Heine propeller

[Edouard]

Hello, I have a propeller marked Heine propeller. I don't find any other marks or numbers on it.
Can somebody tell me more information about this propeller ?
Production period,used on which plane/engine, which kind of wood, value ,etc...

Thank you for any information !

Regards,
Edouard

[Dave]

German propellers can be difficult to identify, even with stamped data. Heine made thousands of propellers over a long period of time, and I think identifying one by the information you have would be nearly impossible.

[Bob Gardner]

Could you tell us the length of the prop, please. Are both blades the same length? They appear different in the photograph but this might still be an effect of the camera lens.

Heine usually stamped the data about the prop on the sides of the hub and occasionally on one blade at the root. Your prop might have been sanded smooth at some time. If so the data might be visible if the look at the surface against the light.

Typical data would read;

Rhone 80PS
D 250
ST 175
ZUG

With kind regards,

Bob

[Edouard]

Hello Bob,
thank you for your reply.
Both blades are the same lenght. Total lenght of propeller is 206cm.
Info that I could , I think, read against the light :
160PS
GNOM
D255
ST245
????
N124
WAK????? /US/

Thank you if you can provide me some more info.
Best regards,
Edouard

[Bob Gardner]

Good Morning Eduard,

The diameter of your prop originally was 255cm. It is likely that it was damaged at one tip in a landing mishap and kept as a souvenir with the damage cut away and the prop reprofiled to its present shape.

Well done for finding the data on your prop. It can be very difficult at times. A few days ago I found some very faint data on a prop. I tried to read it in various lights for twenty minutes or so with no success, then suddenly I could read it.

Your prop is German, made for a Dutch aircraft made by Anthony Fokker for the German Imperial Luftstreitkräfte, the German Air Force of WW1 (I should add that Luftstreitkräfte is colloquially used to describe the air force from 1914 to 1918 but technically it came into being in October 1916 and before that was called Die Fliegertruppen des deutschen Kaiserreiches, the flying troops of the Imperial German Empire.)

The aircraft was the Fokker E IV, the last version of the Fokker E series. It used the 160 hp Oberursel U.III two-row, 14-cylinder rotary engine, a copy of the French Gnome Double Lambda. I have not yet successfully understood why German props can be stamped for either Gnome, as here, or for Oberursel. Some sources suggest the use of GNOM indicates the use of a captured French engine whereas Oberursel indicates the German built copy. But there seem to me to be too many props marked GNOM for this to be likley.

Your data translates as;

160PS 160 horse power. PS indicates Pferdestärke, horsepower. German horsepower is slightly different from British horsepower by about 1.5% less.
GNOM The French Double Lambda engine
D255 Diameter in cm. The letter D indicates Durchmesser,diameter.
ST245 ST, Steigung,the propeller pitch in cm
???? I don't know; possibly ZUG or EDULZUG indicating a tractor prop
N124 The Heine serial number; probably two more digits follow the number 4, thus N124??
WAK????? /US/ I don't know

The Fokker E IV was not a success. The design was obselescent and installing a more powerful powerplant did little to improve it. The engine itself proved to be unreliable. Thus, few E IV aircraft were made and your prop is very rare indeed. It is always possible in such cases that a prop saved as a souvenir is the only surviving part of an aircraft type now extinct, but I do not know if this is true in this case.

With kind regards,

Bob

[Edouard]

Dear Bob,

thank you very much for all the information you could give me regarding my proppeller !
All the information was very interesting to read.
Thank you again.
Best regards,
Edouard