These used hybrid wood and metal structures.īy the 1915/16 timeframe, the German Luft-Fahrzeug-Gesellschaft firm had devised a fully monocoque all-wood structure with only a skeletal internal frame, using strips of plywood laboriously 'wrapped' in a diagonal fashion in up to four layers, around concrete male molds in 'left' and 'right' halves, known as Wickelrumpf (wrapped-body) construction - this first appeared on the 1916 LFG Roland C.II, and would later be licensed to Pfalz Flugzeugwerke for its D-series biplane fighters. Curtiss flying boats and the German/Austrian Taube monoplanes. Well known aircraft from that era include the Dutch designer Anthony Fokker's combat aircraft for the German Empire's Luftstreitkräfte, and U.S. Many early developments were spurred by military needs during World War I. In 1912 the Deperdussin Monocoque pioneered the light, strong and streamlined monocoque fuselage formed of thin plywood layers over a circular frame, achieving 210 km/h (130 mph). Modern airframe history began in the United States when a 1903 wood biplane made by Orville and Wilbur Wright showed the potential of fixed-wing designs.
Four types of airframe construction: (1) Truss with canvas, (2) Truss with corrugate plate, (3) Monocoque construction, (4) Semi-monocoque construction.
