The Sopwith Tabloid and Sopwith Schneider (floatplane) were British

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 ...

s, originally designed as sports aircraft and later adapted for military use. They were among the first successful types to be built by the Sopwith Aviation Company. The " Tabloid", so named because of its small size, caused a sensation when it made its first public appearance. A

floatplane A floatplane is a type of seaplane with one or more slender floats mounted under the fuselage to provide buoyancy. By contrast, a flying boat uses its fuselage for buoyancy. Either type of seaplane may also have landing gear suitable for land, ...

variant was prepared in under a month and entered for the 1914 Schneider Trophy race where it was piloted by Howard Pixton. This aircraft won the competition against minimal opposition.Bruce, 1996, p.1 Production orders for both types were placed by the military, and although a few Gnome Lambda-powered Tabloids saw limited service in the early war years, some Schneiders were still in Naval service four years later, at the end of the

First World War 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 ...

Design and development

The original Tabloid, which was first flown by Harry Hawker on 27 November 1913, was a two-seat single-bay biplane with a side-by-side seating, which was unusual at the time. The equal-span wings were staggered and used

wing warping Wing warping was an early system for lateral (roll) control of a fixed-wing aircraft or kite. The technique, used and patented by the Wright brothers, consisted of a system of pulleys and cables to twist the trailing edges of the wings in opposit ...

for lateral control. The rectangular-section

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 ...

was a conventional wire-braced wooden structure with the forward section covered in aluminium sheet and the remainder, aft of the cockpit, covered in fabric. The wings were also of wood, covered with fabric. The tail surfaces were of steel tubing, fabric-covered, and the undercarriage had a pair of forward-projecting skids in addition to the wheels. The most distinctive feature of the design was the engine cowling, which almost entirely covered the upper half of the engine. The prototype was powered by an Gnome Lambda rotary engine and in a trial flown by Harry Hawker at Farnborough the Tabloid reached and took only one minute to reach while carrying a passenger and enough fuel for 2 hours. A production order from the

War Office The War Office has referred to several British government organisations throughout history, all relating to the army. It was a department of the British Government responsible for the administration of the British Army between 1857 and 1964, at ...

for the

Royal Flying Corps The Royal Flying Corps (RFC) was the air arm of the British Army before and during the First World War until it merged with the Royal Naval Air Service on 1 April 1918 to form the Royal Air Force. During the early part of the war, the RFC sup ...

was placed early in 1914, and a total of 40 were built to this specification. However, the aircraft's speed made it an obvious candidate for entry to the Schneider Trophy competition. Sopwith Tabloid on floats which won the 1914 Schneider Race

Sopwith Tabloid on floats which won the 1914 Schneider Race

Accordingly, a floatplane adaptation was prepared, to be powered by a Gnome Monosoupape, which T.O.M. Sopwith personally collected from Paris. This was initially fitted with a single central float, but on its first taxiing trials with Howard Pixton at the controls the aircraft turned over as soon as the engine was started, and remained in the water for some hours before it could be retrieved. Great effort was made to make the waterlogged machine airworthy, and, lacking the time to prepare a new set of floats, the existing float was simply sawn in half down the middle and converted into a pair of floats. After a satisfactory test flight on 7 April the aircraft was shipped to Monaco, where the competition was to take place. The competition was won by Pixton.The race was technically a time trial as each contestant departed in their own time and was timed, rather than them racing directly against each other. Sopwith did not expect to win,Pixton, 2014, p.278 but all of the leading contenders dropped out from mechanical problems connected to their nearly universal use of a larger two row rotary engine theoretically developing to the Sopwith's 100, leaving the Sopwith to lap the only remaining contender in a FBA Type A

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 ...

even before it stopped to refuel.Pixton, 2014, p.285 Pixton completed his first circuit in around two thirds of the time taken by the FBA. One other competitor broke his prop without completing the race. It was the first British designed and built aircraft to win a major international contest.Pixton, 2014, p.297 Much was made of the British design, with a British made Integral propeller, and protected with British cellon dope in the British press.Pixton, 2014, p.287 Despite the other competitors dropping out, the Sopwith's speed, coupled with Pixton's flying skill, made for a convincing victory. The prizewinning variant was then known as the Sopwith Schneider. After completing the twenty-eight circuits required for the actual race, at an average speed of and suffering from a misfiring cylinder, he made additional laps to set a new world record for seaplanes.Bruce ''Flight'' 8 November 1957, pp. 734–735. The first order, for twelve "Schneider"

aircraft, was placed in November 1914 by the

Royal Naval Air Service The Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) was the air arm of the Royal Navy, under the direction of the Admiralty (United Kingdom), Admiralty's Air Department, and existed formally from 1 July 1914 to 1 April 1918, when it was merged with the British ...

.Bruce, 1996, p.3 Like the race winner, these were powered by the Monosoupape and differed only in minor detail from the racer - most noticeably in the redesigned tail float. Later production aircraft were fitted with ailerons in place of wing-warping, and were fitted with a Lewis gun firing upwards through an opening in the wing centre-section, and development would lead to the Sopwith Baby. In all 160 were built. No original Tabloids or Schneiders survive but full-size reproductions are displayed at the RAF Museum Hendon and Brooklands Museum and a full-scale replica kit is sold by Airdrome Aeroplanes for homebuilders.

Operational history

Single-seat variants of the Tabloid went into production in 1914 and 36 eventually entered service with the

and

(RNAS).Donald, 1997. p 849. Deployed to

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

at the outbreak of the

, Tabloids were used as fast

scouts Scouting or the Scout Movement is a youth social movement, movement which became popularly established in the first decade of the twentieth century. It follows the Scout method of informal education with an emphasis on practical outdoor activi ...

. Some naval aircraft were armed with a Lewis gun on the top wing, firing over the

propeller A propeller (often called a screw if on a ship or an airscrew if on an aircraft) is a device with a rotating hub and radiating blades that are set at a pitch to form a helical spiral which, when rotated, exerts linear thrust upon a working flu ...

arc. One other aircraft used a Lewis gun firing through the propeller arc with deflector wedges mounted on the propeller blades, but the Tabloid was also used as a

bomber A bomber is a military combat aircraft that utilizes air-to-ground weaponry to drop bombs, launch aerial torpedo, torpedoes, or deploy air-launched cruise missiles. There are two major classifications of bomber: strategic and tactical. Strateg ...

, when on 22 September 1914 Tabloids mounted the first raid by British aircraft on German soil; and in their most famous mission two RNAS Tabloids flying from

Antwerp Antwerp (; ; ) is a City status in Belgium, city and a Municipalities of Belgium, municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of Antwerp Province, and the third-largest city in Belgium by area at , after ...

on 8 October 1914 attacked the German

Zeppelin A Zeppelin is a type of rigid airship named after the German inventor Ferdinand von Zeppelin () who pioneered rigid airship development at the beginning of the 20th century. Zeppelin's notions were first formulated in 1874Eckener 1938, pp. 155� ...

sheds at

Cologne Cologne ( ; ; ) is the largest city of the States of Germany, German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with nearly 1.1 million inhabitants in the city pr ...

and

Düsseldorf Düsseldorf is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in the state after Cologne and the List of cities in Germany with more than 100,000 inhabitants, seventh-largest city ...

. The Cologne target was not located, the railway station being bombed instead, but the Zeppelin shed at Düsseldorf was struck by two bombs dropped from and Zeppelin ''Z IX'' destroyed.Bruce ''Flight'' 8 November 1957, p. 736. During 1915 attempts were made to use Schneiders to intercept Zeppelins over the

North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Denmark, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. A sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the Norwegian Se ...

, launching them from seaplane carriers including and , but these efforts were largely unsuccessful due to heavy seas either damaging the floats or making takeoff impossible entirely. On 6 August 1915 a Schneider took off from the aircraft carrier using a jettisonable dolly. A single Sopwith Schneider fighter seaplane was acquired by Captain Shiro Yamauchi, during an inspection tour of England, during 1915. While in

Imperial Japanese Navy The Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN; Kyūjitai: Shinjitai: ' 'Navy of the Greater Japanese Empire', or ''Nippon Kaigun'', 'Japanese Navy') was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1868 to 1945, Potsdam Declaration, when it was dissolved followin ...

service it was designated Yokosuka Navy Ha-go Small Seaplane.Mikesh, Robert and Shorzoe Abe. ''Japanese Aircraft 1910–1941''. London: Putnam, 1990.

Variants

;Tabloid: :Original wheeled version, two seater, 6 built ;Single-seater Tabloid: :Single-seat version for RFC and RNAS, 32+ built ;1914 Schneider Racer :Single-seater Tabloid equipped with floats, 1 or 2 built ;Schneider :Float equipped, production version of Schneider Racer for RNAS, 133 built ; Gordon Bennett Racer :Variant with the fuselage partially faired to a circular section, a smaller fin and rudder, conventional engine cowling and V strut undercarriage without skids. Maximum speed Taken into service by the Admiralty on the outbreak of war as Nos. 1214 and 1215. Two built.Lewis 1962, p.492. ;Lebed VII :Unlicensed copy of the design built by Lebed in Russia as a military reconnaissance aircraft ;Lebed VIII :As Lebed VII but with revised undercarriage ;Yokosuka Navy Ha-go Small Seaplane :A single Sopwith Schneider fighter seaplane operated by the IJN

Operators

; *

** No. 3 Squadron RFC *

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...

** No. 201 Squadron RAF ; * Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service ; * Imperial Russian Navy

Specifications (Production Schneider)

References

Citations

Notes

Bibliography

* Bruce, J.M.
The Sopwith Tabloid, Schneider and Baby: Historic Military Aircraft No.17, Part I
. ''

Flight Flight or flying is the motion (physics), motion of an Physical object, object through an atmosphere, or through the vacuum of Outer space, space, without contacting any planetary surface. This can be achieved by generating aerodynamic lift ass ...

''. 8 November 1957. pp. 733–736. Archived from th
original
on 20 May 2011. * Bruce, J.M.

. ''

''. 15 November 1957. pp. 765–766. Archived from th
original
on 20 May 2011. * Bruce, J.M

. ''

''. 22 November 1957. pp. 821–822. Archived from th
original
on 25 February 2015. * Bruce, J.M.

. ''

''. 29 November 1957. pp. 845–848. Archived from th
original
on 20 May 2011. * * * * * Lewis, Peter, ''British Aircraft 1809–1914''. London: Putnam, 1962. * * Robertson, Bruce. ''Sopwith – The Man and His Aircraft''. Letchwoworth, UK: Air Review, 1970. . * Thetford, Owen. ''British Naval Aircraft since 1912''. London:Putnam, Fourth edition, 1978. . *Mikesh, Robert and Shorzoe Abe. ''Japanese Aircraft 1910–1941''. London: Putnam, 1990. {{Authority control 1910s British sport aircraft Biplanes Tabloid Schneider Trophy Floatplanes Single-engined tractor aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1913 Rotary-engined aircraft 1910s British bomber aircraft