recommend this book. Its period photographs, line drawings and scale drawings are good and informative. I would like to thank Windsock for the opportunity of allowing me to review the book and hope that they continue the good work.
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