The Caudron C.270 ''Luciole'' ("Firefly") was a sporting, touring and trainer aircraft produced in France in the 1930s, derived from the C.230.

Design and construction

It was a conventional biplane with single-bay, unstaggered wings of equal span. The pilot and a single passenger sat in tandem open cockpits. It featured a fabric-covered fuselage in place of the C.230's wooden one, and other refinements including revised control surfaces and undercarriage, and an improved and simplified wing-folding mechanism.

Operational history

The type proved immensely successful, with over 700 machines built in the decade leading up to

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. Of these, 296 were purchased by the French government for its pilot training programme, the ''

Aviation Populaire Aviation includes the activities surrounding mechanical flight and the aircraft industry. ''Aircraft'' include fixed-wing and rotary-wing types, morphable wings, wing-less lifting bodies, as well as lighter-than-air aircraft such as hot ai ...

''. Many examples saw wartime service as liaison aircraft, and those surviving the conflict saw postwar use as glider tugs in the ''Ecole de l'Air''.

On film

20th Century Fox 20th Century Studios, Inc., formerly 20th Century Fox, is an American film studio, film production and Film distributor, distribution company owned by the Walt Disney Studios (division), Walt Disney Studios, the film studios division of the ...

used two Lucioles in their 1966 film ''

The Blue Max ''The Blue Max'' is a 1966 war film , WW I film directed by John Guillermin and starring George Peppard, James Mason, Ursula Andress, Karl Michael Vogler, and Jeremy Kemp. The film was made in DeLuxe Color and was one of the last movies filme ...

''. These had the rear seat converted into a machine-gun position so that they look like British observation planes. One of these survives on the American registry. *

United Artists United Artists (UA) is an American film production and film distribution, distribution company owned by Amazon MGM Studios. In its original operating period, it was founded in February 1919 by Charlie Chaplin, D. W. Griffith, Mary Pickford an ...

used one Luciole for their film ''

Von Richthofen and Brown ''Von Richthofen and Brown'', alternatively titled ''The Red Baron'', is a 1971 American war film directed by Roger Corman and starring John Phillip Law and Don Stroud as Manfred von Richthofen and Roy Brown (RAF officer), Roy Brown. Although na ...

'' (released in 1971). *

EMI Films Canal+ Image International (formerly known as EMI Films, Thorn EMI Screen Entertainment, Lumiere Pictures and Television, and UGC DA) was a British-French film, television, animation studio and distributor. A former subsidiary of the EMI congl ...

used one Luciole for the 1976 film ''

Aces High Aces High may refer to: *Aces High (comics), ''Aces High'' (comics), a comic book series by EC Comics *Aces High (video game), ''Aces High'' (video game), a combat flight simulator/massively multiplayer online game *Aces High (film), ''Aces High'' ...

'', this time reconverted to look like a British

Avro 504 The Avro 504 is a single-engine biplane bomber made by the Avro, Avro aircraft company and under licence by others. Production during World War I totalled 8,970 and continued for almost 20 years, making it the most-produced aircraft of any kind ...

.Mark Carlson, ''Flying on Film: A Century of Aviation in the Movies, 1912–2012'' Duncan, Oklahoma: BearManor Media, 2012. .

Variants

* C.270 - first production version with

Salmson 7A Between 1920 and 1951 the Société des Moteurs Salmson in France developed and built a series of widely used air-cooled aircraft engines.Gunston 1986, p. 158. Design and development After their successful water-cooled radial engines, developed ...

c radial engine (82 built) ** C.270/1 - version with Salmson 7Ac2 engine * C.271 - version with

Lorraine 5P The Lorraine 5P, also called the Lorraine 100CV, Lorraine 110CV and Lorraine 120CV, was a family of five-cylinder air-cooled radial engines designed and built in France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily ...

c engine (1 built) ** C.271/2 - version with Lorraine 5Pb engine * C.272 - version with

Renault 4P The Renault 4P, also called the Renault Bengali Junior, was a series of air-cooled 4-cylinder inverted inline aero engines designed and built in France from 1927, which produced from to . Design and development Charles Lindbergh's Atlantic Ocea ...

b inline engine (52 built) ** C.272/2 - version with Renault 4Pci engine and taller, more pointed tail fin (22 built) ** C.272/3 - version with Renault 4Pdi engine and wheel brakes (15 built) ** C.272/4 - version with Renault 4Pei engine and wheel brakes (21 built) ** C.272/5 - version with Renault 4Pgi engine (80 built) * C.273 - version with Michel 4A-14 engine (14 built) * C.274 - version with Chaise 4Ba engine for 1932 Paris

Salon de l'Aéronautique The Paris Air Show (, ''Salon du Bourget'') is a trade fair and air show held in odd years at Paris–Le Bourget Airport in France. Organized by the French aerospace industry's primary representative body, the ''Groupement des industries frança ...

(1 built) * C.275 - main production version derived from C.272/5 but without wing folding (433 built) * C.276 - version with

de Havilland Gipsy The de Havilland Gipsy is a British air-cooled four-cylinder in-line aircraft engine designed by Frank Halford in 1927 to replace the ADC Cirrus in the de Havilland DH.60 Moth light biplane. Initially developed as an upright 5 litre ( ...

III engine ** C.276H - version with

Hirth HM 504 The Hirth HM 504 is a four-cylinder air-cooled inverted inline engine. The HM 504 was a popular engine for light aircraft of the 1930s-1940s, and it was used to power a number of Germany's trainer aircraft of World War II. The engine featured a ...

A-2 engine (2 re-engined from C.276) * C.277 - similar to C.272/4 with non-folding wings (9 built) ** C.272R - C.275 re-engined with Renault 4Po3 after the war (1 converted) * C.278 - version with new undercarriage and Salmson 9Nc engine to compete in

Challenge 1932 The Challenge 1932 was the third Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, FAI International Tourist Plane Competition (), that took place between 12 and August 28, 1932, in Berlin, Germany. The four Challenges, from 1929 to 1934, were major aviat ...

(1 built)

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 ...

; *

Spanish Republican Air Force The Spanish Republican Air Force was the air arm of the Armed Forces of the Second Spanish Republic, the legally established government of Spain between 1931 and 1939. Initially divided into two branches: Military Aeronautics () and Naval Aeron ...

Specifications (C.272)

References

Bibliography

* * *

External links

Caudron aircraft on Aviafrance.com
{{Caudron aircraft 1930s French sport aircraft C.270 Biplanes Single-engined tractor aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1931