Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.5

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Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.5

Type	fighter
Manufacturer	various
Designed by	Henry Folland/ J. Kenworthy
Maiden flight	22 November 1916
Primary user	RFC

The Royal Aircraft Factory S.E.5 was a British biplane fighter aircraft of the First World War. Although the first examples reached the Western Front before the Sopwith Camel, and it had a much better overall performance, problems with its Hispano-Suiza engine meant that there was a chronic shortage of S.E.5s until well into 1918 and fewer squadrons were equipped with the type than with the Sopwith fighter. Together with the Camel, the S.E.5 was instrumental in regaining allied air superiority in the summer of 1917 - and maintaining this for the rest of the war - ensuring there was no repetition of "Bloody April" 1917, when losses in the R.F.C. were much heavier than in the German Air Service.

1 Design and development
2 Operational history
3 Operators
4 Specifications (S.E.5a)
5 Operators
6 Related content

[edit] Design and development

The S.E.5 (Scout Experimental 5) was designed by Henry P. Folland and J. Kenworthy of the Royal Aircraft Factory in Farnborough. It was built around the new 150-hp (112 kW) Hispano-Suiza 8a V8 engine which, while it provided excellent performance, was under-developed and unreliable. The first of three prototypes flew on 22 November 1916. The first two prototypes were lost in crashes due to a weakness in their wing design - the third underwent modification before production commenced - the S.E.5 was known in service as an exceptionally strong aircraft which could be dived at very high speed, so these changes were certainly effective.

Only 77 original S.E.5s were built before production settled on the improved S.E.5a model. In total 5,205 S.E.5s were built by six manufacturers including Austin Motors and Vickers. A few were converted as two-seat trainers and there were plans for Curtiss to build 1,000 S.E.5s in the United States but only one was completed before the end of the war. At first airframe construction outstripped the very limited supply of French built Hispano-Suiza engines, and squadrons earmarked to receive the new fighter had to soldier on with Airco D.H.5s and Nieuport 24s until early 1918.

A squadron of S.E.5s.

The introduction of the 200-hp (149 kW) Hispano-Suiza or Wolseley Viper (a high-compression version of the Hispano-Suiza made under license by the Wolseley Motor Company) resolved the S.E.5a's engine problems, and was adopted as the standard powerplant.

Like the other significant Royal Aircraft Factory aircraft of the war (B.E.2, F.E.2 and R.E.8) the S.E.5 was inherently stable, making it an excellent gunnery platform, but it was also quite manoeverable. It was one of the fastest aircraft of the war, at 138 mph (222 km/h) equal at least in speed to the SPAD S.XIII, and faster than any standard German type of the period. The S.E.5 was not quite such a good dog fighter as the Camel - lacking the Camel's razor sharp agility, but was a benign aircraft that did not bite novice pilots the way the Camel was known to.

Albert Ball in the cockpit of his S.E.5a

SE5 - Australian War Memorial

The S.E.5 had only one synchronised .303-in Vickers machine gun to the Camel's two. However it did have a wing-mounted Lewis gun on a Foster mounting, which enabled the pilot to fire at an enemy aircraft from below, as well as forward. This was much appreciated by the pilots of the first S.E.5 squadrons, as the new "C.C." synchronising gear for the Vickers was unreliable at first. The Vickers gun was mounted on the left side of the fuselage with the breech inside the cockpit. The cockpit was set amidships, making it difficult to see over the long front fuselage, but otherwise visibility was good. Perhaps its greatest advantage over the Camel was its superior performance at altitude - so that (unlike most allied fighters) it was not outclassed by the Fokker D.VII when that fine German fighter arrived at the front.

[edit] Operational history

The S.E.5 entered service with No. 56 Squadron RFC in March 1917 although the squadron did not deploy to the Western Front until the following month, flying its first patrol with the S.E.5 on 22 April. The S.E.5a entered service in June 1917. At this time 56 squadron was still the only unit flying the new fighter, in fact it was the only unit to use the initial 150 hp S.E.5 - all other S.E.5 sqadrons used the 200 hp S.E.5a from the outset.

In spite of the initial very slow build up of new S.E.5a squadrons, due to a chronic shortage of the type, by the end of the war the S.E.5 equipped 21 British Empire squadrons as well as two U.S. squadrons. Many of the top Allied aces flew the S.E.5 including Billy Bishop, Edward Mannock and James McCudden. Legendary British ace Albert Ball was initially disparaging of the S.E.5 but in the end claimed 17 of his 44 victories flying it. McCudden wrote of the S.E.5 "It was very fine to be in a machine that was faster than the Huns, and to know that one could run away just as things got too hot." In particular this fighter could be dived at very high speed without fear of breaking up.

Sholto Douglas, who commanded No. 84 Squadron RFC which was initially equipped with the S.E.5a, listed the plane's qualities as: