The Starck AS-27 Starcky was a

racing In sports, racing is a competition of speed, in which competitors try to complete a given task in the shortest amount of time. Typically this involves traversing some distance, but it can be any other task involving speed to reach a specific g ...

single seat

biplane A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While ...

of unusual wing layout with full stagger and a small gap. It was designed and 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 1970s; only one was made.

Design and development

André Starck had built the Starck AS-20, a biplane with heavy stagger and small gap, in 1942, guided by the pre-

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 ...

studies of Miroslav Nenadovitch. Conventional biplanes have interplane gaps significantly greater than their wing chord to minimise the usually deleterious inter-wing interactions; Nenadovitch sought to take advantage of the interaction to produce a wing pair that acted rather like a single, monoplane wing with slotted flaps. The AS-27 followed the same plan but introduced

wing tip A wing tip (or wingtip) is the part of the wing that is most distant from the fuselage of a fixed-wing aircraft. Because the wing tip shape influences the size and drag of the wingtip vortices, tip design has produced a diversity of sha ...

end-plates or "curtains" bearing the

ailerons An aileron (French for "little wing" or "fin") is a hinged flight control surface usually forming part of the trailing edge of each wing of a fixed-wing aircraft. Ailerons are used in pairs to control the aircraft in roll (or movement around ...

, used again in the later AS-37. The AS-27 was an all-wood aircraft with Finnish

ply PLY is a computer file format known as the Polygon File Format or the Stanford Triangle Format. It was principally designed to store three-dimensional data from 3D scanners. The data storage format supports a relatively simple description of a s ...

covering. The upper wings were attached to the

fuselage The fuselage (; from the French language, French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds Aircrew, crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an Aircraft engine, engine as wel ...

shoulder wing 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 config ...

position and the lower ones to the lower fuselage, leaving a gap of about 400 mm (16 in). The stagger placed the

trailing edge The trailing edge of an aerodynamic surface such as a wing is its rear edge, where the airflow separated by the leading edge meets.Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Terms, third edition'', page 521. Aviation Supplies & Academics, 1997. ...

of the upper wing above the lower wing's

leading edge The leading edge is the part of the wing that first contacts the air;Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Terms, third edition'', page 305. Aviation Supplies & Academics, 1997. alternatively it is the foremost edge of an airfoil sectio ...

. The upper plane had a longer span and wider chord than the lower one. There were no traditional

interplane strut In aeronautics, bracing comprises additional structural members which stiffen the functional airframe to give it rigidity and strength under load. Bracing may be applied both internally and externally, and may take the form of struts, which act in ...

s; instead, the

s were joined by "curtains", approximately parallelogram-shaped airfoil structures the width of the lower wing. Because of the span difference, these leaned outwards at 45°, allowing them to carry

on their trailing edges. In addition, it was claimed, these provided the lateral stability more usually secured with dihedral as well as producing additional lift. The fuselage and empennage of the AS-27 were conventional, with its

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 ...

over the lower wing. Its fixed

conventional undercarriage Conventional landing gear, or tailwheel-type landing gear, is an aircraft undercarriage consisting of two main wheels forward of the center of gravity and a small wheel or skid to support the tail.Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Ter ...

had arched

leaf spring A leaf spring is a simple form of spring (device), spring commonly used for suspension (vehicle), suspension in wheeled vehicles. Originally called a ''laminated'' or ''carriage spring'', and sometimes referred to as a semi-elliptical spring, e ...

cantilever A cantilever is a rigid structural element that extends horizontally and is unsupported at one end. Typically it extends from a flat vertical surface such as a wall, to which it must be firmly attached. Like other structural elements, a cantilev ...

main legs with cable bracing, together with a steerable tailwheel. It had a 78 kW (105 hp)

Potez 4E The Potez 4E is a French air-cooled flat-four piston engine of the 1960s. It was unveiled at the 1959 Paris Air Show, entered production in 1960 and is rated at 78 kW (105 hp). It remained in production until 1965 when Potez abandoned ...

flat four engine A flat-four engine, also known as a horizontally opposed-four engine or boxer engine, is a four-cylinder piston engine with two banks of cylinders lying on opposite sides of a common crankshaft. The most common type of flat-four engine is the box ...

in its long nose, closely cowled with prominent bulges enclosing the cylinder heads. There were two fuel tanks, one ahead and one aft of the cockpit. The AS-27 was built by Claude Chevassut and his son. It made its first flight in the summer of 1975, piloted by Robert Buisson at

Chavenay Chavenay (), also known as ''Vallon de Chavenay'', is a commune in the Yvelines department in the Île-de-France region in north-central France. It is located close to Saint-Nom-la-Bretèche, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, and Versailles. Twin towns ...

Specifications

References

{{Starck aircraft 1970s French sport aircraft Biplanes Single-engined tractor aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1975