Sopwith Rhino

The Story of the Sopwith Rhino

Lost in the discussion of the Sopwith WWI aircraft is the Sopwith Rhino, an interesting triplane bomber that came out in 1917. World War I has been raging since the summer of 1914, and its end has been in doubt.

Sopwith Air is best known for their early 1916 Sopwith Triplane, followed by their war-winning 1917 Sopwith Camel. With these and several other designs, the company is focused on realizing Rhino as a private enterprise in the medium term. 1917.

The design would successfully combine a triplane wing configuration with a streamlined fuselage to demonstrate a capable two-seat, single-engine bomber. Triplane wings are generally unpopular at this point, but offer superior lift and maneuverability at the expense of drag.

Externally, the Rhino has a distinctive hull shape with a rather deep side profile. The Rhino has a very traditional design, with a single engine at the front of the fuselage and a traditional tail at the rear. The engine drives a two-bladed propeller assembly and is housed in a metal compartment.

As usual, the hull tapers and slopes aft. The main wing section consists of three planes - a middle wing that passes through the fuselage, an upper wing assembly that passes through the fuselage, and a lower wing assembly that passes through the belly of the fuselage. The landing gear is fixed, with two-wheel support assemblies and a simplified tail skid at the tail. The plane was flown by two people in separate open-air cockpits - the pilot in front and the observer/gunner in the back.

It is powered by a 230-horsepower Beardmore Halford Pullinger (BHP) 6-cylinder in-line liquid-cooled engine. This gives the installation a top speed of 103 mph and a service cap of 12,000 feet. Endurance is listed as 3.75 hours.

For its intended bomber role, the Rhino can carry up to 450 lbs of guns in the internal bomb bay. The design is unique in that the ammunition is preloaded into a waiting "package" that is then loaded onto the aircraft. The operation was designed to rapidly replenish bomb stocks in response to war pressures.

To counter the threat of enemy aircraft, the pilot controlled a fixed, forward-firing 7.7mm Vickers machine gun on the hood. The gun is synchronized and can be fired by rotating propeller blades.

The tail gunner protected the aircraft's key "six" by managing a 7.7mm Lewis machine gun on a flexible mount.

As the Rhino was never developed for the formal needs of the British Army, its existence and eventual future was always in doubt. The first prototype was completed and flown in October 1917. While generally a capable aircraft, the prototype exhibited persistent engine overheating issues and snappy handling, the latter due to a pronounced "nose-heavy" layout. A second prototype followed, with only minor changes to the rear cockpit, and testing continued until 1918. The type was eventually abandoned due to its performance as a pedestrian, engine problems and general disinterest from British authorities.

As such, the Rhino would only fall into military aviation obscurity in its two full prototype forms. Sopwith has since continued to use these airframes for various test programs, but with no further results from the Rhino.

Specification

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