Good day all,
recently I've become obsessed with the Pfalz D.XII, the overshadowed stable mate of the Fokker D.VII, and I was reading a report by Rudolf Stark (see below) describing the aircraft as difficult to fly and how anybody would kick up a fuss when they had to fly it. However he also mentions that (like most Pfalz aircraft) it was an excellent high speed diver in fact it could dive faster then the Fokker, and I thought what if: we removed the of the normal dive card of the Q deck (as far as I gather this is the Pfalz's deck) and replace it with a dive similar to the A or N deck and this would give it that extra bonus of speed over the Fokker D.VII.
No one wanted to fly those Pfalzs except under compulsion, and those who had to made as much fuss as they could about practicing on them.
Later their pilots got on very well with them. They flew quite decently and could always keep pace with the Fokkers; in fact they dived even faster. But they were heavy for turns and fighting purposes, in which respect they were not to be compared with the Fokkers. The Fokker was a bloodstock animal that answered to the slightest movement of the hand and could almost guess the rider's will in advance. The Pfalz was a clumsy cart-horse that went heavy in the reins and obeyed nothing but the most brutal force.
Your thoughts?
Regards Alex
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