The L-3 operated with the fleet in the North Sea and her activities served to show the value of supplying as quickly as possible Zeppelins able to fly high and with greater speed than ever. It was also found advisable to cease flying over land by day. The Zeppelins became the night cruisers of the air, and were assigned the task of destroying railway junctions, bridges and ammunition dumps along the enemy line of advance.
The Navy soon acquired the Zeppelins L-4, L-5, L-6 and L-7, which joined the L-3 in the North Sea operations where they became indispensable as the eyes of the fleet and a continual menace to the enemy attempting to establish himself on the German Coast. All these airships were duplicates of the L-3 except in minor details. Their hulls long and cylindrical, of uniform cross sections, that is excepting the ends each part was the same size as the others. This was the first attempt at standard construction and it permitted quantity production more economical and quicker for they were not compelled to design and fabricate each section as it was needed. The plant at Friedrichshafen had been expanded and was working to capacity. Every effort was made to save time. The result was remarkable for they were able to produce one Zeppelin every six weeks. Late in 1914 the Zeppelin Z-11 was delivered to the army and the L-8 to the navy.
The Growth of the Zeppelins
Larger sheds ([Plates 8] and [9]) were completed at Friedrichshafen enabling Zeppelin to build bigger ships which could give the performances he felt was essential.
Zeppelin Airship Bldg. Co.’s Colossal Plant at Staaken (1919). Near Berlin. Consisting of two large sheds (at the left) between which is located the Traverse Ring Fabrication Shed. The Administration Bldg. is shown in the right foreground.
Zeppelin Airship Bldg. Co.’s Staaken Plant. (View taken from a Zeppelin). By far the largest and most complete airship building plant in the world.
The first of these, the LZ-38, left the shed in April, 1915, and joined the army. It had 1,130,000 cubic feet (32,000 cubic meters) of hydrogen capacity and was fuller, that is, its ratio of length to diameter was 9 to 1 where in the former ships it was 11 to 1. The wider girth afforded more freedom in design and the stern was drawn out much finer, resulting in more speed; on later ships reaching 58.1 miles per hour (26 meters per second). The LZ-38 could carry a useful load of 30,865 pounds (14,000 kilograms) besides her own weight, more than 37% of her total lift. The Zeppelins of this type ([Plate 10]—LZ-77) proved from the day they were first flown equal to all the demands made upon them.