The Ducrot SLD was an Italian fighter

prototype A prototype is an early sample, model, or release of a product built to test a concept or process. It is a term used in a variety of contexts, including semantics, design, electronics, and Software prototyping, software programming. A prototype ...

built by Ducrot in 1918.

Design and development

During the latter half of

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

Ing Ing, ING or ing may refer to: Art and media * '' ...ing'', a 2003 Korean film * i.n.g, a Taiwanese girl group * The Ing, a race of dark creatures in the 2004 video game '' Metroid Prime 2: Echoes'' * "Ing", the first song on The Roches' 199 ...

Manlio Stiavelli and Guido Luzzatti of the firm of Vittorio Ducrot at

Palermo Palermo ( ; ; , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan province. The ...

designed a high-performance fighter in an attempt to allow the company to progress from license production of

flying boat A flying boat is a type of seaplane with a hull, allowing it to land on water. It differs from a floatplane in having a fuselage that is purpose-designed for flotation, while floatplanes rely on fuselage-mounted floats for buoyancy. Though ...

s designed elsewhere to producer of originally designed aircraft. Emphasizing

aerodynamic Aerodynamics () is the study of the motion of atmosphere of Earth, air, particularly when affected by a solid object, such as an airplane wing. It involves topics covered in the field of fluid dynamics and its subfield of gas dynamics, and is an ...

cleanliness, they designed the SLD (for "Stiavelli-Luzzatti-Ducrot"), a single-seat

biplane A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While ...

fighter powered by the 149-

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(200-

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)

Hispano-Suiza Hispano-Suiza () is a Spanish automotive company. It was founded in 1904 by Marc Birkigt and as an automobile manufacturer and eventually had several factories in Spain and France that produced luxury cars, aircraft engines, trucks and weapons. ...

35 engine driving a two-bladed

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. It had a

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monocoque Monocoque ( ), also called structural skin, is a structural system in which loads are supported by an object's external skin, in a manner similar to an egg shell. The word ''monocoque'' is a French term for "single shell". First used for boats, ...

fuselage The fuselage (; from the French language, French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds Aircrew, crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an Aircraft engine, engine as wel ...

of oval section. The undercarriage struts extended through the lower

wing A wing is a type of fin that produces both Lift (force), lift and drag while moving through air. Wings are defined by two shape characteristics, an airfoil section and a planform (aeronautics), planform. Wing efficiency is expressed as lift-to-d ...

to carry the fuselage above the lower wing.

Operational history

Testing of the SLD began in October 1918, but its results have been lost. No production order from the ''

Corpo Aeronautico Militare The Italian Corpo Aeronautico Militare (Military Aviation Corps) was formed as part of the Regio Esercito (Royal Army) on 7 January 1915, incorporating the Aviators Flights Battalion (airplanes), the Specialists Battalion (airships) and the Ballon ...

'' (Italian Royal Air Force) ensued, and only one prototype was built.

Operators

; *

Specifications

Notes

References

* {{Portal bar, Italy, Companies, Aviation 1910s Italian fighter aircraft SLD Aircraft first flown in 1918