There is no doubt that the 'Southern Cross' was the most famous of Fokker aircraft.

The equally famous Australian aviation pioneer Charles E. Kingsford Smith used this machine around 1930 to make several historical flights. The flights by this and other F.VIIb-3ms, made the design Fokker's best selling pre-war airliner.

In the November 1925 issue of the 'Fokker Bulletin' magazine, a trimotor version of the F.VII was offered with an enlarged wing.

This wing was the most important difference between the F.VIIa-3m and the F.VIIb-3m.

When in 1925 the F.VIIa was converted to the F.VIIa-3m for the Ford Reliability Tour, the wing remained basically the same except of course for the provisions for the additional engines.

It was clear to the designer however that the fuselages of both the F.VIIa and F.VIIa-3m could carry far more load provided certain changes were made. Important among these were

more powerful engines - which were already under development - and an increased wing area.

The solution to this last requirement was simple. The portion of the wing that was situated above the fuselage was of constant chord (i.e. a constant distance between leading and trailing edges),

Barely six months later, Kingsford Smith took-off on another ambitious flight. Together with Harry Lyon, Charles Ulm and James Warner, he departed from San Francisco to make the first crossing of the Pacific Ocean from America to Australia. His aircraft had meanwhile been baptized 'Southern Cross'.

The risks involved in the flight were considerable. During 1927 alone, 19 people had lost their lives while attempting to fly the Atlantic Ocean. But Kingsford Smith was more successful. After two stops, in Honolulu, Hawaii and Suva, Fiji, the Southern Cross landed in Brisbane on June 9. And just like Lindbergh the year before, Kingsford Smith became famous overnight.

From Brisbane, the F.VIlb-3m flew to Sydney where a large crowd greeted the crew as heroes. Fokker of course also benefited from this publicity, the more so because the flight had been made by a standard airliner and not a purpose-built aircraft. In those days, the majority of record attempts - successful or otherwise - used specially-designed aircraft which had little or no further use or application.

In this case it was different and the flight of Kingsford Smith and his crew had a marked effect on the sale of Fokker airliners. Kingsford Smith did not stop there to make headlines. On 8 and 9 August 1928,'Srnithy'as he was nicknamed by the press, flew non-stop over Australia from Melbourne to Perth.

On 10 and 11 September he became the first man to fly over the Tasman Sea to New Zealand, again in his Southern Cross. In the following year, on 25 June, Kingsford Smith took-off for England.

He reached London in the record time of 12 days and 18 hours. Then on 24 and 25 June 1930 with KLM Captain Evert van Dijk as copilot, he made the first flight from London to New York.

And from there he flew the Southern Cross to San Francisco. He thus became the first person to have flown around the world via Australia. (The first flight around the world via Alaska had been made by a Douglas World Cruiser in 1924).

Smithy seemed unstoppable, but in the early morning of 8 November 1935 his luck finally ran out. While flying a Lockheed Altair in an attempt to set a new England-Australia record, he disappeared over the Gulf of Bengal. No trace of him or his aircraft was ever found.

Early in 1926 George Hubert Wilkins, an Australian-born American, started preparations for a flight to the North Pole under sponsorship from the 'Detroit News'. For this Detroit News Arctic Expedition, he ordered both a single-engine F.VIIa, named the 'Alaskan', and a trimotor F.VII.

During contract negotiations, Wilkins learned that a larger wing could be fitted. As Wilkins wanted to take as much fuel and cargo as possible, he ordered the larger wing version. He thus became the first customer for the F.VIIb-3m, although the aircraft had not yet been given that designation.

The F.VIlb-3m was built in Amsterdam, bulk stripped and shipped to the U.S.A. where it was reassembled at the Atlantic Aircraft Corporation, Fokker's American factory. Three Wright J-4 Whirlwind engines of 200 hp each were installed. To avoid any confusion about the sponsorship, 'Detroit News Arctic Expedition' was painted in large letters on the fuselage sides and the aircraft was named the 'Detroiter'.

Together with the F.VIIa 'Alaskan', the 'Detroiter' was transported by ship to Alaska. From this point onwards, things began to go wrong.
First someone was killed when he walked into the rotating propeller of the 'Detroiter',

The fourth F.VIIb-3m, like its predecessors, also made the front pages. Richard E. Byrd, who had earlier flown to the North Pole in a Fokker, also wanted to fly to the South Pole. And he considered it quite natural that for the Byrd Antarctic Expedition, he would again fly a Fokker. He felt that the type had clearly proven its worth. But his main sponsor, Henry Ford, was not too pleased with Byrd's preference because Ford himself produced airplanes and his Ford Trimotor was an F.VIIb-3m look-alike.

Byrd could not cancel his order for the Fokker and so arranged to sell the aircraft to a wealthy American, Amy Guest. This lady baptized the aircraft 'Friendship' and intended to use it for a flight over the Atlantic from the U. S. to Europe. As she did not have a pilot's license herself, she hired a crew. When her family learned about her bold plan, it was quickly made clear that not all her relatives shared her enthusiasm. And just as Byrd had to give in to Ford, Amy Guest had to give in to her millionaire family. This she did only after stipulating that "an American girl of the right type" should take her place aboard the 'Friendship'.

It was Amelia Earhart, daughter of a leading railway official, who eagerly accepted the invitation. She had a pilot's license and had already gained a measure of reputation by flying in competitions and in 1922 had set a new world altitude record for women. She did not however have any experience in flying over long distances and she had never piloted a multi-engined aircraft.

This was no problem however as Amy Guest had already hired a crew: Wilmer Stulz as captain and Louis Edward Gordon as co-pilot and flight engineer. As a number of earlier attempts to fly the Atlantic had ended prematurely and fatally, the Guest family had the standard undercarriage replaced by a pair of floats. To help finding the aircraft in the event of an emergency landing, the fuselage had been painted orange and wing was a gold colour. Departure from Trespassy, New Foundland was on 17 June 1928.

The flight proved to be uneventful except for the latter part when visibility deteriorated. Amelia threw a sack overboard to a steamer passing below, requesting that the ship's position be laid out on its deck. Although weighted with an orange to help its trajectory, the sack missed the vessel and the aircraft had to continue without a position report.

After a short while however Stulz spotted fishing boats and soon a coastline came into to view. The Friendship landed in a bog and the crew was surprised to find that the nearest place was Port Burry near Llanelli in Wales.

When in 1927 and 1928 there was a rush of orders for the F.VIlb-3m, the capacity of the Amsterdam factory was insufficient to cope with the demand. There were already plenty of orders in hand for the F.VIIa, F.VIIa-3m, F.VIII and the military C.V, C.VI and C.VIIw. Fokker therefore decided to sell manufacturing licenses to other aircraft companies.

First was Poland when in October 1928, Plage & Laskiewicz started a series of twenty F.VIIb-3m's modified as bombers. The Poles acquired the drawings for the commercial airliner and then engineered the necessary changes to convert the type to a bomber role. Following completion of these aircraft, a further eleven were built for airline use.

The majority of these entered service with the Polish airline LOT.

In the same year, Avro in England approached Fokker for license rights. Until then, British airliners had been mainly biplanes because "the good old biplane with all its struts and bracings and things which together cause what is scientifically called parasitic drag, is superior to the monoplane, whether of the braced type which is so popular in the U.S. or of the pure cantilever type, such as has been produced by Mr. Anthony Fokker."

The worldwide success of Fokker aircraft hardly supported this statement which had been made by U.K. aviation expert William Farren during a lecture on 31 January 1929. Not everyone was so convinced of the advantages of the biplane. Some, including Avro, favored the monoplane.

Production of the type at the Fokker works in Amsterdam ended in 1932. Complete production records no longer exist, but it is known that at least 63 were built there. KLM had 14 and used them for many years on just about all the airline's routes. KLM considered the type a success both technically and financially with operating costs per seat mile only a quarter of those of the F.III.