Federal Aircraft Factory
The company Federal Aircraft Factory (F + W) ( French Fabrique fédérale d'avions ) in Emmen LU was a publicly owned enterprise and part of the Group on Arms Services of the Federal Military Department (now VBS). The aim of the F + W was to make Swiss national defense independent of imported armaments in the field of military aviation and in times of crisis, and to ensure the maintenance of the existing fleet. In the abbreviation “F + W”, the “+” stands for the Swiss cross , ie for “federal”; analogous abbreviations were and are also common for other federal companies. In 1940 the flight technology department of the Federal Construction Workshop was relocated from Thun to Emmen. In 1943 it was spun off from the Federal Construction Workshop and made independent within the military administration as the Federal Aircraft Factory (F + W). Today, the plant with all the branches that were created later is part of the privately organized technology group RUAG and, as the RUAG Aviation division, has its headquarters in Emmen.
Space activities
In 1962, Switzerland was one of the founding states of ESRO , which then merged into today's ESA . In order to "utilize free capacities in research, development and production and to maintain an interaction with our traditional aircraft construction." F + W participated in space projects. Today these activities belong to RUAG and are part of the RUAG Space division .
Guided missiles
The production under license as well as the maintenance of various guided missiles was part of the aircraft works' field of activity. So among other things:
- Anti-aircraft guided missile ground / air 64 "Bloodhound"
- Anti-tank guided weapon ground / ground 65 "Bantam"
- Anti-tank guided weapon Boden / Boden 77 "Dragon" including various performance enhancements
- Anti-tank guided weapon ground / ground "Tow 2"
Aircraft types
Compare also the aircraft from K + W in Thun, which were responsible for the construction and maintenance of the aircraft of the Swiss Air Force from 1915 to 1943 .
In-house development
License construction
- D-3800 (Morane-Saulnier MS.406)
- Aérospatiale SA-319 "Alouette III"
- Dassault Mirage III
- Northrop F-5 "Tiger"
- Aérospatiale AS 332 "Super Puma" and Aerospatiale AS532 "Cougar"
- McDonnell Douglas F / A-18 C / D
literature
- Lecture by André Jordi: The space projects in the Eidgenössisches Flugzeugwerk Emmen (PDF; 3.8 MB), lectures at the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule in Zurich in the winter semester 1977/1978.
Web links
- Hervé de Weck: Arms factories. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Lecture by André Jordi at the ETH (PDF; 3.8 MB)
- ↑ Morane Saulnier D-3800, co-licensed construction ( Memento of the original dated November 13, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed November 13, 2013
