Planes worth modeling

Model Airplane News, May 2000 by Cozine, Geoff

3-View Documentation for Scale Modelers

In 1935, a call went out from the German government for a plane that could take off and land in highly restricted spaces. This call was answered by Gerhard Fieseler and his chief designer, Reinhold Mewes. Their design-the Fi.156C-fit the German Air Ministry's request perfectly.

Takeoff speed could be reached within around 75 feet, and the Storch climbed at an incredibly steep angle, so confined spaces were no problem. In addition, the Fowler flaps, which increased the Storch's wing area by 18 percent when fully deployed, and the flaperons, which deployed when the flaps were extended past 20 degrees, gave this craft the ability to land in a space less than 100 feet long. The Storch's inverted V-8 engine afforded the pilot great visibility (he could see the wheels from inside the cockpit), so obstacles could be dodged to a certain extent, and if a rut was hit or a landing was extraordinarily rough, shock absorbers on the landing gear took the brunt of the blow.

Because it could operate with so little landing space and was able to fly so slowly, the Storch was used for staff transportation, short-range reconnaissance and other generalpurpose duties. A Storch was responsible for rescuing Benito Mussolini, who was being held captive in a hotel at the top of the almost inaccessible peak of the Gran Sasso Massif in the Abruzzi Malise. It was also a Storch that delivered General Ritter von Greim to Berlin in the last hours of the War so that Hitler could make him the head of the Luftwaffe after Goring's dismissal. Still, the Storch rarely found the glory it deserved and was usually saddled with laborious general tasks, although Morane-Saulnier, the plant in occupied France responsible for making it, continued to do so after the War's end.

Even though it is not well-known, the Fi-156C Storch is truly a great aircraft worth modeling attention. Although it mostly served as a "grunt" laborer, the tales of Storches dodging Mustang fire by flying at below stall speeds between the buildings of Paris while making abrupt 90-degree turns down side streets definitely conjure up a picture worthy of awe and one worthy of reproduction in an RC model.