Zeppelin-Staaken Type 8301

The Zeppelin-Staaken Type 8301 was a class of large seaplanes, serialled 8301 to 8304, built for the Imperial German Navy during the First World War, and they are the largest although not the heaviest floatplanes ever constructed. Based on experience with the Type L, the Navy ordered 8301 and 8302 in December 1917 and further aircraft in January 1918. Zeppelin-Staaken mated R.VI wings to an all-new fuselage suspended midway between the mainplanes to improve seakeeping, with a tail based on those of the R.XIV and R.XV, large cellon windows wrapped around the nose and four Mercedes D.IVa engines. The first, 8301, flew in mid-1918, tested first on a land undercarriage and then on duralumin floats. Naval trials at Warnemünde were under way when the war ended, before the aircraft had been accepted for naval service, but 8301 and possibly 8303 and 8304 found brief postwar use as airliners on weekend trips between Berlin and Swinemünde.