Shipbucket

Unfulfilled dreams - East German airliner designs

For a time being in the late 1950's East Germany attempted to build airliners itself. Basis for these plans was design bureau from the former Junkers factory in Dessau, that in 1945 was captured and transported (together with all factory equipment) to Soviet Union and forced to participate in Soviet aerospace research activities. One of the Junkers' design teams, headed by dr. Brunolf Baade created designs of the jet bombers that led to building of the "150" airplane (also called Alekseyev 150), first flown in 1952. In the 1955 German engineers were allowed to return to their homeland - namely to its eastern part, and begun work in VEB Flugzeugwerke Dresden (Dresden Aircraft Works - VEB stands for Volkseigener Betrieb - Publicly Owned Operation) which already produced Ilyushin 14 transport planes under license.

First flight of the new aircraft, named "152" took place on 4 december 1958, but already on 4 march 1959 it crashed, killing the entire crew. Flight testing were continued on the second flying prototype, that however had different undercarriage configuration - instead of the main gear in the centerline and outriggers in wingtips (similar to that used on B-47 or Harrier) it had conventional landing gear with front wheel and main gear housed together with engines, and was also slightly longer. Production of the 20 series aircraft was already underway when in 1961 East German government, due to Soviet pressure, cancelled all aircraft design activities.





"152" wasn't the only airliner designed by the design team of the Dresden factory. Already in Soviet Union they begun preliminary works on several turboprop airliners of slightly different sizes and configurations (two- and four-engined), named "153", "154" and "155". These designs were further developed after the return of designers to GDR in 1955, but proceeded no further.





Shortly after work begun on more refined designs. First of them, "153A" of 1956 was twin engined turboprop, followed in 1959 by relatively small, but four-engined jet "154A" and in 1960 by small twin-jet "155A". They too didn't progress too far (although it seems that their full-scale mock-ups were built) due to cancellation of design work in 1961.





These weren't the only planes designed in that factory - among other projects were "160" - four engined passenger jet with engines located in two pairs on the lower part of fuselage (in front and behind wings), SP-022 small twin-jet with engines above wings (similar to VFW-614), twin-engined agricultural utility plane SP-043 Flora of 1960, as well as several small planes for use by aero-clubs as trainers, glider tugs etc.



VEB Flugzeugwerke Dresden after ending of the Il-14 manufacturing and cancellation of "152" become maintenance centre for the East German and Soviet aviation, and after the reunification of Germany it was taken over by Daimler-Chrysler Aerospace (DASA) and after it's merger into EADS is now EADS Elbe Flugzeugwerke GmbH.

Main sources:
http://www.flugzeug-lorenz.de/index.php?id=45
http://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/i ... 0/all.html

General note: various (internet) sources differed significantly regarding the quantity of airplanes operated by the East German airlines, therefore I decided to follow the source that was giving most details - if it was wrong - then I'm sorry.

Note on registration markings: initially German Democratic Republic was using DDR- registrations, in 1956 they were changed to DM- and in 1981 again to DDR-.

THE END
(although there may be some postscripts )

And btw. Folks - Polish Wings thread is still going on, currently under leadership of Rhade who's working hard with it, so please, add Your comments there too - they will be greatly appreciated!

http://www.shipbucket.com/forums/viewto ... 819#p91819

I'm just
Congratulation for all you extraordinary work.

Best regards.

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Je pardonne à tous ceux qui m'ont offensé... mais je garde la liste!


Worklist, FD scale submarines and ships :
- Project 971 "Akula" (80%)
- Project 705 "Alpha" (10%)
- Project 371 (70%)
- Project 1459 (30%)
- Projekt 151 Sassnitz (To be redone)

It's an marvelous thread, I was allways looking to new designs, i aplaude your chef d oeuvre and hope to see more in the future, perhaps the Belgian defunct airliner SABENA if you have time that is and i don't want to harass you or so, just thinking out loud

amazing thread Eswube!

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My Worklist
Sources and documentations are the most welcome.

-Koko Kyouwakoku (Republic of Koko)
-Koko's carrier-based aircrafts of WWII
-Koko Kaiun Yuso Kaisha - KoKaYu Line (Koko AU spinoff)
-Koko - Civil Aviation

Thank you Eswube for this thread. It has been a joyfull journey

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Work in progress:
DD County Class PNS Babur (1982)(PAK)
FF Type 21 Class D182 PNS Babur (2000)(PAK)
All relevant Coat of Arms

You've outdone yourself Eswube!!

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Republic of Lisenia AU - In progress
Republic of Lisenia in FD Scale - In progress

So, would the passengers have been able to see out of the glass nose or would that have been a crew compartment of some sort?

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“Close” only counts with horseshoes, hand grenades, and tactical nuclear weapons.
That which does not kill me has made a grave tactical error

Worklist

Source Materiel is always welcome.

Crew compartment, primarily navigation, if it's anything like the Soviet birds.

Thank You all for Your kind comments and for the time You spent on watching this thread.

@Schepper911
I'm afraid I'm not planning to do SABENA. First of all I'm already busy with other things, secondly it's matter of access to necessary sources.

@Thiel, Klagldsf
These glazed noses aren't for passengers enjoyment, but are indeed housing navigator's seat.

eswube, you have surpassed yourself here. I wondered whether you would draw these and you have! They all look great and seeing them in airliner colours has really brought these to life.

The 155A with its odd jet-engine arrangement reminds me of the later jet-powered Avro 748 concepts of the 1960s, and also of the Aviation Traders Accountant. It's hard to say for certain, but externally these look ever bit as equal as western and Soviet efforts but of course Soviet engines and avionics would be used. If the USSR refused to export these items to the GDR then any hopes they had would have been dashed. Given later E.German-Polish technical co-operation its not hard to imagine these appearing in LOT colours in an AU!

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Hood's Worklist
English Electric Canberra FD
Interwar RN Capital Ships
Super-Darings
Never-Were British Aircraft