Fokker D.XXIII

The Fokker D.XXIII was a Dutch single-seat fighter designed and built by Fokker, of which only one was flown before the Germans invaded the Netherlands in May 1940. It was designed as a twin-engined single-seat aircraft with a tractor engine at the front and a pusher engine at the rear, to overcome the problems of asymmetric flight, in the form of a cantilever monoplane with twin tail units on booms, an enclosed cockpit between the engines and a retractable tricycle landing gear. The prototype first flew on 30 May 1939 powered by two Walter Sagitta I-SR air-cooled Vee piston engines of 400 kW each, but trials showed cooling problems with the rear engine and poor engine performance. The aircraft flew 11 times in under four hours, its undercarriage was damaged on the eleventh flight in April, and the programme was abandoned in May 1940.