German Air force TOE

[chimpchoker]

A friend and I are starting a campaign up and we are looking for information on which aircraft and their relative numerical proportions were serving in the german air service at around the start of the Michael offensive (march 1918).

Any help would be appreciated.

Chimpchoker

[Flying Officer Kyte]

Don't know if this helps but it may be a start.
April 1918 Fokker Dr1 171 Pfalz Dr1 9. Rumpler Rubild 45. Rumpler Rubild Mb 50.Halerstadt Cl11 & Cl 1V 342. Hanover CL11 249 CL111a 109. CL 111. 51. AEG. J1 66, J11 !5. J -. Albatros J1 33. J11 - Junkers J1. 25, AEG. N1 19. Sablatnig N1 -.
Rob.

[Dom S]

It's probably worth narrowing it down - in particular are you looking at an area with JagdGeschwader around or not...? If yes the Dr.I is going to be a major player, if not mainly Albatross and Pfalz types for the fighters. It's just too early for the D.VII - the first prototypes were just coming off the lines, but not up at the front for evaluation yet. In terms of 2-seaters, just about every Schlasta available was thrown into the offensive, so swarms of CL types in ground support, with lesser numbers of C types in the traditional spotting, recce etc. roles.

[chimpchoker]

I think what he has in mind is to randomly roll which aircraft you have to fly, so Robs list of aircraft numbers is probably what we need.

This all started because I found a list of RAF squadrons, what they flew and where they were based.

[Dom S]

I think you still need to make a geographical decision then - at the time of the Michael offensive there were 79 Jastas, but only about half of them were involved in related operations, including most of the more modern fighters, so simply tallying up the numbers in service will give a wrong impression, since many of the more obsolete aircraft were kept well away, while almost all of the Dr.I Jastas were involved, for instance.

The lack of homogeneity within Jastas makes life much more complicated than for the Brits, where squadrons rarely had more than one aircraft, and then usually only for a month or so as they transitioned between types. That said, painting with a broad brush, the Dr.I was at its peak, while the D.V was the backbone of the Jasta strength, with the Albatross and Pfalz D.IIIs both remaining of some significance. (The Pfalz's persistence owed a lot to politics - Pfalz was the only major Bavarian manufacturer, so Bavarian Jastas pretty much got their machines by default. That said the real biggy was the doubling of the Jastas from 40 to 80 from September 1917 - 100% increase meant taking up whatever aircraft could be produced, even if they weren't cutting-edge....)