Caudron C. 460
The Caudron C.460 was an aircraft made by the French manufacturer Caudron in Issy-les-Moulineaux (Seine). Variants of this design were the Caudron C.450 with fixed chassis and the further development Caudron C.461 .
It was a single-seat, single - engine, low - wing aircraft with a retractable tail landing gear that had been specially built for speed races .
The design goes back to the Caudron C.362 , which won second place in the Coupe Deutsch de la Meurthe race in 1933 . The designer Marcel Riffard improved the design and built in a retractable landing gear . A total of at least three of these aircraft were built to be used in the Coupe Deutsch 1934. The machine was largely made of wood. The planking of the top of the fuselage and the bow consisted of magnesium sheet , the rest was covered with canvas. The upper part of the vertical tail and the wings were planked with wood. The two-spar wings had a profile thickness of 13% and were attached with an angle of attack of 2 °. The joints of the ailerons and flaps were attached to auxiliary spars. Since the trim changed significantly when the landing flaps were operated, the horizontal stabilizer was automatically readjusted. According to the planned use, a six-cylinder in-line engine from Peugeot with a displacement of 8 liters and an output of 300 hp at 2900 / min −1 (325 hp at 3250 / min −1 were possible for a short time ) was selected as the drive. This cubic capacity was set as the upper limit in the competition regulations. Other special design features in addition to the retractable landing gear were the use of an adjustable propeller with two positions, which was actuated via a baffle depending on the airflow, and a low-resistance surface oil cooler below the engine. The retractable landing gear supplied by Charlestop was unsatisfactory, so that the machines had to start in the 1934 race with a fixed and disguised landing gear. The version built at that time as the Caudron C.450 , which had a fixed chassis from the start, was able to enter the list of winners. A C.460 with Albert Monville at the wheel came third. The achieved speeds of over 400 km / h gave reason to hope that a specially prepared machine would be able to surpass the existing world record for land aircraft.
For this, the Charlestop suspension was against one of Messier exchanged and into the factory number 690.7 Renault 428 engine with 370 hp at 3200 / min -1 installed. With this machine, Raymond Delmotte took off on September 25, 1934 in Istres on a successful world record flight. He reached a speed of 505.848 km / h. In 1935, two 8-liter engines with a continuous output of 330 hp achieved a double victory in the Coupe Deutsch, which was rounded off by third place in a C.450. In the course of the year, further world records were flown over various distances, with an additional oil cooler being installed next to the engine on long distances. The serial number 690.9 with Michel Détroyat , the chief pilot of Morane-Saulnier , was brought to the USA in 1936 to take part in the National Air Races . The C.460 was able to win both the Greve Trophy and the Thompson Trophy , although it had less than half the engine power compared to the runner-up.
The serial numbers 690.7 and 690.8 were then modified for participation in the Coupe Deutsch 1936 on the bow, cockpit and vertical stabilizer. These machines were given the designation Caudron C.461 , but remained unsuccessful. However, they served as the basis for the further development of the Caudron C.560 .
Technical data (record execution)
- Span: 6.75 m
- Length: 7.12 m
- Area: 7 m²
- Empty weight: 590 kg
- Takeoff weight: 950 kg
- Powerplant: a six-cylinder in-line Renault 428 engine with 380 hp (approx. 280 kW)
source
- Erich H. Heimann: The fastest aircraft in the world. Motorbuchverlag, Stuttgart 1978, ISBN 3-87943-540-5 .
- FAI world record list
- FAI world record list
