Fokker E.V – D.VIII

The E.V/D.VIII became the last wartime fighter created by Reinhold Platz, Fokker’s prolific lead designer. Trials would show this to be a light and nimble fighter designed with a thick, cantilevered wing, steel-tube fuselage, powered with a rotary engine and equipped with two-synchronized Spandau machine guns. Production began despite the acute shortage of Castor oil, the lubricant used in rotary engines. 

Poor workmanship by a sub-contractor for the wings would almost immediately short-circuit the potential of this aircraft. Shortly after arriving at the front, two pilots suffered fatal wing failures in their E.V machines which grounded the model for months. With the wing construction issue rectified, the E.V was renamed the D.VIII and returned to the front just three weeks before the Armistice, too late to make an impact. Some 381 were built with a fraction of that number serving in front line units.

This is the second of four Fokker E.V/D.VIIIs that were built by Aerodrome pilot: Brian Coughlin. He has flown this aircraft in our shows since 1994. Its distinctive lozenge fabric and markings represent the earlier E.V version that flew with Jagdsta 6 in July-August of 1918. Powered with an original WW1 160 HP Gnome rotary engine, the E.V/D.VIII delivers a dramatic aerial performance in our Sunday airshows!

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