November 11 1907, after a lot of unsuccessful and unsuccessful flight attempts, the airplane created in Europe for the first time covered a distance of more than a kilometer by air. Aircraft "Voisin" №1, developed by French engineer Gabriel Voisin, flew under the control of the pilot Henri Farman 1030 meters and lasted 114 seconds in the air.
However, compared with the results that the Americans, the Wright brothers, had achieved by that time, this success did not look at all impressive, because Wright's Flyer-3 flew more than 1905 kilometers back in 38, and the flight duration was 39 minutes. In technical terms and in terms of safety, Vyazen's car was also inferior to the Flyer. Unlike him, she was not controlled by a roll, therefore she was very unstable and flew only in calm, since a gust of side wind could overturn her, and the pilot had nothing to fend off the slope.
In addition, "Voisin-Farman" was distinguished by poor maneuverability. It could only make very slow and smooth pancake turns, and its primitive propeller with flat blades cut from aluminum sheets had a much lower efficiency than the carefully calculated Wright propellers with shaped blades. Only in terms of power-to-weight ratio did the French airplane surpass its overseas competitor: it had an eight-cylinder engine of 50 horsepower, and the Flyer had a four-cylinder 30-horsepower engine.
Later, Farman founded his own aircraft manufacturing company and significantly improved Voisin's aircraft, equipping it with a lighter rotary motor and ailerons, thanks to which the device became much more stable and safer, and controllability improved markedly. Already in 1909, Farman on his airplane repeatedly blocked Wright's distance record, flying without landing, first 180, and then 220 km. However, this is another story.
On the screen saver - "Voisin" №1 in four projections. This double unit was the first airplane, which was built in series and went on sale. In total, about 60 copies were released within a year and a half. The car shown in the picture was purchased by the famous American magician Harry Houdini.
Left: Henri Farman and Gabriel Voisin. Right: Farman in the cockpit of his airplane with another pioneer. aviation Ernest Archdeacon.
"Voisin" No. 1 in flight.
"Voisin" №1 and a group of aviators at the airport of Murmelon, where Farman organized the world's first aviation school. The device shown in the photograph did not have a linen skin of the fuselage gondola.
"Voisin" №1 with Farman's mannequin at the helm in the Paris Aviation History Museum.
Gondola close up. The plane was controlled by the steering wheel. Moving it back and forth, the pilot rejected down and the top of the elevator, and the rotation of the steering wheel was transmitted by cable rods to the rudder.
The power plant of the airplane is a 50-horsepower eight-cylinder water-cooled Antoinette engine with a two-bladed metal propeller. Interestingly, the motor did not have a radiator, but only an expansion and cooling tank for water. The plane was not designed for long flights, respectively, the maximum engine operation time did not exceed several minutes, and during this time the water in the cooling system did not have time to boil.