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Photo: Robert Deering 9/3/2011 Museum of Flight King County International Airport (BFI) Seattle, Washington |
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Some pilots called it, "the perfect plane." The Pup was light, basic, and simply simple. "They were tiny little things," says a British pilot, "just big enough for one man and a machine gun." The machine gun was key -- a trusty Vickers gun equipped with a hydraulic synchronizing gear which allowed it to fire through the propeller. With a good weapon and not much else, it was said that, "a Pup could turn twice to an Albatros' once" -- an invaluable trait in a chaotic dogfight. At a time when other Allied aircraft were suffering terrible losses, German flyers would try to avoid getting into a scrap with a Pup.
The Museum of Flight's aircraft was built by Carl Swanson of Darien, Wisconsin and is considered to be a masterpiece of replication. It is virtually indistinguishable from the original aircraft -- right down to the Le Rhône 9D, 80-horsepower rotary engine and .303-inch Vickers machine gun. |
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Photo: Robert Deering 7/21/2018 Frontiers of Flight Museum Love Field (DAL) Dallas, Texas |
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