Although technically classified, such as the Bleriot XI, the Monoplane Hanriot and the Curtiss D model, like the “pioneer plane”, the Deperdussin racer, only in appearance, indicates that it does not fall into this category. Its fully covered, streamlined, mounting thread-like fuselage; single, sharp razor wings; tiny tail surfaces spinning with decreasing drag; chassis with washer; and the modern control wheel reflect advanced technology and speed, placing the type in its “transitional” category, between the original, pioneering and later designations of the First World War.
He owes his origin to Armand Deperdussin, who was either the inventor of the aircraft or the pilot. Starting his career as a cabaret singer in Belgium, he pursued several professions, none of which was remotely related to aeronautics, including attracting customers to cinemas run by the Lumiere brothers as a barker and selling fabrics at wholesale prices to French department stores. In the autumn of 1909, he agreed to provide a Christmas show with a picture of an airplane to the Bon Marche store in Paris, but he didn’t know anything about aerodynamics or design that made Sociéte de Construction Airiens closer to meet his needs.
Instrumental for this display and Deperdussin’s future was 32-year-old Louis Beckhow, a graduate of Ecole de Art and Metrière Angers and the chief engineer there. His reputation has reached "shine."
Attracted by his canal plane, Deperdusin himself took over the Societe de Construction d'Atareil Aeriens, located in Bethany, near Reims, France, in 1910 and renamed it the Societe de Production des Apppareils Deperdussin or SPAD.
The proposed static display, appearing at the end of last year, resembled Antoinette's monoplane with tail plumage.
The original version, based on it and preserving the general configuration of Antoinette, especially in the tail section, was completed in 1910 and was offered in several versions, which varied both in the power plant and in the number of seats.
For example, the Deperdussin A was equipped with a three-cylinder Anzani, 50-hp Clerget and a 50 hp Gnome engine.
Thanks to a long, thin, 24-foot, 11.5-inch spruce-oven frame and a 28-foot, 10.5-inch wingspan, covered with an oily cotton, Deperdussin B, the first version that received considerable attention changed its original version in 1911 Powered by a 50 hp seven-cylinder Gnome engine. and weighing 551 pounds, it distributed hinged elevators and rudder surfaces, the latter serving as a deflecting surface for vertical steering and attached to the reminder of a fixed stabilizing fin. Cables acting on the wing turn mechanism were aimed at a T-shaped lever, mounted on the rear transverse chassis itself, and then passed through the pulleys on the runners before splitting into two pairs of wires that are connected to an equal number of points on the wings wing. Pilot control was achieved using a wheel mounted on the crosspiece, its direction of rotation differently deflected each wing spar, that is, while one was shifted down, the other was pushed, changed their angles of incidence and prompted the bank to increase.
Relying on two wheels and a tail to the ground, the monoplane reached a maximum speed of 56 miles per hour in the air.
Type cut a few entries. Of the seven aircraft introduced in June 1911, the Europe of Europe race, for example, one Renée Vidarta stream ranked third, while this type showed significant performance in the Concourse Milieier, which was held at the end of the year, between October and November, in Reims. Indeed, the two Deperdussin Monoplanes, along with the Nieuport, were the only structures capable of satisfying the demands of the French military.
Deperdussin C, the next in 1912, was equipped with a 100 hp Gnome engine. and accommodated two people, and the type, marked by its carrying capacity and speed with great payloads, occupied all world records up to five places and distances up to 30 miles before the end of 1911. The aircraft enjoyed widespread use in both France and England.
Divided by only two years, Deperdussin Racer, which was alternatively known as the “Deperdussin Monocoque”, looked as if it should have been separated by two decades from its predecessor Monoplane.
As early aeronautics showed, airframes required three main components:
1). A frame or fuselage considered as a common anchorage point for its flight surfaces.
2). Auxiliary methods such as trusses, cross beams and fixing wires.
3). The coating or surface, then usually made of cloth.
Despite the fact that wood was traditionally used to create airframe structures, it, in particular, according to the methods of the “turn of the century”, was difficult to mold or bend to form a single unit that even included two of these parameters integrally, until Eugene Rouchonnet, a Swiss pilot and engineer who previously worked at the Antoinette plant with Rene Hanrio, sublimated his experience of building boats in aeronautical design, embracing the basic frame with red wood and creating a light but durable fuselage concept with mines Resistance that can carry high loads.
Luis Bekreo, designer of Deperdussin Racer, developed this concept by forming two halves of the fuselage diagonally, superimposed on three thin strips of paired glued tulip, which was usually used in the building of the cabinet in three cross layers, allowing them to dry before removing them from the reusable shape and collect the two halves. The result, designated as “monocoque” —from Greek “mono” or “single”, and French “coca”, or “shell” - was permitted in a radical departure from the forest, the fuselage of aircraft fuselage, such as Bleriot XI, providing circular, despite the decreasing diameter, the cross-section, which narrowed as it moved from nose to tail, but which carries its own loads, integrally including the three frame components, supports and coatings. Simplified, strong and aerodynamic, it eliminated the need to use external struts or fastening wires and became the standard of aviation design to this day.
Deperdussin Racer with a 20-foot total length of 1/8 inch introduced this advanced construction technology, which represents a "step change" in aviation design.
Equally deviating from most pioneer aircraft and World War I, he distributed single or monophonic, high-hanging, sharp razor wings, which included a reverse cone at its inner rear edges, covering 21 feet, 9 inches and covering 104 square feet of area.
Like its predecessor, Monopane Deperdussin, it features both mounted elevators and handlebars attached to seemingly tiny horizontal and vertical stabilizers covered in checked linen. The aircraft had a seven-foot height of 6.5 inches.
When using multiple engines with a more powerful Gnome engine, Deperdussin Racer used a rotating technology.
Engines evolving from steam to internal combustion types developed gradually more horsepower per pound of engine weight, and the latter, appearing at the dawn of heavier flight, can be divided into reciprocating and turning categories. Designed by Laurent Seguin and his stepbrother Louis (great-grandfather, Marc, by coincidence, was the nephew of the Montgolfi brothers, who made them the first successful flight in the world in 1783 in France) when he explored the new lightweight configuration, designed " Gnome ”, which originated from the static block of the previous year 34-hp.
Constructed from solid, forged steel blocks, the power plant showed a 13.5-pound crankshaft, reduced from the original, 100-pound mass of raw materials and extremely thin piston walls.
Unlike the piston engine, the pistons of which turned the crankshaft on which the propeller was mounted, the rotating type had a fixed crankshaft around which the cylinder block rotated. However, he used the standard four-cycle Otto cycle, although its valves were located in pistons, and each cylinder, as for both types, experienced a different phase during this cycle.
During the suction stroke, for example, a vacuum is formed in the cylinder, causing the intake valve to open to pull the fuel-air mixture out of the crankcase, while it was compressed during the compression stroke, at the end of which its spark plugs, slightly before reaching top dead center. During the power stroke, the exhaust valves opened in front of the lower dead center, followed by the exhaust stroke.
Thanks to symmetrically mounted cylinders around a drum-shaped crankcase, the rotating Gnome engine rotated with an optimal balance. The cylinders themselves were designed with head inlet and exhaust valves, controlled by beam arms, suction fuel and combustible gases, displaced by centrifugal force, which itself was neutralized by counterweight valves. The fuel entering one end of this crankshaft has flowed extremely into the carburetor attached to the other. When moving the engine during descent, the cylinders of any accumulated raw fuel and oil were cleaned.
A virtual design solution for the often conflicting balance of power, weight and reliability of a rotary engine offered several advantages.
1). Since its large rotating cylinder block effectively served as a flywheel, and there were no reciprocating parts associated with the engine installation, it provided power very smoothly.
2). Shorter crankcase and crankshaft reduce the weight of the structure.
3). As the entire unit rotates, eliminating the need for radiators, water pumps, fans and coolants, it has its own integral method of cooling the air flow, which further reduces the structural mass compared to water-cooled power units.
The rotating engine equally offered three flaws.
1). Since he had to work at full speed through all his phases of struggle, he consumed a large amount of fuel.
2). The rotating block, having a significant mass, created a formidable gyroscopic effect, which increased the fast and fast right banks, but resisted by the fact that it was on the left. They were slow and lethargic.
3). Since centrifugal force displaced castor oil after a single stream through the engine, unlike the recirculation method used by the reciprocating type, the range of aircraft was to a certain extent limited by its oil capacity.
The 50-strong seven-cylinder rotary engine Gnome, competing with Antoinette and first appeared in the Paris Salon in 1908, was characterized by a weight of 172 pounds, a 110-mm bore, a 120-mm stroke and turned by 1,100 revolutions per second-minute.
A later version offering improved access to maintenance and a turn at 1300 revolutions per minute generated 70 hp. and then in 1911, burning almost 90 pounds per hour of fuel, as opposed to 50 hp. 44.1, and had a .5-to-1 gallon ratio of fuel consumption to fuel.
The first practical rotor available to aircraft builders, Gnome, produced in abundant quantities, numbering 3,638 units between 1908 and 1913, reached almost all world-wide indicators of speed, height and endurance for a glider powered by, such as London-Manchester, Paris-London, trans-Alps, around the Statue of Liberty, as well as the highway Est, becoming the dominant power plant at the dawn of the First World War. Earned the first significant increase in performance, the rotary engine, as well as the fuselage of the monocoque, introduced technological changes.
Powered by a 160-horsepower, 14-cylinder Gnome double-row rotor, a Deperdussin racer driving a mahogany propeller and facing a large but aerodynamic spinning rod, which seemed to be a front, integral part of the fuselage, the maximum 127- mph airspeed and feverish maneuverability. He was often called the “flying engine”.
The 992-pound aircraft was supported by the ground using a two-wheeled chassis with a central skid.
Racer, like its predecessor Monoplane, retained the standard cabin control wheel of the latter, which from the left or right side activated the wing turning mechanism to control its lateral axis, wires extending from its front and rear longerons directed to the two upper ones - triangular, triangular tapered struts above and lower chassis below. Pulling or pressing, he found elevators for pedal or longitudinal control of the axle, while the steering pedal was controlled by the pedal. The switch, located on the side of the wheel, interrupted the engine power for retreating descents.
Demonstrating and confirming his superior performance, he scored an impressive array of achievements.
On September 9, 1912, for example, on a hot, hot day, Jules Vedriny flew out in his field in a distant circle at a low altitude during the fourth race of Gordon Bennett, winning the prize for the fastest aircraft at 105.5 miles per hour, and Marcel Prevost , circling at a height of 20-30 feet above the ground in its own aircraft of the same type as during the day, took second place. They were the first to exceed 100 miles per hour. All other participants, with the exception of overheating of the Hanriot engine, left the competition the previous evening. Hanniot himself took half the course.
On April 10 of the following year, equipped with a Deperdusin pontoon, again treated by Prevost, won the Schneider trophy in Monaco, the only time in two decades, from 1912 to 1931, that the French had succeeded in doing this.
During the fifth race of Gordon Bennett, held at the Bethany airfield near Reims on September 29, 1913, four aircraft participated, including two Deperdussin Rn riders, equipped with the Le Rhone engine, and a monoplane designed by Alfred Ponier, itself a henncote runner. After Henri Krombez from 10:00 am, Prevot starred in his Depperdussin armrest under the control of Gnome at 11:15, completing the second, third, fourth and fifth laps in two minutes, 50 seconds each and covering a 20-kilometer course lap for 59 minutes, 45 3/5 seconds with an average of 204 km / h, the first of which ever did it in less than an hour, and reached an absolute world speed of 126.67 mph.
The following month, October 27, the Deperdussin flock of Eugene Gilbert won the Henry Doyca de la Meerta air race in Paris.
The Deperdussin Racer was the fastest, most maneuverable, pre-world army.
An example of the Old Rhinebeck airfield, the result of a trip to Paris in 1974, during which Cole Palen and his wife Rita studied, measured, sketched and photographed the plane on a static display in the “Musee de l'Air et de l”, Espace was built at his Florida home during the winter when Cole completed the two frames of the monocoque fuselage before destroying the form he had created before them.
A later restoration by Brad Adams, Ryan Kassens, Bob Mackenzie, John Nadadich, Paul Savastano and Nick Ulfik between 2000 and 2001, was caused by engine hood cracks, flat tires, rusty cable rails, peeling paint and fuel tank paint, and the absence of its power plant Gnome 160 hp
After being transferred from the Pioneer building located on a hill to the Fokker hangar on the field, the aircraft was equipped with a static engine assembled from spare parts and three wooden epoxy-coated valves painted and painted, while the other faults were equally marked.
In the restored appearance, he first appeared in the Civic Center of Westchester County during the Westchester Radio Aero Modelers Show in February 2001.
Due to the high speeds and minimal areas of Deperdussin Racer, Cole decided to limit it to land taxation on the grass field, which would not provide sufficient length for a safe public advertising operation, and today it is often displayed in the courtyard, directly behind the closed entrance to the airfield, elegant , an aerodynamic, high-performance monoplane, radically different from its other pioneering colleagues, embodying advanced step change technology. He proudly displays the functions that make it up.
