Two Bremen rivals become one

VFW was the product of West Germany’s campaign to tidy up its scattered aircraft industry. Bremen had two famous names: Focke-Wulf, maker of the wartime Fw 190, and Weser-Flugzeugbau, known as Weserflug. The two had worked together since 1961 in the Entwicklungsring Nord space and rocket alliance with Hamburger Flugzeugbau, and they merged into the Vereinigte Flugtechnische Werke, or United Aviation Engineering Works. Sources disagree on when: German Wikipedia says 1961 or 1963, English Wikipedia 1964. In 1964 VFW also absorbed the aircraft business of Ernst Heinkel, with its works at Speyer.

A jetliner with its engines on top

Its flagship was the VFW 614, conceived in 1961 as a 36 to 40-seat replacement for the Douglas DC-3. Its oddity was the engine layout: two Rolls-Royce and SNECMA M45H turbofans mounted on pylons above the wing, out of the way of stones on rough runways. The government provided 80 per cent of the backing when the project got the go-ahead in 1968. The first prototype flew on 14 July 1971, which was also the first time its engine had ever been airborne. Rolls-Royce went bankrupt that year, and on 1 February 1972 the first prototype was lost to elevator flutter.

Europe’s first cross-border aircraft company

To sell the 614, VFW joined Fokker of the Netherlands in 1969 in VFW-Fokker, each holding half, described as Europe’s first transnational aircraft company. It was an unhappy marriage. German staff complained that Dutch salesmen pushed their own Fokker airliners; Lufthansa declined to buy any 614s. By February 1975 only ten had been ordered, the first production aircraft went to Cimber Air of Denmark that August, and the programme was cancelled in 1977 after 19 had been built. The last airworthy example flew as the German Aerospace Center’s ATTAS research aircraft until 2012.

The VTOL fighter that became a test rig

VFW also chased vertical take-off. The VAK 191B was meant to replace the Fiat G.91 strike fighter, but Italy withdrew in 1967 and the project became a demonstrator. Three prototypes flew 91 times between 1971 and 1975, testing fly-by-wire ideas later used for the Panavia Tornado; the SG 1262 hover rig had paved the way in 1966. VFW also built centre fuselages for the Transall C-160 transport and held a 20 per cent share in Deutsche Airbus through VFW-Fokker. In 1981 VFW was taken over by Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm, whose line runs through DASA and EADS to today’s Airbus.

Fabrikalar

• Bremen works · Bremen — Headquarters and VFW 614 final assembly
• Speyer works · Speyer, Rhineland-Palatinate — Came with the Heinkel aircraft business in 1964
• Hoykenkamp works · Hoykenkamp, near Delmenhorst — Built caravans and tail-lifts under the VFW name in the 1970s

Rekorlar ve ilkler

• First jet airliner developed and produced in West Germany, the VFW 614, 1971
• VFW-Fokker described as Europe’s first transnational aircraft company, 1969