The Hansa-Brandenburg C.I, also known as Type LDD, was a 2-seater armed single-engine reconnaissance biplane designed by Ernst Heinkel, who worked at that time for the parent company in Germany. The C.I had similarities with the earlier B.I (Type FD, also designed by Heinkel), including inward-sloping interplane bracing struts. Like other early-war Austro-Hungarian reconnaissance aircraft, such as C-types of Lloyd or Lohner, the Type LDD had a communal cockpit for its crew. The C.I served in the Imperial and Royal Aviation Troops in visual- and photographic reconnaissance, artillery observation and light bombing duties from early spring 1916 to the end of World War I. The aircraft had good handling characteristics, and steady introduction of more powerful engines in successive production batches (see below) enabled the improvement of performance and thus the continuing front-line service. Armament of the type consisted of a free-firing 8 mm Schwarzlose machine gun at the rear for the observer, and at least in some aircraft for the pilot there was also a similar fixed, non-synchronised forward-firing gun in a pod above the top wing. This latter weapon was replaced in later production examples by a synchronised 8 mm Schwarzlose gun on the port side of the fuselage. The normal bomb load for the C.I was 60 kg, but some aircraft could carry one 80 kg and two 10 kg bombs.

Production

Data from Austro-Hungarian Army Aircraft of World War One In addition to 84 aircraft built by Hansa-Brandenburg, Phönix Flugzeugwerke (400 C.I(Ph)), Ungarische Flugzeugfabrik A.G. (834 C.I(U)) and Aero (A-14, A-15, A-26) also made the type under licence in the following batches:

Operational history

After World War I, in 1918, 22 original Hansa-Brandenburg C.I seized by the Poles were among the first aircraft of Polish Air Force. According to some publications, it was the first Polish aircraft to perform a combat flight on 5 November 1918, flown by Stefan Bastyr (others claim he flew Oeffag C.II ). They were used in Battle of Lemberg and then Polish–Ukrainian War and Polish–Soviet War. Approximately 30 more aircraft were assembled or built by the Poles afterwards in Lviv and Kraków. During the Hungarian–Romanian War, Romania used Hansa-Brandenburg C.I airplanes captured from the Hungarian Red Air Arm. By the end of the war, a total of 22 aircraft of this type were captured. The aircraft were used by the Romanian Air Force until the mid 1930s.

Operators

Surviving aircraft and replicas

Specifications (Brandenburg C.I(Ph) Series 29.5)