The Blériot III was an early French aeroplane built by pioneer aviators

Louis Blériot Louis Charles Joseph Blériot ( , also , ; 1 July 1872 – 1 August 1936) was a French aviator, inventor, and engineer. He developed the first practical headlamp for cars and established a profitable business manufacturing them, using much of th ...

and

Gabriel Voisin Gabriel Voisin (5 February 1880 – 25 December 1973) was a French aviation pioneer and the creator of Europe's first manned, engine-powered, heavier-than-air aircraft capable of a sustained (1 km), circular, controlled flight, which was made ...

. It was later modified and renamed the Blériot IV, but both versions failed to fly.

Design and development

The Blériot III was radically different from what was to become the orthodox design for aircraft, having two large elliptical

closed wing A closed wing is a wing that effectively has two main planes which merge at their ends so that there are no conventional wing tips. Closed wing designs include the annular wing (commonly known as the cylindrical or ring wing), the joined wing, ...

cells in tandem connected by booms. A single transversely mounted 24 hp (18 kW)

Antoinette Antoinette is a given name, that is a diminutive feminine form of Antoine and Antonia (from Latin ''Antonius''). People with the name include: Nobles * Antoinette de Maignelais, Baroness of Villequier by marriage (1434–1474), mistress of C ...

engine mounted on the lower front wing drove two tractor propellers using flexible drive shafts incorporating reduction gearing to reduce the 1,800 rpm of the engine to 600 rpm. The transmission arrangement accounted for 100 kg of the aircraft's 400 kg weight. The undercarriage consisted of a pair of long floats under the front wing cell and a third below the aft wing cell. Blériot and Voisin attempted to fly it from the Lac d'Engheim in May 1906, but the machine would not become airborne. In October they made major changes to the design, adding a rudder to the aft cell, replacing the forward wings with a more conventional biplane arrangement, adding a second engine, and changing the propellers from tractors to pushers. At this point, it was renamed the Blériot IV. Attempts to fly the aircraft as a floatplane were made on 12 and 18 October at Lac d'Engheim. Even with these modifications, the aircraft still refused to leave the ground. They then removed the floats and added a wheeled undercarriage. On 12 November 1906 further attempts at flight were made at the Parc de Bagatelle, but the aircraft hit an obstacle during a ground run and was damaged beyond repair. To underline this failure, Voisin and Blériot were then to witness Santos-Dumont's successful flight in the

14-bis The ''14-bis'' (french: Quatorze-bis), (), also known as ("bird of prey" in French), was a pioneer era, canard-style biplane designed and built by Brazilian aviation pioneer Alberto Santos-Dumont. In 1906, near Paris, the ''14-bis'' made a m ...

, made at Bagatelle the same day.Hallion 2003 p.228 After this failure the partnership between Voisin and Blériot was dissolved, both men preferring to concentrate on their own design ideas. Voisin set up

Appareils d'Aviation Les Frères Voisin Aéroplanes Voisin was a French aircraft manufacturing company established in 1905 by Gabriel Voisin and his brother Charles, and was continued by Gabriel after Charles died in an automobile accident in 1912; the full official company name then ...

with his brother, and Blériot went on to build further experimental aircraft in collaboration with various other people.

Specifications (IV)

References

Bibliography

* Elliot, Brian A. ''Bleriot: Herald of an Age''. Stroud: Tempus, 2000 * Hallion, Richard P. 'Taking Flight''. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. * Taylor, M.J.H. ''Jane's Encyclopedia of Aviation'' London: Studio Editions, 1989, p. 161 * Devaux, Jean and Michel Marani. "Les Douze Premiers Aéroplanes de Louis Blériot". ''Pegase'' No 54, May 1989.

External links

Nova: A Daring Flight

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bleriot 03 1900s French experimental aircraft 3 Twin-engined pusher aircraft Annular-wing aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1906