News: De Havilland Mosquito

My tribute to the De-Havilland Mosquito the worlds first multi-role aircraft.

With resources such as skilled labor, gasoline and metal in short supply, how could England manufacture a better aircraft to meet the Nazi threat? Luckily a handful of British furniture factories provided one of the very best solutions: the Mosquito fighter plane!

The firebombing campaign was supposed to begin with an USAAF Eighth Air Force raid on Dresden on February 13 but bad weather over Europe prevented any American operations. So it fell to RAF Bomber Command to carry out the first raid. During the evening of February 13, the RAF bombers 796 Avro Lancasters and 9 De Havilland Mosquitoes were.......

NC State ID student Joe Harmon's graduation project was initially inspired by WWII era all-wood aircraft like the de Havilland Mosquito--raising the question, "Why not a wooden car?" He ended up with Splinter, a "mid-engined, monocoque design to be constructed almost entirely out of wood laminates... ...and a power goal of over 600 horsepower.

Its final construction was heat-formed plywood over a wooden frame, with sections glued and screwed for extra strength. It employed Ecuadorean balsawood sandwiched with Canadian birch, a particularly strong and lightweight grade of plywood. Metal was used in only a few parts, including the engine housings and some control surfaces.