Félix du Temple de la Croix
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F̩lix du Temple de la Croix (18 July 1823 Р3 November 1890) (usually simply called F̩lix du Temple) was a French naval officer and an inventor, born into an ancient
Norman Norman or Normans may refer to: Ethnic and cultural identity * The Normans, a people partly descended from Norse Vikings who settled in the territory of Normandy in France in the 10th and 11th centuries ** People or things connected with the Norm ...
family. He developed some of the first flying machines and is credited with the first successful flight of a powered aircraft of any sort, a powered model plane, in 1857. and is sometimes credited with the first manned powered flight in history aboard his
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 planes. A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing confi ...
in 1874. He was a contemporary of
Jean-Marie Le Bris Jean Marie Le Bris (March 25, 1817, Concarneau – February 17, 1872, Douarnenez) was a French aviator, born in Concarneau, Brittany who built two glider aircraft and performed at least one flight on board of his first machine in late 1856. His ...
.


Military life

Félix du Temple entered the French Navy Academy (
École Navale École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Savoi ...
) in 1838. He participated in most of the conflicts during the
Second French Empire The Second French Empire (; officially the French Empire, ), was the 18-year Empire, Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 14 January 1852 to 27 October 1870, between the French Second Republic, Second and the French Third Republic ...
, especially the
Crimean War The Crimean War, , was fought from October 1853 to February 1856 between Russia and an ultimately victorious alliance of the Ottoman Empire, France, the United Kingdom and Piedmont-Sardinia. Geopolitical causes of the war included the de ...
, the French intervention in Italy against Austria, and the French intervention in Mexico. At the age of 41, he returned to France, became a captain (Capitaine de Frégate), and joined the Loire Army (
Armée de la Loire The Armée de la Loire was a French army of the Franco-Prussian War. It was formed in October 1870 by Léon Gambetta, interior minister and minister for war in the Government of National Defence, then taking refuge in Tours after the French d ...
). A partisan of the
Comte de Chambord Henri, Count of Chambord and Duke of Bordeaux (french: Henri Charles Ferdinand Marie Dieudonné d'Artois, duc de Bordeaux, comte de Chambord; 29 September 1820 â€“ 24 August 1883) was disputedly King of France from 2 to 9 August 1830 as Hen ...
and a
legitimist The Legitimists (french: Légitimistes) are royalists who adhere to the rights of dynastic succession to the French crown of the descendants of the eldest branch of the Bourbon dynasty, which was overthrown in the 1830 July Revolution. They re ...
(an "Ultra-Royalist"), he was forced to quit the Navy in 1876.


Flying machine patent

Félix du Temple accomplished the first successful flight of a powered aircraft of any sort, a model plane that was able to take-off under its own power, in 1857. There are however competing claims for the first "assisted" powered flight, with
John Stringfellow John Stringfellow (1799 Р13 December 1883) was a British early aeronautical inventor, known for his work on the aerial steam carriage with William Samuel Henson. Life Stringfellow was born in Attercliffe, England to Martha ̩e Gil ...
's experiments in 1848.''First to Fly'' By Thomas C Parramore, p.46
/ref> Félix du Temple patented the designs for his aerial machine in 1857,''Inventing Flight'' By John David Anderson p.41
/ref> which incorporated a retractable wheel landing gear, a propeller, a 6 hp engine and a dihedral wing design, under the title "Locomotion aérienne par imitation du vol des oiseaux" ("Aerial locomotion by imitation of the flight of birds"). He built several large models together with his brother Luis. One of them, weighing 700 grams, was able to fly, first using a clockwork mechanism as an engine, and then using a miniature
steam engine A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a cylinder. This pushing force can be trans ...
. The two brothers managed to make the models take off under their own power, fly a short distance and land safely. As they tried to build a machine capable of carrying a man, they realized that steam engines lacked power and were too heavy. In 1867 they designed an original "
hot air ''Hot Air'' is a conservative American political blog. It is written by the pseudonymous Allahpundit, Ed Morrissey, John Sexton, and Jazz Shaw. Hot Air was founded by Michelle Malkin, a conservative author and blogger, in 2006, taking over ''h ...
" engine, which did not prove satisfactory. They also experimented with the new internal combustion gas engine design developed by
Lenoir Lenoir may refer to: Locations: * Lenoir, North Carolina, United States * Lenoir County, North Carolina, United States * Lenoir City, Tennessee In Universities: * Lenoir-Rhyne University * Lenoir Dining Hall, a dining hall at the University of N ...
, but this also lacked the necessary power. Du Temple continued his research and finally succeeded in creating a very compact high-speed circulation steam engine, for which he applied for a patent on 28 April 1876. The engine used very small pipes packed together "to obtain the highest possible contact surface for the smallest possible volume" : "When he began with the aid of his brother, M. Louis du Temple, to experiment on a large scale, the inadequacy of all motors then known became apparent. They first tried steam at very high pressures, then a hot-air engine, and finally built and patented, in 1876 a very light steam boiler weighing from 39 to 44 lb. to the horse power, which appears to have been the prototype of some of the light boilers which have since been constructed. It consisted in a series of very thin tubes less than 1/8 inches in internal diameter, through which water circulated very rapidly, and was flashed into steam by the surrounding flame." Octave Chanute, ''Aeroplanes: Part III'', August 1892


The "Monoplane"

In 1874, the two brothers built the ''
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 planes. A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing confi ...
'', a large plane made of
aluminium Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. I ...
in
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,
France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
, with a
wingspan The wingspan (or just span) of a bird or an airplane is the distance from one wingtip to the other wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777–200 has a wingspan of , and a wandering albatross (''Diomedea exulans'') caught in 1965 had a wingspan of ...
of 13 meters and a weight of only 80 kilograms (without the pilot). Several trials were made with the plane, and it is generally recognized that it achieved lift off under its own power after a ski-jump run, glided for a short time and returned safely to the ground, possibly making it the first successful powered flight in history, depending on the definition — since the flight was only a short distance and a short time. The plane was displayed at the 1878 World Fair (
Exposition Universelle (1878) The third Paris World's Fair, called an Exposition Universelle in French, was held from 1 May to 10 November 1878. It celebrated the recovery of France after the 1870–71 Franco-Prussian War. Construction The buildings and the fairgroun ...
) in Paris.


High-circulation steam engine

The plane's engine used a very compact, high-speed circulation steam boiler, the
Du Temple boiler Three-drum boilers are a class of water-tube boiler used to generate steam, typically to power ships. They are compact and of high evaporative power, factors that encourage this use. Other boiler designs may be more efficient, although bulkier, a ...
, for which Félix du Temple applied for a patent on 28 April 1876. The engine used very small pipes packed together "to obtain the highest possible contact surface for the smallest possible volume". The original steam engine which had been developed by Félix du Temple was later commercialized by him from a company he established in
Cherbourg Cherbourg (; , , ), nrf, Chèrbourg, ) is a former commune and subprefecture located at the northern end of the Cotentin peninsula in the northwestern French department of Manche. It was merged into the commune of Cherbourg-Octeville on 28 Feb ...
, "Générateur Du Temple S.A." and became highly successful. The design was adopted by the
French Navy The French Navy (french: Marine nationale, lit=National Navy), informally , is the maritime arm of the French Armed Forces and one of the five military service branches of France. It is among the largest and most powerful naval forces in t ...
for the propulsion of the first French
torpedo boat A torpedo boat is a relatively small and fast naval ship designed to carry torpedoes into battle. The first designs were steam-powered craft dedicated to ramming enemy ships with explosive spar torpedoes. Later evolutions launched variants of se ...
s: : "Officers and engineers have now made up their opinion regarding Du Temple's steam engine. Everybody proclaims the superiority of its qualities… orders are pouring in from our commercial harbours and from the French government." Revue Maritime 1888 (''L’opinion est faite aujourd’hui sur la chaudière Du Temple parmi les officiers et les ingénieurs. Tout le monde proclame ses qualités supérieures… les commandes affluent de nos ports de commerce et de la part du gouvernement français''.)


Industrial legacy

Following his death in 1890, his successors took over the management of the company. "Générateur Du Temple S.A.", acquired the Lesénéchal company in 1905, and by 1918 had several hundred employees when it was absorbed by the shipbuilding company Société Normande de Construction Navale.


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See also

*
List of early flying machines Early flying machines include all forms of aircraft studied or constructed before the development of the modern aeroplane by 1910. The story of modern flight begins more than a century before the first successful manned aeroplane, and the earl ...
*
Timeline of aviation - 19th century A timeline is a display of a list of events in chronological order. It is typically a graphic design showing a long bar labelled with dates paralleling it, and usually contemporaneous events. Timelines can use any suitable scale representin ...
*
History of aviation The history of aviation extends for more than two thousand years, from the earliest forms of aviation such as kites and attempts at tower jumping to supersonic and hypersonic flight by powered, heavier-than-air jets. Kite flying in Chin ...


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External links


Flying machines
{{DEFAULTSORT:Du Temple 19th-century French inventors History of aviation Steam-powered aircraft 1823 births 1890 deaths