Sopwith’s 1916 design pioneered the triplane fighter
By the summer of 1915, Allied aircrew reports from war-torn France were noting a new enemy fighting aircraft fitted with a revolutionary weapon: a fixed machine gun firing forward through its propeller arc. With this armament the Fokker E.III ‘Eindecker’ enjoyed a notorious period of success: the so-called ‘Fokker scourge’.
Similarly-equipped Allied types gradually appeared, including the Sopwith Aviation Company’s Pup single-seater, which entered service in the autumn of 1916. By then another Sopwith design was emerging, and in the race for advantage the company had taken a drastic step. Its new scout was a triplane.
From the earliest attempts at aviation, use of the multiplane layout had been considered only occasionally. As far back as 1843 Victorian pioneer Sir George Cayley had pondered the triplane form, having examined engineer William Henson’s newly created Aerial Steam Carriage design. Cayley feared for the structural integrity of the Carriage’s high-aspect ratio wings: “Would it not be more likely to answer the purpose to compact it into the form of a three decker, each deck being 8 or 10 feet from the other, to give free room for the pass…
