The Caudron C.109 was a light utility aircraft built in
France
France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...
in the late 1920s.
Design and development
The C.109 was a
parasol-winged braced
monoplane
A monoplane is a fixed-wing aircraft configuration with a single mainplane, in contrast to a biplane or other types of multiplanes, which have multiple wings.
A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing con ...
of conventional configuration with fixed tailskid
undercarriage
Undercarriage is the part of a moving vehicle that is underneath the main body of the vehicle. The term originally applied to this part of a horse-drawn carriage, and usage has since broadened to include:
*The landing gear of an aircraft.
*The ch ...
. The pilot and single passenger sat in tandem open
cockpit
A cockpit or flight deck is the area, on the front part of an aircraft, spacecraft, or submersible, from which a pilot controls the vehicle.
The cockpit of an aircraft contains flight instruments on an instrument panel, and the controls th ...
s. C.109s were used in a number of record attempts of the day,
and were used to set distance records in the under 350 kg class of 868 km on 19 May 1927 (piloted by Juste Thoret), and 1,581 km on 27 October 1927 (piloted by Max Knipping), a women's duration record of 26 hours 47 minutes on 27 July 1929 (piloted by
Maryse Bastié
Maryse Bastié (; 27 February 1898 – 6 July 1952) was a French aviator who set several international records for female aviators during the 1930s.
Early life
She was born Marie-Louise Bombec in Limoges, Haute-Vienne; Bastié's father died ...
), and the first crossing of Mediterranee by a woman,
Léna Bernstein
Léna Bernstein (1906–1932) was the first woman to fly across the Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the ...
(19 August 1929), 2,268 km.
[
]
Survivors
At least one aircraft survived to fly postwar, ''F-PFLN'', ''F-AIQI'' prewar, being airworthy at Mitry-Mory airfield near Paris in 1957. This aircraft is held in the collection of the Musée de l'Air et de l'Espace
The Musée de l'air et de l'espace (, ) is a French aerospace museum, located at the south-eastern edge of Paris–Le Bourget Airport, north of Paris, and in the Communes of France, commune of Le Bourget. It was inaugurated in 1919 after a propo ...
at Le Bourget
Le Bourget () is a commune in the northeastern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the center of Paris.
The commune features Le Bourget Airport, which in turn hosts the Musée de l'Air et de l'Espace (Air and Space Museum). A very ...
but is not currently on public display.
Variants
;C.109
:Two-seat light utility aircraft.Anzani 6-cylinder
Alessandro Anzani developed the first two-row radial from his earlier 3- cylinder Y engine by merging two onto the same crankshaft with a common crankweb.
Development
By December 1909 Anzani had a 3-cylinder air-cooled true radial engine runn ...
radial engine.[
;C.117
:Fitted with a Salmson 5Ac radial engine.]
Operators
;
*French Air Force
The French Air and Space Force (, , ) is the air force, air and space force of the French Armed Forces. Formed in 1909 as the ("Aeronautical Service"), a service arm of the French Army, it became an independent military branch in 1934 as the Fr ...
Specifications (C.109)
References
Bibliography
*
Further reading
*
*
{{Caudron aircraft
C.109
1920s French civil utility aircraft
Single-engined tractor aircraft
Parasol-wing aircraft
Aircraft first flown in 1925