![]() ![]() As the JN-4 was a dedicated trainer aircraft, she was not typically fitted with armament of any kind.© The undercarriage consisted of a two-wheeled, reinforced arrangement of struts and cabling as well as a wooden tail skid under the tail unit. Visibility was therefore quite good from the sides and to the rear though the front was dominated by the engine placement and both positions suffered from the large biplane wing structure. Each pilot sat in an open-air cockpit protected by nothing more than a windscreen at the front. The tail unit consisted of a rounded vertical tail fin and applicable horizontal tailplanes. When viewed in the side profile, the fuselage was something of a pleasing teardrop shape, running under the engine compartment to the base of the empennage tapering rearwards. ![]() The engine was situated at the forward-most portion of the slim fuselage with twin inline cockpits (the front for the student and the rear for the instructor) fitted aft of the engine compartment and forward of amidships. Its success was such that a modified, local-license production version in Canada - the JN-4 (Can) - was soon realized.ĭesign of the JN-4 was traditional for the time, characterized by its use of a staggered biplane wing arrangement of unequal span and parallel struts with a double-bay configuration. The design was furthered to become the definitive "JN-4" and it was this mark that would go on to make history for American military aviation. The upcoming JN-3 was developed as an interim design and this sported unequal-span biplane wings with refined controls for the wing surfaces, quickly becoming the new JN standard for the preceding JN-2s. The US Army Signal Corps purchased several JN-2s though these were eventually deemed unsafe after a fatal accident. It was these two aircraft that would come to form the basis for the JN-1 mark to follow and this was, itself, followed by the limited-run JN-2 biplane form. The actual Curtiss JN-4 model owed much of its existence to the original Curtiss "Model J" and "Model N" airplane developments appearing prior the Model J being a conventional biplane aircraft fitted with the Curtiss O series inline engine of 90 horsepower while the Model N series being completed with the Curtiss OXX inline engine of 100 horsepower. The JN-4 was born of a 1914 US Army requirement calling for a dedicated two-seat trainer aircraft platform to be powered by a single engine installation in a "puller" arrangement. The nickname of "Jenny" was formed from the "JN" used in the aircraft designation. Design of the aircraft was attributed to Benjamin D. Over 6,800 Jennys were produced and many of these were of the definitive JN-4D production model. A 1915 version, the JN-3, was used by the US Army in their war against Pancho Villa during the Mexican Revolution (1910-1920). ![]() The aircraft proved highly suitable in stunt flying and helped give rise to the classic "barnstorming" age of the 1920s, proving popular across many air shows during the decade. The "Jenny" gave many-an-airmen in America, Canada and Britain their first taste of powered flight while also training pilots in the details of aerial gunnery, bombardment, observation and basic aircraft handling. The JN-4 proved just as critical a "weapon" in World War 1 as it did an advertising platform for civil aviation in the decade to follow. The much-loved Curtiss JN-4 "Jenny" two-seat trainer aircraft was utilized in a myriad of ways throughout her operational career. ![]()
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