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Schütte-Lanz

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SL22 landing at Rheinau in summer, 1918
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SL22 landing at Rheinau in summer, 1918

Schütte-Lanz is the name of a type of rigid airship designed and built for the first time in 1909 which was a successful early competitor of the more famous airships built by Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin.

When the Zeppelin LZ4 met with disaster at Echterdingen in 1908, Professor Johann Schütte started to consider the problems of airship design. He decided, with the co-operation of his students to develop his own scientifically designed, high performance airship. In partnership with Dr Karl Lanz, an industrialist and wood products manufacturer he started the Schütte-Lanz Luftschiffbau on April 22, 1909. The ships were successful at first, and introduced a number of highly successful innovations.

Twenty-four Schütte-Lanz airships were designed before the end of the First World War, most of which the company was not paid for due to the collapse of the German Monarchy. By the time the last eight ships were ready, most of them could not be operated due to the losses of trained crews and also the serious problems that had developed with their wooden structures. In the words of Fürher der Luftschiffe Peter Strasser:

Most of the Schütte-Lanz ships are not usable under combat conditions, especially those operated by the Navy, because their wooden construction cannot cope with the damp conditions inseparable from maritime service...
The decision was made to compensate the company for the unusable wooden ships, and in response the company started work on a tubular aluminum framed ship which was probably not completed.

In the postwar period, Professor Lanz designed a series of very large advanced airships for transatlantic and transpacific passenger operations, as well as proposals for the US Navy’s rigid airships ZRS-4 and ZRS-5. However none of these were ever realized due to Allied objections.

Contents

SL1

The Schütte-Lanz airship SL1 was the first of 20 airships built by the company. Construction was carried out in a large hangar at Rheinau near Mannheim. The ship was powered by four 125 horsepower (93 kW) Daimler-Benz engines installed in two ventral gondolas. A distinctive feature of the Schütte-Lanz ships was that the frame was constructed from special plywood which were (supposedly) waterproofed and protected from frost. The SL1 was constructed with a diamond lattice frame and had a highly streamlined shape, allowing it to achieve a record speed of 38.3 km/h. Fifty-three experimental flights were made between October 1911 and December 1912. The longest flight was over 16 hours. It was handed over to the German army on December 12 1912 but destroyed soon afterwards when it was swept free of its temporary mooring in a storm.

SL2

The Schütte-Lanz airship SL2 surpassed the contemporary Zeppelin airships in performance. It adopted the Zeppelin ring-girder construction method, but retained the streamlined shape and plywood construction of SL1. SL2 was also the most significant airship to date in that it laid down two vital design innovations that were copied in almost all subsequent rigid airships. The first was the cruciform tail plane, with a single pair of rudders and elevators. The second was the location of the engines in separate streamlined gondolas or cars. A third innovation, for war service, was the mounting of heavy machine guns for defense against attacking aircraft in each of the engine cars. SL2 was built between January and May 1914 and transferred to Austrian military control. It carried out 6 missions in the first year of the war over Poland and France. After being enlarged in summer 1915, several more missions were carried out before SL2 was stranded at Luckenwalde on January 10 1916 after running out of fuel and decommissioned.

SL3

Naval airship based at Seddin which flew 30 reconnaissance missions and one bombing mission over England. The highlight of SL3's career was its attack on British submarine E4 on September 24, 1915. The structure of the ship degraded because of atmospheric exposure and the ship was stranded near Riga on May 1, 1916.

SL4

Naval airship based at Seddin. SL4 flew 21 reconnaissance missions and two bombing raids again enemy harbors on the Eastern front. It was destroyed on December 14 1915 after its hangar collapsed due to snow accumulation on the roof.

SL5

SL5 was an army airship, based at Darmstadt. The structure was damaged during the first flight, but repaired after several months work. During its second flight the ship was forced down by bad weather at Giessen and stricken from service on July 5 1915

SL6

Naval airship based at Seddin. Flew six reconnaissance missions, but exploded due to unknown causes with the loss of all hands while taking off on November 10 1915.

SL7

Army airship based at Königsberg. Carried out three reconnaissance missions and three bombing raids before suffering structural failure. Repaired and possibly enlarged before being decommissioned March 6 1917 when the army terminated airship operations.

SL8

Naval airship based at Seddin. Carried out 34 reconnaissance missions and three bombing raids, carrying 4,000 kg of bombs each mission. Held the record for the greatest number of combat missions of any Schütte-Lanz airship. Decommissioned due to age November 20 1917.

SL9

Naval airship based at Seddin. Carried out 13 reconnaissance missions and four bombing raids carrying 4,230 kg of bombs each mission. Crashed in Baltic, possibly after lightning strike on March 30 1917.

SL10

Army airship based at Jamboli, Bulgaria. Carried out a 16 hour reconnaissance mission. Disappeared during a subsequent attack on Sevastopol, possibly due to bad weather July 28 1916.

SL11

Army airship based at Spich. Shot down over Hertfordshire by Lt. W.L. Robinson in a BE 2C with incendiary ammunition September 3 1916.

SL12

Navy airship based at Alhorn. Obsolete in design before completion, this ship only flew reconnaissance missions. Badly damaged after hitting gasometer near hangar and deleted December 28 1916

SL13

Army airship based at Leipzig. Considered unfit for combat duty and used for training only. Badly damaged when hangar collapsed because of heavy snow and stricken February 8, 1917.

SL14

Navy airship based at Seerapen and Wainoden. Carried out two reconnaissance missions and two bombing raids. A latter attack on Riga was abandoned because of engine failure. Rebuilt February 1917 and but damaged before finally being scrapped May 18, 1917.

SL15

Army airship based at Mannheim. No active service. Decommissioned August 1917.

SL16

Intended for the Army, this ship was never officially commissioned and was laid up at Spich. Scrapped August 1917.

SL17

Intended for the Army, this ship was never officially commissioned and was laid up at Allenstein. Scrapped August 1917.

SL18

Construction completed at Leipzig base, but ship destroyed by hangar collapse on February 8, 1917.

SL19

Never built due to lack of space at Leipzig base, due to hangar collapse on February 8, 1917.

SL20

Navy ship based at Alhorn. Burnt in huge hangar explosion and fire with four zeppelin airships on January 5, 1918 after only two missions.

SL21

Intended for Army but never officially commissioned. Based at Zeesen and used for static testing. Decommissioned February 1918.

SL22

Intended for Navy but refused acceptance on grounds of insufficient payload. Based at Gegen and scrapped June 1920.

SL23

Never commissioned. First Schütte-Lanz ship with tubular aluminum frame. May have been complete at war's end but no further details are known.

SL24

Never commissioned. Second Schütte-Lanz ship with tubular aluminum frame. May have been completed after war, but no further details.

SL101

After the war, Schütte-Lanz came up with several peacetime airship projects which were never realized. Based on the metal framed SL23 and SL24, the first was the SL101. This was intended for a regular transatlantic service to New York or South America.

SL102 Panamerica

This was intended for a regular transatlantic service to New York or South America.

SL103 Pacific

This was intended for a regular transatlantic service to New York or South America, although the name indicates different aspirations.

American Airship Tender

Schütte-Lanz submitted an unsuccessful design to the U.S. Navy in 1926 in competition to the successful Goodyear designs, USS Akron (ZRS-4) and USS Macon (ZRS-5).

See also

References

 

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