Help needed to identify an early flying boat marked AD

[gekkegerritje]

Dear Seawings members,

Please find attached two pictures I found on a car boot sale.
These are shared with you for information but NOT for publication or distribution.

The person on both pictures is the same. The message and signature are difficult to read, but appears to be French.

Would be great if you could help me to establish:
- Which type of aircraft is shown?
- What does the sign A - D signify?
- Anything else you observe of note.

Best regards,
Thomas Helmer

Original photograph with pilot seated behind the controls
Original photograph of flying boat marked A D

[AlexNortonesq]

Wikipedia has an entry on AD Flying Boat. The Ad stands for the British Admiralty's Air Department. The entry is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AD_Flying_Boat

Unfortunately you pictures did not show up on my computer. All I saw was a question mark.

[dogsbody]

No pics here, either.

[MrWidgeon]

Welcome Aboard gekkegerritje.
The reason your photos didn't show is you can't load them directly, you have to use a photo hosting service like Photobucket.
If you do that maybe we can be of more help.

Bill

[AlexNortonesq]

The Windsock DataFile #159 by Colin A. Owers is entitled "AD Flying Boats.' Published in 2013 it presents as complete a history of the AD Flying Boats as you will find. At the end of WW1, Supekrmarine purchased the remaining AD boats from the Air Ministry and converted them to civilian use under the name Supermarine Channel.

[DavidLegg]

Re the Windsock publication mentioned above, I wrote this review for The Catalina News a few months ago …

"We have from time to time reviewed books published by Albatros Productions Ltd in its Windsock Datafile series. These books concentrate on aviation of the WWI period and have included a small number of seaplanes, the latest being Datafile 159 – AD Flying Boats by CA Owers. During WWI, the British Admiralty had its own Air Department at its Isle of Grain factory at the tip of the Medway Estuary. After producing the Type 1000 floatplane and the AD Scout landplane, attention was turned to the AD Flying Boat, a two-place patrol and reconnaissance biplane with a single rearward facing powerplant and wings that folded forward for storage purposes. The prototype’s hull was built at Hampton Wick in Middlesex whilst Southampton-based Pemberton-Billing Ltd (later Supermarine) was contracted to build the wings and carry out final assembly. The prototype first flew from Southampton Water in mid-March 1917 with later trials being carried out at Grain. The design was not particularly successful although a total of 27 were produced. The Royal Navy handed over its remaining ADs to the newly-formed Royal Air Force in April 1918 and most of them were subsequently re-purchased by Supermarine and modified to passenger carriers. Known as the Supermarine Channel (a slightly modified version was the Channel II), a total of twelve were placed on the UK civil register and individual examples went on to fly in Bermuda, Norway and British Guiana whilst other aircraft flew in Chile, Japan, New Zealand and Venezuela. This slim A4 softback has 34 pages of text, photos and tables including a twelve page pull-out section of 1:48 scale line drawings. The price is £11.75 in the UK, ISBN number 978-1-906798-31-4. The fantastic range of Windsock publications may be viewed at the relevant website – see list of links at the end of this feature….."

[gekkegerritje]

Dear Seawings aficionados,

Many thanks for your responses so far.
Tried to upload the pictures in various was and failed.
Bryan, who is travelling right now, offered to help out when he is back.

Hope that works.
Best regards,
Thomas.

[schneiderman]

I do hope you work out how to post the photographs, they sound interesting. Did you check out the instructions at the top of the forum home page on posting photos?

[seawings]

Dear Seawings aficionados,

Many thanks for your responses so far.
Tried to upload the pictures in various was and failed.
Bryan, who is travelling right now, offered to help out when he is back.

Hope that works.
Best regards,
Thomas.

Bryans back!

Can you email me the pictures and I will upload them for you.

Cheers,