lfg

Great pic and very cool series !

The L.F.G.-Roland D.XVI here in its first version powered by a 160 hp Siemens Sh.II rotary engine driving a four-bladed propeller. A second sample of the L.F.G.-Roland D.XVI was fitted with a Goebel III rotary of 170 hp driving a two-bladed propeller. Sometimes the different machines are identified as D.XVI/1 (with the Siemens engine) and D.XVI/2 (with the Goebel engine). But these identities may have been dreamt up years after the event. A picture of the D.XVI with the Goebel engine can be found here

An Albatros C.I license built by Roland (the brandname of L.F.G.). This sample is C 643/15 of a series of 24 ordered in August 1915, serials C 640/15 - C 663/15. Given the marking on the side of the fuselage this was before the time that license built machines were marked after the serial in parentheses like C 643/15 (Rol). These further specifications were added sometime later.

LFG Roland D.VI b 6142/18

The 805th Aero Squadron was an Aero Repair Squadron formed on 23 November 1917. The German biplane is a L.F.G. Roland D.VIb with serial 6142/18. This machine was from a series of 50 machines ordered in September 1918 with the serials D 6100/18 - D 6149/18. This is a brand new machine which probably never saw action and was handed over according to the armistice terms. The collection of Corporal Richard M. Denbo is so interesting as it documents the enormous number of machines handed in according to these terms. This A.S.P.C. [Air Service Production Center] was one of the concentration points where machines were stored and eventually transported further to the USA or scrapped (or sold for scrap) in France.