I think the simple answer is that they did not usually operate at those altitudes where oxygen is necessarry.
There wouldn't have been much reason to. A big part of the scouts job was to clear the air of enemy observation aircraft. The cameras in those days were not like today, so I'm sure they weren't going up to twenty thousand feet to take pictures. If you were patrilling for enemy planes dropping bombs on your troops, again, you'd be down low looking for them.
The Gothas did fly high, and so did the Zeps. I've seen a photo of a Gotha gunner sucking oxygem through a tube. No doubt these large planes carried oxygen tanks a lot easier than a little WW1 fighter would have.
Cold, well, you wore heavy clothing, and smeared whale oil over your face to keep from getting frostbite.
They were a tough bunch. I don't even fly the '172 when it's freezing out!!

You don't have to be a pilot to enjoy smearing whale oil all over your face.

RD.

From Sagittarius Rising (Chapter IV Ariel Fighting)

"Scrapping at high altitudes, fifteen to eighteen thousand feet, the Huns had a marked superiority in performance. This naturaally tended to make us cautious, since we knew that, once we came down to their level, we should not be able to get above them again."

He goes on to explain why always being above the enemy is important.

The time frame here is spring 1917.

It seems to have always been a race to the top.

Yes, two to three hundred feet is the same as all the kinetic energy, should you wish to zoom...

A height advantage of 1000ft is completely unassailable, even to a longish range shot at the top of a zoom.

Even in (early) WW2 a 500' advantage was often decisive.

Pooch: not the case. The Rumpler was the best German recon of its day because of its high altitude performance. It would get over 20K at a time when no fighter could come close. Later in the war some scouts like the SE5a could reach, but still not easily. A Rumpler flown by a skilled pilot usually came home. Even with O2 it was an uncomfortable flight but much better than being killed. They did carry oxygen.

As for photo quality, it was good enough. You have to realize that they were looking for really big things, like tens of thousands of troops and their equipment. Not like today when we are looking for a particular face in a particular mud hut.

As far as scouts go I know that the D.VII carried oxygen, and presumably other late war German types would too. Not sure about the .

I suppose I have a vision of The First World War as being a ,mostly, low level air war.
Incorrect, obviously. And, naturally, if you are a fighter pilot you want to be higher than your opponent. So that alone is a very good reason to climb to eighteen thousand feet. Oxygen or no oxygen.

Anybody planed RR with the SE5A vs the Dr1?

That's the only fight I have seen that gains altitude the entire fight.

Most of the surviving pilots suffered from lung problems due to the open cockpits and after the war many died. We also forget the bombing of London by high altitude dirigible. The crews suffered much from the affects.

Hello,

one of those SE5a pilot aces (McCudden?) said something about how bad he felt, and headaches and ear problems he had, after a patrol at high altitude. But then he usually flew higher than the rest of his flight, having somehow supercharged his engine.
You can generally be at altidudes of 3500 meters, or 11000 feet, without any problems unless you go up very fast and without time for adaption, most you might get is some nose bleed.


Ah, airships (OT i fear lol):

The people in the dirigibles are another story. The non-rigid blimps were usually not able to get to high altitudes, but others, especially the german airships from "Luftschiffbau Zeppelin" LZ, finally managed to get up to 24.000 feet, only a few went to 27000, if now and then unintentionally. Altimeters would get stuck and barographs often resumed to work properly in those heights, compasses froze despite the Alcohol in it and engines as all material in general behaved "unexpected" at those altitudes, at least until special heigth climber engines were developed, which delivered their maximum power only at high altitudes.

Problem of Zeppelins always was that they had to change altitude often, to either observe, bomb, or vertically withdraw from attacks, and this sudden change was not always as controllable as intended. The word "Prallhöhe" does not exist in english - maybe burst height, or b. altitude ? Anyway if an airship reached a certain altitude, the inner gas bags would then be blown up to their full extent, and any climbing higher would make them blow off hydrogen via safety valves. So if a ship got really high above its "Prallhöhe", it had to drop ballast when sinking below again, to adapt its weight to the now missing, vented hydrogen gas.

The first oxygen canisters being used in german airships in WW1 had more bad "side-effects", than they did make breathing easier. Some of the glue and grease used in the masks made the crew vomit, or feel dizzy right to unconsciousness - the masks, mind you, not the lack of oxygen. Only in 1917 technical improvements began to make those oxygen masks less harmful. There were medical teams to research the impact of high altitudes on the Zeppelin crews, who were asked about their experiences after every mission.

A good deal of the later Zeppelin performance in the 1920ies, and 30ies, was only due to the fact that they did not have to change altitude all the time, and were thus much easier to fly, and handle. They barely exceeded 2000 meters or 6500 feet.


Sorry for OT, but maybe if we ever see a Zeppelin fly in RoF, ROF i say, arf, arf lol ...

Greetings,
Catfish

(emphasis mine)

Freudian slip or intentional jab?