The Macchi M.14 was an Italian
fighter of 1918 designed and manufactured by
Macchi. The M.14 was the first non-seaplane fighter Macchi produced, its previous fighter production having focused on
flying boat fighters.
[
]
Design and development
Alessandro Tonini designed the M.14, which was a single-seat wooden sesquiplane with Warren truss
Warren Errol Truss, (born 8 October 1948) is a former Australian politician who served as the 16th Deputy Prime Minister of Australia and Minister for Infrastructure and Regional Development in the Abbott Government and the Turnbull Governm ...
interplane bracing and armed with two fixed, forward-firing 7.7-millimeter
330px, Different lengths as in respect to the electromagnetic spectrum, measured by the metre and its derived scales. The microwave is between 1 meter to 1 millimeter.
The millimetre (American and British English spelling differences#-re, -er, ...
(0.303- inch) Vickers machine gun
The Vickers machine gun or Vickers gun is a water-cooled .303 British (7.7 mm) machine gun produced by Vickers Limited, originally for the British Army. The gun was operated by a three-man crew but typically required more men to move and o ...
s synchronized to fire through the propeller. It had fixed, tailskid landing gear
Landing gear is the undercarriage of an aircraft or spacecraft that is used for takeoff or landing. For aircraft it is generally needed for both. It was also formerly called ''alighting gear'' by some manufacturers, such as the Glenn L. Martin ...
, and its 82- kilowatt (110-horsepower
Horsepower (hp) is a unit of measurement of power, or the rate at which work is done, usually in reference to the output of engines or motors. There are many different standards and types of horsepower. Two common definitions used today are t ...
) Le Rhône 9J
The Le Rhône 9J is a nine-cylinder rotary aircraft engine produced in France by Gnome et Rhône. Also known as the Le Rhône 110 hp in a reference to its nominal power rating, the engine was fitted to a number of military aircraf ...
nine-cylinder rotary engine
The rotary engine is an early type of internal combustion engine, usually designed with an odd number of cylinders per row in a radial configuration. The engine's crankshaft remained stationary in operation, while the entire crankcase and its ...
drove a two-bladed tractor
A tractor is an engineering vehicle specifically designed to deliver a high tractive effort (or torque) at slow speeds, for the purposes of hauling a trailer or machinery such as that used in agriculture, mining or construction. Most commo ...
propeller.[
]
Operational history
Company testing of the M.14 prototype began in the spring of 1918. It was destroyed in June 1918, but Macchi then constructed 10 production aircraft, which underwent official evaluation at Guidonia Montecelio
Guidonia Montecelio (), commonly known as Guidonia, is a town and ''comune'' in the Metropolitan City of Rome Capital, Lazio, central Italy.
Geography
The municipality of Guidonia Montecelio, formed by the main towns of Guidonia and Montecelio, l ...
in 1919. Although no additional M.14s were ordered, the 10 aircraft saw service as advanced trainers
Sneakers (also called trainers, athletic shoes, tennis shoes, gym shoes, kicks, sport shoes, flats, running shoes, or runners) are shoes primarily designed for sports or other forms of physical exercise, but which are now also widely used fo ...
. At least one of them is known to have become a civilian aircraft with the civil registration I-BADG.[
]
Operators
;
* 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 Ballo ...
Specifications
See also
References
{{Portal bar, Italy, Companies, Aviation
1910s Italian fighter aircraft
M.14
Sesquiplanes
Aircraft first flown in 1918