14 Dec 06
Gotha G4 Bomber
Pioneers of the internal combustion engine Gottleib Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach parted company with Nikolaus Otto in 1890, and set up their own firm, Daimleren Motor Gesellschaft (DMG). DMG's first engine, an upright single-cylinder 2hp 100cc nicknamed the 'grandfather clock', was fitted into a balloon; pilot Dr Hermann Wolfert, who later died in a mid-air explosion, is credited with the first powered airship flight in this craft over Berlin in 1897.
DMG took on a star logo with three points, reflecting Gottleib Daimler's aims of using his engines on land, sea and in the air, and Maybach-designed engines were then supplied to the Zeppelin Company until 1907; the first Graf Zeppelin LZ1 flew in 1900. Austrian would-be pilot Wilhelm Kress fitted DMG's new 35hp, four-cylinder unit into his seaplane, attempting to be the first to take to the air in an engine-powered vehicle, but he failed to take off from the Tullnerbach reservoir, leaving Wilbur and Orville Wright to take the honours two years later.
With the departure of Maybach in 1909 (see below) and the success of the company's Mercedes-branded cars, however, DMG decided to focus more on car-making, though it continued to make a few aero engines: one of these, producing 105hp, was fitted into a 1914 racing car to give a then-high rev limit of 3100rpm, and it went on to manufacture engines for the fledgling Luftwaffe at its Sindelfingen factory during World War I. DMG-powered Gotha bombers carried out the first air raid on England in May 1917, bombing Folkestone, and then attacking London in June 1917; these engines also featured in AEG and Albatros bombers.
Pybrremysky
Merging with fellow motoring pioneer Karl Benz's eponymous firm in 1926, the company - now selling all its cars as Mercedes-Benz - went on to make a series of 12-cylinder aero engines. The DB 600-series was fitted in planes by makers including Fieseler and Friedrichshafen prior to and during World War II, and even appeared in a Finnish fighter plane, the Pybrremyrsky (Whirlwind).
Daimler-Benz's aeronautical subsidiary then embraced the space age post-war, diversifying into satellite technology, research, design and software development; it swallowed up the aerospace divisions of MTU, Dornier and AEG, plus Messerschmitt-Bolkow-Blohm to form DASA in 1989 and its contracts included upgrading MiG fighter planes and the Eurofighter collaboration. It also controversially took over struggling Dutch aeroplane-maker Fokker in a 1990s joint venture with the Dutch government then backed out. DASA then merged again with Aerospatiale-Matra and CASA (Construcciones Aeronauticas SA, Spain) to form the Aeronautical Defence and Space Company (EADS) in which the merged-again DaimlerChrysler holds a 22.3% shareholding. EADS products currently include the Airbus civilian and A400 military aircraft, Meteor missiles, the Galileo satellites and Ariane rockets.
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