Ar.66C
Unit: NSGr.12 Serial: 6A+TL In 1943 Arado 66C served with special night strike
unit Nahaufklaerungsgruppe 12 in Pribaltika (partially with Latvian volunteer
pilots). This profile shows typical camouflage of these planes - white from
above and black on bottom, including chassis and mid-wing supports. Unit code
letters (6A) and individual plane code (TL) were black with white hand-painted
outlines. Yellow band means plane serving on East front. Simplified insignia
painted only on top wings. In difference from trainers, strike Ar.66C had
longer exhaust pipes, bomb racks and sometimes photo-camera pod installed.
Walter Rethel's last completed design for Arado before
his transfer to Messerschmitt was the Arado Ar 66, a two-seat single-bay
biplane trainer of mixed construction. The tailplane was mounted on a raised
rear fuselage fairing, ahead of the vertical tail surface which comprised a
wholly movable rudder, there being no fin. The first prototype, the Ar 66a of
1932, was powered by a 240-hp (179-kW) Argus As l0C inline engine. The second
prototype, designated Ar 66b, was generally similar except that it had twin
wooden floats, the rudder being extended beyond the bottom of the sternpost and
faired into the rear fuselage by the addition of a ventral fin. Ten production
Ar 66b aircraft were built subsequently. When Rethel left to join Bayerische
Flugzeugwerke, as the Messerschmitt company was then named, Dipl. Ing. Walter
Blume assumed responsibility for development of the Ar 66a, which entered
series production as the Ar 66c, initial deliveries being made to the Luftwaffe
in 1933. The Ar 66c continued to serve with Luftwaffe training schools after
the outbreak of World War II, and as late as 1943 it was pressed into service,
together with the Gotha Go 145 trainer, to equip the night ground-attack
Storkungkampfstaffeln on the Eastern Front, armed with 4- and 9-lb (1.8 and
4-kg) anti-personnel bombs.
Variants
Ar 66A
Used in the
new Luftwaffe as a trainer.
Ar 66C
Modified
elevators, larger rudder, and larger-diameter wheels.
Ar 66B
Seaplane
version of Ar 66C. Two large steel hollow floats braced with iron cable. About
10 were constructed and used for seaplane training.
Specifications
(Ar 66C)
General
characteristics
* Crew: Two
* Length:
8.3 m (27 ft 2¾ in)
* Wingspan:
10 m (32 ft 9¾ in)
* Height:
2.93 m (9 ft 7⅓ in)
* Wing area:
29.6 m² (319 ft²)
* Empty
weight: 905 kg (1,996 lb)
* Loaded
weight: 1,330 kg (2,993 lb)
*
Powerplant: 1× Argus As 10 C eight-cylinder air cooled inverted V-8 engine, 179
kW (240 hp)
Performance
* Maximum
speed: 210 km/h (130 mph)
* Cruise
speed: 175 km/h (109 mph)
* Range: 716
km (389 nmi, 445 mi)
* Service
ceiling: 4,500 m (14,800 ft)
* Climb to
1,000 m (3280 ft): 4.1 min
* Landing
Speed: 80km/h (50 mph)
Armament
* 2 kg (4.4
lb) and 4 kg (8.8 lb) anti-personnel bombs
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