Old biplanes

[N201MKTurbo]

I’m watching a very old airplane movie. Flight Commander, 1930, WWI biplanes. 

Strange how France looks like the hills around San Diego.

Anyway, I noticed the planes almost all had a scarf tied to one of the wing struts. I have flown quite of few planes that had a yaw string taped to the windshield, saillanes, twins and old military jets.

By tying a scarf to the strut, you would get a yaw indication, but you would also get an angle of attack indication. I wonder if that is what they were used for instead af an airspeed indication?

Maybe these guys were ahead of their times?

 

[bob865]

If I remember right, weren't they used for plane identification?  So you could spot you wing leader easily? 

That could just be hollywood's explaination and I'm remembering it from a movie.

[N201MKTurbo]

21 minutes ago, bob865 said:

If I remember right, weren't they used for plane identification?  So you could spot you wing leader easily? 

That could just be hollywood's explaination and I'm remembering it from a movie.

You may be right. After I wrote that I rolled back the movie and there was only one plane in the squadron that had the streamer.

http://www.theaerodrome.com/forum/showthread.php?t=32632

 

Edited December 14, 2018 by N201MKTurbo

[rbridges]

We're they regular scarves or a PMA/TSO scarf?