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28-522: The Vickers Vireo was an experimental low wing all-metal monoplane built to explore both all-metal service aircraft and the use of catapult launched ship board fighters. Only one was built. The Vickers-Wibault construction method was based on the patents of Michel Wibault , who began working with Vickers in 1922. It was a way of producing an all-metal aircraft with an airframe built up from simple, non-machined metal shapes, covered by very thin 0.4 millimetres (0.016 in) corrugated light alloy sheets. On

56-440: A chain of about a hundred grocery shops. They had three sons and three daughters. At the age of four, Michel was disabled by polio affecting all his limbs. As a result, he did not attend school, and was entirely home- and self-educated. He also had a German nanny. His disability precluded him from military service. During his childhood he often visited La Brayelle Airfield , where the world's first aviation meeting took place. It

84-593: A lower deck bar and restaurant was named the Air-Wibault 1.00. The prototype was completed, but only three engines could be obtained, and it was destroyed in an air raid on the Arsenal works at Villacoublay on 3 June 1940. It is said that Wibault himself set fire to it to stop it falling into German hands. On 17 June 1940 Wibault escaped with his wife Marie-Rose from Paris to London where Charles de Gaulle appointed him as technical director of France Forever ,

112-657: A major role in the plot of the 1927 thriller So Disdained by Nevil Shute . In 1919 he founded the Compagnie des messageries aériennes , which evolved into Air France . Over the years, his aircraft set several records. A Breguet plane made the first nonstop crossing of the South Atlantic in 1927. Another made a 4,500-mile (7,200 km) flight across the Atlantic Ocean in 1933, the longest nonstop Atlantic flight up to that time. He returned to his work on

140-705: A model which was successfully tested in the Eiffel aerodynamic laboratory . With French engineer Paul Boccaccio, in 1918 he designed and built his first aeroplane, the Wibault-Boccaccio & Cie C.1 fighter powered by a 220hp Hispano-Suiza engine. Tests were very successful, achieving a top speed of 237km/h and an altitude of 7,500m, but development was abandoned at the end of the war. In 1919 Wibault founded Société des Avions Michel Wibault at Billancourt , with various aircraft, mostly parasol monoplanes of Duralumin construction, flying from 1920. At first

168-563: A support organisation for de Gaulle in the USA, and he was very active in the group. Moving to America, Wibault joined Republic Aviation where he worked with the company’s major driving force and chief designer Alexander Kartveli . Kartveli, a Soviet émigré, had trained at an aviation school in Paris and then worked for Louis Bleriot , and for the Wibault company, leaving for America in 1927, and

196-593: A two-bladed propeller. The specification called for the fitting of either wheels or floats and both were used, though the Vireo took its Ministry tests as a landplane. These tests began at RAF Martlesham Heath a month after the initial flights in March 1928. The long gap between the tender submission in December 1925 and the first flight was partly because the novel structure had undergone structural and aerodynamic tests at

224-481: A vertical take-off and landing ground-attack Gyropter using the most powerful turboshaft engine then available, a Bristol Orion , driving four centrifugal compressors mounted on the sides of the airframe around the centre of gravity . The compressor outlet nozzles were able to swivel between pointing straight down for take-off and landing, and pointing horizontally backwards for forward flight. He obtained patents for his vectored thrust design. Unable to interest

252-511: The Legion of Honour . He died in the 16th arrondissement of Paris on 23 January 1963. Louis Charles Breguet Louis Charles Breguet was the grandson of Louis-Francois-Clement Breguet , and great-great-grandson of the famous horologist Abraham-Louis Breguet . In 1902 Louis married Nelly Girardet, the daughter of painter Eugène Girardet . They had five children together. In 1903, he graduated from École supérieure d'électricité , which

280-610: The Royal Aircraft Establishment . There were a few minor incidents during the tests but more serious was a tendency to drop heavily at touchdown, which led to some rear fuselage damage. This was later attributed to root interference of the highly cambered wing leading to nasty stall characteristics. Nevertheless, by July the Vireo was on board HMS  Furious for deck landing trials. The Air Ministry's interest in low-powered on-board fighters, catapult-launched to compensate for their small engines, waned when

308-781: The Vickers Wibault Scout (based on the Wibault 7 ) - 26 of which were bought by the Chilean Air Force - the Vickers Vireo and Jockey fighters, and the Viastra , Vellore and Vellox civil transports. In 1930 French shipbuilders Penhoët (Chantiers St. Nazaire) funded construction of the Wibault-Penhoët 280-T low-wing trimotor transport. This was the first of a series of airliners that

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336-655: The French government or industry in the idea, in 1955 Wibault submitted it to the NATO Mutual Weapons Development Programme and was subsequently introduced to Stanley Hooker who was then technical director of Bristol Engines . Soon Wibault agreed to work with Bristol, and they worked to lighten and simplify the engine design, leading to a new patent in 1957, jointly authored by Michel Wibault and Hooker’s assistant, Gordon Lewis . Meanwhile, Hawker’s chief designer Sidney Camm , noting

364-607: The French in World War I and through the 1920s. One of the pioneers in the construction of metal aircraft, the Breguet 14 single-engined day bomber, perhaps one of the most widely used French warplanes of its time, had an airframe constructed almost entirely of aluminium structural members. As well as the French, sixteen squadrons of the American Expeditionary Force also used it. A plane of this type has

392-478: The Vireo proved no faster than the conventional ship board aircraft like the Fairey IIIF . The Vireo experience gave Vickers enough confidence in all-metal fighters to proceed with their later Jockey and Venom designs. Data from General characteristics Performance Armament Michel Wibault Michel Henri Marie Joseph Wibault (born 5 June 1897, died 23 January 1963)

420-449: The aircraft were all military types, with Wibault turning to civil transports from 1930. Wibault became a consulting engineer for Vickers , starting in 1922. As a pioneer of metal construction for which he held patents, he closely followed the design methods of Hugo Junkers and Caudius Dornier . Wibault and Vickers jointly developed more metal construction patents. By 1925 Vickers had adopted Wibault’s construction methods, and produced

448-657: The gyroplane in 1935. Created with co-designer René Dorand, the craft, called the Gyroplane Laboratoire , flew by a combination of blade flapping and feathering. On 22 December 1935 it established a speed record of 67 mph (108 km/h). It was the first to demonstrate speed as well as good control characteristics. The next year, it set an altitude record of 517 feet (158 m). Breguet remained an important manufacturer of aircraft during World War II and afterwards developed commercial transports. Breguet’s range equation , for determining aircraft range ,

476-439: The nose fell away, giving it a slightly humped look. The flying surfaces were all without external bracing; the wing was tapered, of deep section and incorporated twin machine guns. The horizontal stabiliser had a straight leading edge but tapered at the rear. There was a square topped, balanced rudder but no fin. The Vireo was powered by an uncowled 230 horsepower (170 kW) Armstrong Siddeley Lynx IV radial engine, driving

504-727: The success of the Ryan X-13 Vertijet , had developed an interest in VTOL aircraft, which he expressed in a letter to Hooker, and thus the scene was set for the development of the Bristol Siddeley Pegasus engine. This was at the heart of the Hawker P.1127 design that evolved into the Hawker Siddeley Harrier . In March 1930 he married Marie-Rose Boistel. In 1931 he was appointed a Chevalier of

532-480: The war, Wibault divided his time between New York and Paris. He became increasingly interested in vertical take-off and landing ( VTOL ) aircraft, with projects ranging from interceptors to large airliners, most of which he classified as a “Gyropter” (French – “Gyroptère”). His starting point was a circular aircraft comparable to the Avro Canada VZ-9 Avrocar . In 1954, one of his projects was for

560-405: The wings, the corrugations were aligned along the chord and longitudinally on the fuselage. The resulting fuselage was not monocoque but was internally braced and the skin on the wings was not stressed. Panels were riveted to each other and to the underlying structure. Vickers first experience of the method was with the licence built Wibault Scout . The first Vickers design using this construction

588-583: Was a French aircraft designer. He was a strong advocate of metal construction, and his airliners were important in the development of French commercial aviation in the 1930s. He is especially known for his invention of vectored thrust for aircraft, which led to the development of the V/STOL Hawker Siddeley Harrier . Michel Wibault was born in Douai , near Lille , France , on 5 June 1897 to Achille and Madelaine Wibault. Achille owned

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616-686: Was a strong proponent of metal construction methods. For Republic, Wibault worked on the design of the XF-12 Rainbow , and the RC-3 Seabee . While in New York in 1940, Wibault met Winthrop Rockefeller , the billionaire politician and philanthropist, who was to finance Wibault for the rest of his career, mainly through an entity called the Vibrane Corporation which supported him and sponsored his US patent applications. After

644-629: Was also not a free flight, as four men were used to steady the structure. He built his first fixed-wing aircraft, the Breguet Type I , in 1909, flying it successfully before crashing it at the Grande Semaine d'Aviation held at Reims. In 1911, he founded the Société anonyme des ateliers d’aviation Louis Breguet . In 1912, Breguet constructed his first hydroplane . He is especially known for his development of reconnaissance aircraft used by

672-506: Was home to the workshops of Louis Breguet whom he met and with whom he later formed a lasting acquaintance. In August 1914 Douai was captured by the Germans, and German officers occupied the family mansion. Michel made visits to the occupied La Brayelle airfield. The Germans took little notice of the disabled young man and, understanding German, he was able to observe the activities and take extensive notes. He also met Anthony Fokker , who

700-561: Was staying with family friends while demonstrating his designs to the Germans. Michel built his own wind tunnel for testing models. Disliking the Germans, he was able to move to Belgium and then to Switzerland where he developed his ideas. In March 1917 Wibault presented a fighter design to Lieutenant-Colonel Émile Dorand , Director of the Technical Section of Military Aeronautics (STAé) in Paris, and with financial assistance from his maternal uncle, made in December 1917, built

728-418: Was the Vireo. The Vireo (named after a Latin word thought to mean Greenfinch) was built to Air Ministry specification 17/25 , intended to evaluate both all-metal aircraft and low powered, catapult launched, carrier borne fighters. It was a low-winged single-engined monoplane of rather angular appearance with a flat-sided, deep fuselage except immediately aft of the engine. Forward of the overwing open cockpit

756-460: Was the top electrical engineering school in France. In 1905, with his brother Jacques, and under the guidance of Charles Richet , he began work on a gyroplane (the forerunner of the helicopter ) with flexible wings. On 29 September 1907, at his workshop at La Brayelle , it achieved the first ascent of a vertical-flight aircraft with a pilot, albeit only to a height of 0.6 metres (2.0 ft). It

784-700: Was vitally important to the development of commercial aviation in France in the 1930s. The collaboration was successful, with Penhoët merging with Wibault in 1931, forming the Chantiers Aeronautiques Wibault-Penhoët. Then in 1934 Wibault-Penhoët itself was sold to Breguet , which went on to produce several Wibault designs. In 1937 the French Air Ministry awarded Wibault a contract for a large four-engined double-deck airliner carrying up to 72 passengers. An early version, carrying 25 passengers in some luxury, including

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