WORK OF RICHARD KELLER
.....It is taken from a recently published book. See bottom of page. It has been written by my friend Giorgio Evangelisti, who is also a lifetime friend of Richard Keller.
.....Keller is now living at Arco, near Trento, on the Eastern Italian Alps. He was born on 5 November 1923 at Augsburg (Bavaria) and started his aeronautical career by building plenty of free flight tailless models. No radio gear was available in those days. While testing his models in a field near his home, he was noticed and contacted by the (then middle aged) professor Alexander Lippisch. This extremely valid researcher, a Messerschmitt employee, was experimenting with his model airplanes side by side with the young Keller.
.....Lippisch so was impressed by the innovative shapes of Keller's flying models that hired him as his assistant and collaborator. Computers and CAD did not exist yet, but the young Keller had developed an extraordinary capability for tracing three-dimensional drawings of aero planes, which existed only as blue prints. Starting from the ME 163, Keller designed in 1942 a two-reactor interceptor. (Image 1) The drawing that he made of this aero plane was so realistic, that Hermann Goering took it as true photography, and asked Lippisch and Keller whether they had already built it.
.....When Lippisch and Messerschmitt parted company, Keller was transferred to the Horten Sonder Kommando. (Image 2)
.....In this new position Keller was very instrumental in designing the Horten H-XIII-a delta plane, the first one with a 60° sweep. (Image 3)
.....The relevant drawing was made by Keller on November 6, 1944, his 21st birthday. The plane was test-towed in the air, like a sailplane, on November 27, 1944 !!!!! Everything went fine, exactly as expected. A curiosity: for this project Keller had available a long horizontal drawing board (15 meter by 2). Keller's first job with the Horten team was the set of aerodynamic calculations for the H-IX-V1. After the war, Keller could not emigrate in America, as requested by Reimar Horten, because he had suffered TBC.
.....Drawings and technical reports by Keller, which had been given in custody to a friendly family, were burned in order to prevent American soldiers to seize them. Another curiosity: when employed by the Messerschmitt firm at Augsburg, the young Keller had the opportunity of drawing the image of a two reactor plane with enormous auxiliary fuel tanks. (Image 4)
.....Only later he learned that it was piloted by Rudolph Hess, in his historic escape to England.
.....Very little remains of the Keller's advanced work: a two-reactor pursuit plane; a rocket interceptor (1942), designed upon request by Lippisch. (Images 5 & 6)
Ferdi Gale
PS: EROI DEL CIELO (Heroes
of the Sky) by Giorgio Evangelisti, Editoriale Olimpia, Florence (www.edolimpia.it), 42 €.
The text is Italian, but
Spanish speaking Twitters could easily undersand it. By the same
token, we Italians read easily the papers in Spanish, written by
Dr.Horten in Argentine.
Image 1
Image 2
Image 3
Image 4
Image 5
Image 6
