FEATURES

• Four optional ailerons driven by Sullivan tube and internal fuselage servo
• One piece construction
• Pull-pull rudder and elevator linkage
• Dummy Lewis machine gun
• Laser cut balsa spars and strip wood included
• Sheet wood included

HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE

The S.E.5a was one of the most important and influential aircraft of the war. The S.E.5a (Scout Experimental 5a) was designed by H.P. Folland and J. Kenworthy of the Royal Aircraft Factory in Farnborough. The introduction SE5a with the 200-hp Hispano-Suiza or Wolseley Viper engine resolved earlier SE5 engine problems and added nearly 30 mph to the S.E.5a as top speed. The S.E.5a was inherently stable making it excellent at gunnery. It was also one of the fastest aircraft of the war, at 138 mph, it was as fast as the the SPAD S.XIII. The S.E.5a was not a great dog fighter, lacking the agility of the Camel. However, it was much easier to fly. The S.E.5 had only one synchronized .303-in Vickers machine gun, however it did have a wing-mounted Lewis gun which enabled the pilot to fire at an enemy aircraft from below. The S.E.5a entered service in June 1917. Legendary British ace, James McCudden wrote of the S.E.5a "It was very fine to be in a machine that was faster than the Huns, and to know that one could run away just as things got too hot."