Talk:Sopwith Camel/Archive 2

Camel as a "ground-attack" aircraft
All RFC/RAF single seater "scouts" were used as "trench straffers" during both British and German offensives - the Camel certainly being no exception. This was certainly not confined to "near the end of the conflict". The "germ of truth" in the last sentence of the lead is that this was a duty that tended to go especially to obsolete types and that the Camel WAS obsolete by the end of the war - comparing poorly with the Fokker D.VII and other late war German types. Any way to put all this into one clear, neat, succinct and NPOV sentence? --Soundofmusicals (talk) 23:12, 15 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Large scale, organised use of single-seat fighters for strafing by the RFC seems to have started at the Battle of Amiens in August 1917, when DH.5s were used, with Camels being used at the Battle of Cambrai in November that year. Losses of both types were very high - an average of 30% attrition per day of operations on close support missions - see Sopwith Salamander for references.Nigel Ish (talk) 17:40, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Change to reference format
Why has the reference and citation format for this article been completely changed? This change has made the citations much less clear and has completely mangled the references to the J. M. Bruce Flight articles. Please provide some justification to these changes, which appear to go against WP:RETAIN.Nigel Ish (talk) 07:27, 16 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Same Anon has been about in other articles, changing to suit his/her style. Moved back. FWiW Bzuk (talk) 13:24, 16 June 2012 (UTC).
 * The ip has reverted, reinstating all the sfn and citation templates - I've left a note on their talk page.Hopefully they will self revert and discuss it here.Nigel Ish (talk) 08:54, 17 June 2012 (UTC)


 * I reverted the change before I saw this discussion but the IPs have been challenged a few times so they still needs to gain a consensus for the changes. MilborneOne (talk) 10:45, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Wing span
I changed the wing span back to 28 ft 0 in after checking with the cited reference (i.e. Quest for Performance) and other sources. It was changed to 26 ft 11 in (which is the correct value for the 2F1 Ships Camel here in 2006, and was not spotted.Nigel Ish (talk) 18:14, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

LEGO Sopwith Camel
I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, but I think that under, "Notable appearances in media," it should be mentioned that there have been three LEGO incarnations of this plane, the 10226 Sopwith Camel, released in September 2012, the 3451 Sopwith Camel in 2001, and the 40049 Mini Sopwith Camel, also released in September of 2012. 10226 also had moving wing flaps connected to a joystick that moved like the real thing. --ThePlaneFan (talk) 23:02, 15 February 2013 (UTC)ThePlaneFan
 * I dont think models and toys based on the aircraft are notable enough to mention. MilborneOne (talk) 15:55, 16 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Actually they may be very eligible for inclusion in an article about LEGO - but not in this article. Would any other LEGO models be "notable" in a discussion of the real thing? Think about it. --Soundofmusicals (talk) 20:58, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Removal of cited content
"The Clerget engine was particularly sensitive to fuel mixture control and incorrect settings often caused the engine to choke and cut out during take-off. " This cited sentence, which can be verified to be an accurate summarisation of information stated by the cited work and author, has been removed under seemingly dubious reasoning. I fail to see how the Clerget engine being 'preferred' or being 'heavier' in any way contradicts the above; no evidence has presented for a conflicting point of view or to invalidate the above. Can a solid reason for writing the author off (an author that has been used to explicitly cite parts of this article for eight years) as incorrect? A failure for other authors not mentioning the fuel mixture issue, which is an assertion that has been made, could simply be a symptom of whatever selection of authors be used for that statement having simply not mentioned/covered the sub-topic in question, and may be more a statement of their lack of coverage than Bruce's lack of accuracy - which I don't think is a fair assumption to make upon him/his work in the absence of any contradicting statements from established authors. Kyteto (talk) 23:23, 12 October 2015 (UTC)


 * He is confusing it with the early Gnome rotaries, an error that has been repeated ad nauseum by many authors over the years, each parroting the errors they read. They early Gnomes lacked any sort of automatic mixture control, and hence was very sensitive and difficult to control, while the Clerget, did have an automatic mixture control. In a gasoline engine of any type, as you open the throttle, the mixture needs to be progressively leaned out - on the early rotaries, this meant adjusting the throttle, then the mixture, for every change in throttle setting, hence the need for the blip switch to kill the ignition on 1 3 5 7 or 9 cylinders, as those adjustments are prone to power loss at inopportune times. The Clerget's mixture control still needed to be adjusted but it was less likely to die during throttle changes.
 * A LOT of contemporary aircraft used this same engine and none are mentioned as having this problem, including aircraft that were every bit as maneuverable, so it can hardly be accurate that this one type's flaws can be blamed on the engine. If a reference is needed I will dig one up - IIRC the book on rotaries mentions it. As for the Clerget being preferred - I will find a reference for that too (probably in the datafile). The fundamental problem the Camel had, is they screwed up the weight and balance calculations and got the center of weight too far aft - a problem partially alleviated by the overweight Clerget, which, according to the RFC's own official reports was significantly heavier than its contemporaries, and delivered only the nominal HP (110 or 130), unlike its contemporaries which usually exceeded those numbers by a healthy margin. In most types the Clerget was an unpopular engine choice as its lower power and higher weight degraded the performance of the aircraft it was used in, but its weight helped make the Camel a little more manageable, hence the unusual preference. All of which comes from established authors.NiD.29 12:41, 13 October 2015 (UTC)


 * You might read up on rotary engines (our article is at least a start). The difference between a "normal" and a "mono" rotary is (to be a bit simplistic) that one had tricky air/fuel mixture control and the other had none whatsoever. Neither had anything resembling "automatic" adjustment. One can indeed speculate and surmise about why Camel pilots had particular problems with stalling engines (I have never seen anyone suggest that these problems were actually better or worse with the Clerget than with any of the other engines used) - perhaps they were simply too preoccupied with the notorious tendency to spin shortly after takeoff to manage the fiddle with the air control valve ("fine adjustment") that ALL pilots of rotary-engined aircraft needed to master? The Clerget was the most widely used engine in the Camel by the way, but this was at least a matter of availablity as anything else - the Bentley BR1 was "preferred" - in fact the RNAS, who had longstanding contractual preferences with Sopwith, were eventually able to standardise on the Bentley. Was the Bentley actually lighter, heavier, or roughly the same weight as the Clerget (look it up?) The main feature of the Camel was not that it was tail heavy (which it was - as was pretty standard, especially in a fighter) but that all the heavy parts (engine, guns, fuel tank, pilot) were even closer together than in (say) a contemporary Nieuport - making the relative position of the centre of gravity and the centre of pressure very unstable. This was not a "screw-up", but quite deliberate - although it made handling a Camel "tricky" it also made it very manoeuverable. Given the fact that most "beginner" Camel pilots were really still learning to fly when they started on operations the whole bit was probably a bit overdone, but it was not, as you imply, the result of incompetence or carelessness. Most Camel pilots did (provided they lived long enough) master the "beast", and in fact appreciated it. Not all Camel pilots even found it particularly difficult, if we are to believe their written accounts.


 * But all this is not really the point. We can speculate and surmise all we like, but the fact is that Bruce is still a reliable source if anyone is - even if his work is a little dated - and if we are going to directly contradict him we need to do so from a thorough background knowledge, and we also need to have things well cited from an equally good but more up-to-date source. While we need that background knowledge, to rely on it too much, and not to back it up properly, in the context of Wiki, is WP:OR, and very naughty. --Soundofmusicals (talk) 20:03, 14 October 2015 (UTC)


 * I have THE book on rotaries, Andrew Nahum's "The Rotary Aero Engine" published by HMSO (ISBN 0112904521) so I doubt the wikipedia page can add anything useful - indeed I am sure it is full of the same nonsense that has been parroted for decades and could probably do with a complete rewrite, but I am disinclined for the fight at the moment. To quote from page 44 to 45 - "By the middle of the war, however, some throttling was essential to allow aircraft to fly in formation, and the improved carborettors then in use would allow a power reduction of up to 25 percent. The pilot would close the air valve by the desired degree and then re-adjust the mixture." "An exception to this general control system was the Gnome mono." (due to its use of fixed inlet ports, much like a two stroke)
 * No OR as I have seen it all in print, I just have to find the references - digging as we speak. They should both be from either Over the Front and Cross and Cockade, which are far more reputable than old generalist hagiographies. As for the concentration of masses silliness, the Camel was nothing more than a Nieuport 17 with a second Vickers in place of the overwing Lewis, and a full chord bottom wing, yet the Nieuport shared none of the Camel's vices, was just as well known for its exceptional maneuverability, and had its masses just as concentrated, if not more so since the pilot didn't have fuel behind him - and all of the other matters still applied as the number of hours of experience was unlikely to have been much different. As for preferences - there were official preferences (the Clerget was problematic and the supply was dependent on the French who had their own priorities), and those of the pilots, which often didn't coincide, and I suspect the preference was Clerget over Le Rhone, which dry was 85 pounds lighter, and used less fuel and oil while the standardized Royal Aircraft Establishment tests showed the 110 Le Rhone produced almost as much power as the 130 Clerget (the ratings being purely nominal).NiD.29 02:56, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

Incomplete sentence needs editing
The last paragraph of the section on the Western Front consists of nothing but a sentence fragment; in this case, a subject without a predicate. I'd edit it myself, but I'm not sure if it needs more material added or, most likely, it simply needs to be restructured into a proper sentence. If somebody more familiar with the material would take a look at it, I'm sure it can be corrected fairly easily. JDZeff (talk) 00:50, 15 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Fixed.NiD.29 02:58, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

Difficult handling
Many sources - including all (that I can find) of the memoirs of pilots who actually flew the Camel - remark on the "trickiness" of the type, together with the fact that it could turn inside practically anything. Many of them contrast it with the Pup - e.g. Lee in No Parachute where he compares the Pup's "sensitivity" with the Camel's "razor sharp" response. We are perfectly entitled to find all this (and the reasons generally used to explain it) unconvincing - but the expression of personal opinions about the questions without clear citation (preferably from a contemporary source) is not on in an encyclopedia article.

In context (this is my OR and I am not suggesting for one moment that it can go into the article either) - handling characteristics of an aeroplane (or, for that matter, a car or a speedboat!) are pretty subjective, and rely very much on comparisons with what we are used to. Many WWI pilots - even quite successful ones - had been through abbreviated courses by instructors who didn't really know what they were doing. Essentially they were "self-taught". The fact seems to be that rotary engined aircraft in general did all kinds of strange things when you started to wriggle about - a "stationary" engined aircraft like the S.E.5 was praised for (in contrast) "going where it was pointed"! Thus the reportedly "delightful" handling of the Pup (for instance). One should always read "in comparison with other rotary engined fighters". Modern pilots flying replica or original examples of the Pup (for example) have stated that they have been less than "delighted", and found the tendency of the aircraft to do strange things in tight turns very disconcerting indeed.

Sadly - we have to go with our sources. It would indeed be nice to get to the 'real truth" which probably lurks somewhere - but we can't make it up. --Soundofmusicals (talk) 02:54, 19 March 2016 (UTC)

Official name
If the official name was actualy the F.1, that should be included in infobox as well as the first line in the lede.  Nyth 63  10:44, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
 * However that is only one of several official names as the Ship's Camel was the 2F.1.&#32;- NiD.29 (talk) 19:29, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Both "F.1" and "2F.1" are manufacturer's model numbers rather than "official names" in the later sense - at the time nobody called a Sopwith Camel anything but a Camel (or perhaps a Ship's Camel in the case of a 2F.1) anyway. The system of giving British service aircraft official names arose out of the often "unsuitable" nicknames they otherwise acquired. In any case, as NiD points out, both models are covered by this article - so we use the general inclusive term as the article title. --Soundofmusicals (talk) 23:13, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
 * The change was not in the article title.  Nyth 63  23:54, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
 * The official rigging drawings refer to it as either the Sopwith Biplane F.1 or Sopwith Biplane 2.F.1 - no mention of "Camel", which was an unofficial nickname arising supposedly from the fairing/hump over the guns - official names issued by the government came later. Sopwith factory drawings also refer to the design as the F.1 and 2F.1 (with different punctuation). Oddly no other types are listed on the list of types using most of the parts - perhaps only production types got added to the list. The exception is the drawing for the footstep, which lists all the late war production types (again no prototypes) and how many each needed - 2F.1 is still there but the F.1 was listed as Camel.&#32;- NiD.29 (talk) 01:40, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

2F.1 Prototype
The Air-Britain RN aircraft serials and units shows that the prototype 2F.1 was modified from a Sopwith FS.1 Baby (Improved) N5 built with a fixed landing gear. Dont seem to mention it anywhere anybody have anything else on this?. MilborneOne (talk) 18:16, 22 March 2016 (UTC)


 * I am gathering stuff for a rewrite of this article - there is a mention of the connection in Sopwith, the man and the aircraft Soundofmusicals (talk) 20:45, 22 March 2016 (UTC)


 * The 2F.1 Ships Camel or Split Camel had a completely different development history than the F.1 and much like the Nimrod and Fury it was a parallel development that arrived at almost the same point - it really should have its own page as it had its own distinct history. Windsock Datafile No 6 dealt exclusively with the 2F.1, and the Putnam Sopwith book has a section on it. There was a pair of (seemingly) unphotographed FS.1 "Sopwith Improved Baby" prototypes, N4 had floats (but was almost immediately wrecked), N5 had wheels, and there were significant differences from the F.1 - different span (26' 11" vs 28'), narrower center section, metal cabane struts, different dihedral, control lines were run outside the fuselage, the single Vickers and Lewis was standard, the split rear fuselage and numerous other details. The first prototypes even had the Lewis mounted inverted. &#32;- NiD.29 (talk) 02:24, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

Dihedral
I have just reverted a good faith edit adding a mention of the dihedral on the lower wing to the lead ("lede"). This is already described under "design and development". Note than this is a descriptive rather than a truly notable feature anyway - as most contemporary aircraft had some degree of dihedral. In any case it is not a matter that needs mention in the lead setcion. --Soundofmusicals (talk) 00:16, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

First with synchronised gun?
Patently not, I trow - although it was the first British type with more than one such weapon. --Soundofmusicals (talk) 04:08, 9 January 2017 (UTC)
 * No, there were many aircraft before the F.1 Camel to have a synchronised gun, one example is the Sopwith Pup. - ZLEA (talk) 15:26, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Re: "blipped throttle" comment
Quote: "If you watch any old World War I films, you can hear the sound of the engine going . . . Brrrappp! . . . Brrrappp! . . . Brrrappp!. . . when the aircraft comes in to land."

The problem with actual World War War I films as a reference source for what things sounded like back then, the state of the art for motion pictures was not advanced enough yet to include the actual sound at the time the motion picture was being filmed. Sound movies with actual sound of what was going on were being worked on at the time, but did not come into general use until some years later, commercial movies with sound for theaters first appeared in the early 1920s. Actual film footage taken during World War I, which now have sound and are in color, have had the sound added and have been colorized. Those are nice touches, but are not as they were originally filmed.

One more thing, back during that time period, the frame rate was usually 16 frames per second, not the later 24 frames per second. That is why films from back then are either jerky, or the motion is absurdly fast, 1.5 times as fast to be exact, since many movie projectors do not include the option of running at both 16 frames per second and 24 frames per second. Having the option to run very old movies at their correct 16 frames per second, they can be viewed as intended. Too bad films that included sound were not quite available yet back in the World War I era. Sound recordings as phonograph records do exist from back then, hundreds of thousands of them still survive, if not millions, and have been transferred to digital format. However, I have no idea how many recordings were made on the actual battlefields with battle in progress. Linstrum (talk) 05:22, 15 June 2023 (UTC) Linstrum