"Favourite Interwar Aircraft" Topic

What are aircraft you find quirky, and interesting – that just appeal to you for whatever reason or other…

I nominate my choices:

#1. I-16
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Looks like something from a pulp movie; has a quirky charm that appeals

#2. TB-3
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Fascinating range of uses. Has a real 'interwar' feel with monoplane wing but fixed landing gear and open gun mounts.

#3. CR42
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Perhaps the last, and ultimate of the biplane fighters.

I have a soft spot for the gull-wing PZL-11, and another chubster, the B339 Buffalo (technically more a WW2 design) which did so well in Finland.

The super sexy Hawker Fury.

One of my favorites, just slipping in under the wire:
clipperflyingboats.com

I like a lot of them. Especially the ones with mixed nose armament(e.g., one .30 and one .50). I also like the fictional Crimson Skies models.

The Mohawk is my favorite, I-16 a close second

1.
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I've always had a soft spot for the Hs 123 & the Wellesley.

Assorted French bombers. So ugly they fascinate me – and the French are supposed to have style!

I kinda like the P-26 and the He-51. Then again I always thought it would be cool to put guns on the BEEGEE

Boeing F4B-4 / P-12

Grumman F3F-1

Curtiss F11C Goshawk

Mike

P-26

Glouster Gladiator

The Polish PZLs are neat and definitely have the underdog factor.

The Japanese also put some pretty cool biplanes into service in the 30s.

I like the Martin B-10. They have one at the US Air Force Museum in Dayton.

Curtiss P-36

Armstrong Whitworth Siskin, mostly because I won a model making competition with one when I was 14

Handley Page Heyford, biplane bomber where the fuselage connects with the upper wing, and the undercarriage and bomb bay are on the lower wing.

Boulton-Paul Overstrand.

A Lewis gun in a power-operated turret, how high-tech can you get?

All the best,

John.

[T]he B339 Buffalo

The OP must mean the much-maligned F2A, as originally designated and purchased for the USN…

I always liked the look of the Avia B-534, as I think they could have given the German biplane fighters a run for their Reichsmarks.

Curtiss P-6E, link

Sharpest biplane that I ever saw. Still my favorite at the USAF Museum.

Fairey Fox

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I love all the "ultimate biplanes".

Biplanes peaked in technology ~1936. So there are so many super fast (better than many monoplanes of the same period! super sleak or super chunky planes.

Hawker Hart, Hawker Demon, Hawker Hind, Gloster Gladiator (it has an enclosed cockpit ! The luxury !!).

Fairey Flycatcher
Fairy Firefly
Fairy Fox
Fiat Cr 42
Hawker Fury
Hawker Osprey

Much as I love planes like the spitfire aviation didn't get this exciting again until the advent of the jet engine, 1945-1960 sees the same race to work out what a jet plane should be like. then they work it out. then it gets boring again.

Much as I love planes like the spitfire aviation didn't get this exciting again until the advent of the jet engine…race to work out what a jet plane should be like. then they work it out. then it gets boring again.

Agreed: transitional periods are the most interesting.

Hawker Hart, the Siskin and the CR-32, the sexy version of a CR-42. In the unlovely but damned fine anyway, I'd go for the Gloster Gamecock and the Bolton Paul Overstrand.

Another vote for the gull-winged PZLs

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Hawker Hart, Hind, and Fury – and all very definitely finished in silver!

Love em all. Im trying to put together a set of 1930s aircraft for a hypothetical conflict between the US and Japan. Surprisingly most of the aircraft I have found are 1/700. I think the 20s and 30s are the most interesting period in aviation.

My favorites are probably the Boeing B9 and the Gloster fighters of the period.

Curtiss Hawk III hands down.

Ki 27 or early Bf 109s for the Axis
Gladiator or Buffalo for the Allies

I find this period interesting for the same reason I find the 1946-50 period interesting… coming to the limit of certain designs, be it biplanes or props.

P 26
Seversky P35
Brewster Buffalo
B10
I153
PZL11
Amiot 143

DH 60
DH 82
Gladiator
Brewster Buffalo
Fairey Firefly
Fairey Seal
Fairey Swordfish

The Hawker family (not so much with radial engines) were all pretty little things, and the Bulldog was a looker too.

Hughes H-1, GeeBee, Lockheed Electra, Weddel Williams Special, Laird Bi-plane. Curtiss Sparrowhawk, my god the list goes on for miles.

Laird Super Solution racer and Curtiss Sparrowhawk. They're cool and unusual.

K

The power-operated Lewis Overstrand was a goodie!

The Martin B-10 always makes me laugh when I look at it – has a certain 'charm'

The Sparrowhawk is also being added to my list….

Lots of great planes! Now to look at the other cool/weird era – the early jets…

Goodness gracious, is there room enough?
I also must include aircraft that were designed and flown in the InterWar, but also had important conributions later.

For me, the list should include:
Douglas DC-2
Douglas DC-3
Boeing 314
Boeing 247
Boeing 80
Martin 130
Sikorsky 42
Sikorsky 38
Ford/Stout 4-AT
Ford 5-AT
Lockheed 14
Lockheed Orion
Vultee 1
Curtiss 32
Northrup A/G/D
Stinson 6000

Laird Super Solution
Wedell-Williams
Travdel Air Mystery Ship
Curtiss R3C-2
Gee-Bee (sort of){two of my all-time favorite pilots raced this aircraft type and survived: Cochran & Doolittle}
Curtiss-Cox Cactus Kitten

Curtiss Sparrowhawk
Boeing Peashooter
Curtiss Shrike
Curtiss P-6 Hawk
Lockheed Model 1937-608 (Yeah for Kelly Johnson!)
Seversky P-35 (Cochran won the Bendix in a developmental racer version of this in '38)

Akron-class

Granted, there were some good foreign jobs too:
Junkers 52
Junkers 38
Henschel 123
Short Sunderland
Short Empire
deHavilland Comet
deHavilland Dragon Rapide
SIAI-Marchetti 55
Macchi 39
Fokker 34
Polikarpov 15
Polikarpov 16
ICAR 36
LZ-127
LZ-129
LZ-130

And those are only to name a few of the airccraft I like of those designed and flown in the InterWar period.

Airacuda, hands down.

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-Kle.

Wow, never saw the Airacuda before. That's…. unique.

Got to be the Gladiator

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First attempt at uploading a pic! Also first pic with my new digital camera. It can only get better:-)

I'm showing off – even old wrinklies can do this stuff!!

Bill

Many already mentioned, of course.

I'm also fond of the early US bombers like the MB-2 and the Keystone series.

For me it is the P26

The UB-14 of course

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Belatedly The Kawasaki Ki 10 Perry. IMHO the most beautiful airplane ever made.

Any USN biplane in yellow wings and colored tails.

Personal favorites have always been the French aircraft from the 30's:

Amiot 350

Breguet 690

Loire-Nieuport 411

Potez 63

The Loire-Nieuport 411 is a very interesting design, I've never seen that aircraft before. Thanks.

Keystone bomber:
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Hi

In M&M I have actually flown missions in the Potez and the Amiot!

Rocky

The Farman F-222/1

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Does the Boulton Paul Defiant count? If not then teh Supermarine Walrus!

The Whitley ~ so graceful and elegant.

F3F

If pressed, my vote goes to the Sparrowhawk, but since it hasn't been mentioned yet, I also submit the Skyrocket:

Wow. Where does one begin?! In no particular order:

Dewoitine 510. That 20mm cannon – what fun!

Avia B-534. Four (4) synchronized machine guns, an enclosed cockpit, and a sleek inline engine fuselage on a fixed (spatted) landing gear *biplane?* Heart be still! It's like a refugee from some bizzare anime film!

Hawker Fury/Hart/et al. Simply gorgeous lines on this family of inline engined British biplanes. Like some hot Brit gal and her sisters and cousins, and they're *all* good lookin'!

Fiat CR 32. Like a Ferrari or Lamborghini with biplane wings and a blown engine.

Polikarpov I-15. Four machine guns and a stubby look, this little Russian biplane fighter is like a flying Pug dog with a Pit Bull's bite.

Curtiss A-12 Shrike. A real clunky-looking dedicated ground atack fighter whose only actual combat success was when pressed into action over China as a two-seater *fighter.* The Shrike packed four machine guns firing forward, plus the gunner's single weapon. The plane turned out to be more successful as a heavy fighter rather than as a ground attack aircraft; when the Chinese switched them to their intended role, losses soon mounted (predictably for a level-flight ground 1930s technology aircraft IMHO), and the few survivors wound up being withdrawn for use as trainers.

Bloch MB 200. Ye stars and little comets! It's a Flying Boxcar!

Savoia-Marchetti S.55 flying boats:

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The design of these flying Venetian gondolas speaks for themselves.

Leland R. Erickson

I love the 1930's aircraft! My Imaginary Air Force:

Suitably Evil Looking Heavy Bombers (that will of course Always Get Through):

Junkers 86 link

Bolkhovitinov DB-A link

Definitely the French Uglies: link

Barling Bomber link

Light Bombers/Ground attack:

- Breguet 693
- Aichi series of dive bombers – very pretty

Fighters

- Gull winged PZLs
- Brewster Buffalo "flying dustbin"
- The Westlnad Whirlwind was a contemporary of the Hurricane & spit link

Liaison:

- Those gorgeous de Havilland planes (Dragon etc)
- the plug ugly