The Giant Airliner With Cabins In Its Wings | Junkers G38 [Aircraft Overview #19]

The Junkers G38 was a striking site when it first flew in 1929. It was perhaps the pinnacle of mixed-wing

aircraft

design in the interwar period, at least as far as success was concerned. It was manufactured during a time when some

aircraft

designers predicted combined or even full

wings

. Flying wing aircraft would be the future with many passengers accommodated on these large

wings

instead of a fuselage in 1929, this was not a new concept for Hugo Junkers. 20 years earlier he had applied for a patent for a thick profile hollow wing design that could be used as a large

airliner

back in 1909, the standard design for airplanes at the time could be summarized as a flying box, as the old saying goes.

Most of Junckers' aerodynamic designs rejected this way of thinking and wanted to present the concept of a large wing. cantilevered metal that, as a result of its design and aerodynamically functional thickness, would provide an optimal relationship between lift resistance and viability that the First World War allowed. to partially realize his idea of ​​an internally structured aircraft with all metal wings eliminating the need for obstructive cables and struts, but his designs were limited by military specifications. After the war, he now had the experience and manufacturing facilities available to make His dream of a large commercial aircraft came true, but this time he was limited by the Treaty of Versailles.

In 1920 he began development work on the Junkers JG1, which was a four-engine or metal transport aircraft. Construction of a prototype began in 1921 with the outer wing and rear parts of the However, when the Allied Supervisory Board inspected the factory, they found this prototype during their investigations and demanded that work stop and the aircraft be scrapped. Undeterred, Hugo Yonkers continued to release designs throughout the 1920s, but it would not be until the late 1920s that he would make another serious attempt that would result in the g38 working in collaboration with design engineer Ernst Zindle in 1927 began design work on the G40 project, which was for a postal seaplane that could perform transatlantic flights.

Junckers also developed a landplane variant called the g38 and although the german navy was more interested in seaplanes junckers preferred the g38 because he believed it offered more versatility and was able to secure funding from the air ministry for its construction from conception to completion, the Work on the prototype took just over two years. and in november 1929 the first aircraft identified as d2000 left the juncker desalination plant for its maiden flight when it took to the skies on november 6, 1929 the g38 was the largest land plane in the world the dominant aspect of the plane was of course , the massive cantilever wing had a wingspan of 44 meters, making it slightly wider than that of a B-29 superfortress.

It was built on a series of tubular frames and struts that were bolted together and attached directly to the fuselage for production. easier maintenance and transportation the wing of the g38 was divided into a center section, two middle sections and two outer sections covering the structure were the classic corrugated and tensioned aluminum sheets that were the hallmark of many all-metal aircraft built in germany in At that time, not only did this metal provide strong and effective protection but it also served to absorb the torsional movement exerted on the wing? Not only was it wide but it was also incredibly thick where it met the fuselage.

It had a height of 1.9 meters. This is because it was not only designed as a lifting surface but as a functional section of the internal structure of the aircraft, very similar to the Russian Kalinin K7 that was covered in a previous video. The forward inner sections of the g38 wing were designed to house people and equipment in the front. Immediately adjacent to the fuselage and accessed via a hallway were a pair of passenger

cabins

offering commanding views through a series of curved windows. Hopefully, it came with a warning for passengers suffering from vertigo or fear of heights, as it also gave them a good idea.

A view of what was below the plane as well as in front of it, further outside this cockpit were the intermediate wing sections which mounted the engines, the front of each section housed one engine, each consisting of two

junkers

l55b12 and two l8 in line. six engines, the larger engines were mounted as the internal pair and the smaller ones as the external pair, together they provided the g38 1971 horsepower, the more powerful engines drove four-bladed propellers and the smaller ones drove two-bladed propellers, which gave the g38 a max. At a speed of 225 kilometers per hour and a cruising speed of 180 kilometers per hour, this section of the enormous wing not only housed the engines, but also housed them in what could be called the aeronautical equivalent of the engine room of a boat.

A maintenance corridor that ran behind the wing's passenger

cabins

and its brelvan aisle and this allowed engine work to be carried out during flight, was certainly not something that many aircraft then or now could boast. The runner ran through most of the wing and allowed it. to be accessible for inspection almost to the wingtips, if the engineers agreed to a narrow passage behind the passenger and engine rooms that were at the leading edge of the wing, separated by a double firewall and a large amount of metal, there was the The main fuel compartments consisted of two rows of fuel tanks with a hallway between them for inspection.

Towards the inside of this and again behind a double firewall were the storage cabins containing the necessary luggage and cargo of the passengers and crew, accessed from there from the fuselage. There was also another luggage and cargo rack located at the bottom of the fuselage as on more traditional

airliner

s, but the thick wings allowed the space to be reduced for better overall cabin space. The fuselage itself, like the wing, was built with tubular struts and the spars are covered. With an all-metal skin, the pilots and co-pilots enjoyed an elevated position in a comfortable cockpit just above the nose and slightly below them was a navigation room which also assisted two passenger seats just in front of the nose for those.

Those who felt more adventurous behind the cockpit was the chief mechanics position from where the entire power plant and fuel systems can be controlled. Behind this was the crew cabin in the steward's room where meals and drinks were prepared and adjacent to this room was a small bathroom. Further back were two more spacious passionate cabins and a smoking cabin. Passenger accommodation was considered very luxurious and was intended to compete with the standards found aboard the zeppelins which at that time were the pride of German commercial aviation like many others. The Yonkers aircraft of the time, the G38, featured control surfaces that ran the entire length of the trailing edge of the wing.

They were divided into two sections, allowing them to be operated as flaps at the intersection and ailerons on the outer section of the tail control surfaces. They were arranged in a biplane-style configuration with three vertical rudders. This was done in response to the resistance consideration. If a single large rudder were used, the drag force of the tail wing would have been too great to count manually. All control surfaces were dynamically balanced to reduce flutter and flight test reports praised the G38 for its easy handling characteristics. The g38's controls supposedly seemed no more difficult than those of the much smaller Junkers F13 and G31, which was saying a lot for such a bulky aircraft.

Large in volume, the g38 with its all-metal design, thick wings and four engines was quite heavy when completed, at least by the standards of the time, having an empty weight of 13 tons and a maximum takeoff weight of 21 tons. supported by a main landing gear composed of four large wheels that were placed in pairs in tandem to improve comfort and handling on the ground, these wheels rotated in the horizontal plane and were held in place by a series of springs, the gear The landing gear was in a fixed arrangement dotted with shock absorbers integrated into the vertical frame.

Originally, this landing gear was covered by an aerodynamic fairing, but at some point it was removed to save weight and then at another time refitted for styling reasons. . This seems to come and go several times during the 1930s, which makes dating unknown photographs a bit tricky. After its maiden flight, the Air Ministry purchased the g38 with the intention of flying it with Lufthansa. It then underwent a series of tests and demonstration flights that attracted much attention in On November 30, 1930, test pilots Zimmerman and Sninzinger set several world speed and altitude records while carrying a 5-ton payload. The flight tests concluded with a round trip around Europe which went a long way to further stoking enthusiasm for Yonkers' new aircraft and it was then officially handed over to tour lufthansa then began operating a commercial route between London and Berlin almost immediately after beginning to fly this route however the decision was made to modify the g38 recent press tours had increased demand for the aircraft so much that the passenger capacity of only 13 was considered ridiculous the engines were upgraded from four l88 to v12, which increased the power from 1971 horsepower to 3100 and now all drove four-bladed propellers.

The aircraft itself was modernized to enlarge the passenger cabins, which increased the cargo capacity to allow up to 30 passengers and their burden. This refit was completed in the summer of 1932 and the aircraft took to the skies once again. Lufthansa also commissioned the construction of a second aircraft that would receive the designation d2500 from the start. With lessons learned from the first prototype, it was built with a full double-deck fuselage and its wing cabins were enlarged to allow a total passenger capacity of 34. This new aircraft also had the added advantage that most passengers They were in the center fuselage.

A view of the outside world Something that was missing from the first prototype This aircraft entered service around the same time as the first completed its overhaul and together they both entered commercial service The G38s soon earned a very solid reputation among luxury and comfort passengers They were allowed to move freely during the flight and were served by well-trained staff, although their passenger capacity was still somewhat small compared to their impressive scale. The aircraft quickly became the pride of Lufthansa and German aviation. In 1933, the D2500 was named Marshall. Hindenburg in honor of then President Hindenburg In 1934 both aircraft returned for another overhaul, this time replacing all their engines with inline six-cylinder Jimo Fours giving a new total power of 4023 horsepower.

The aircraft was also redesignated being the first G38A and the second G38E, unfortunately for the G38A, it did not survive beyond 1936. It crashed on takeoff during a workshop flight at De SAO as a result of incorrectly connected cables the pilot survived but the Extensive damage wrote off the aircraft, it could actually be repaired however the cost of repairing it versus the gain of repairing it was not considered worthy as the aircraft was already becoming somewhat obsolete by the mid to late 1930s compared to Other larger commercial aircraft were coming into the field both in Germany and abroad, the G38E would continue to fly commercial routes for Lufthansa until the start of World War II, then it would be repainted in war camouflage and used as a military transport.

It operated regularly during the military campaign in Greece as a long-range transport aircraft for troops and supplies, but on 17 May. In 1941 it was also destroyed during an attack by British bombers. A militarized version of the G38 had been planned for use with the Luftwaffe. In fact, the

junkers

had been in charge of designing said plane with the designation K-51, but it was never built. At least not in Germany, as early as 1928 Japan had shown interest in the G38 design and, in fact, was the first to approach Yonkers to convert the G38 for use as a bomber.

Youngers licensed the design to Mitsubishi in April 1930 and sent a team overseas to Japan and supported further development. This was developed into the type 92, also known as the k20. mitsubishimanufactured six of these between 1933 and 1935. They were powered by four Jumo 204 engines, had a maximum speed of 200 kilometers per hour and could carry up to five tons of bombs, in addition to this, they were also well defended for a bomber. At this time, they mounted five machine guns in various positions and a 20-millimeter dorsal cannon. When first operated, they were the largest offensive aircraft deployed by Japan and were involved. secretly, but at the height of the second world war they were hopelessly obsolete and only used as transport, sadly none of these aircraft survived today as they were all destroyed in one way or another, usually involving explosions, but equally The Italian Caproni 60s were recently immortalized in the Studio Ghibli film The Wind Lifts You.