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Aviation History
1912
1912 - 1104.PDF
THE CAUDRON BIPLANE. IT is difficult sometimes to follow with quite the closeness that one could wish the line of thought that the designer has pursued in the evolution of the latest product of his brain. JBut with a* machine like the Caudron there is at least the inspiration of an unusual ap pearance to stir the mind's curiosity to the point of inquiry. You look, for example, at one of those little biplanes that has been doing such good service in the Ewen School at Hendon, and you observe that peculiar little coracle like body that is so curtailed by com parison with the corresponding member i 'f the ordinary tractor-driven machine. It is at once a point of interest, and one is impelled to ask, why is it built as it is ? Its mere presence is a clear in dication that the designer appreciates- the advantage of protecting the pilot and also of stream-lining his body as a means of reducing head resistance. The reason for curtailing the extension that ordinarily forms the backbone to such machines, however, may be due either to one of two causes, either the designer has a prejudice against the Sketch illustrating arrangements of "Flight" Copyright. The body and undercarriage of the Caudron biplane. exposure of a backbone, and particularly a surfaced backbone, to the wind, or the reason may be found in the desire to demonstrate some particular principle in connection with the tail of the machine, which does not lend itself so well to the backbone type. In the Caudron biplane, this latter assumption is more reasonable because the tail is quite one of the most in teresting features of its construction at the same time that it is also one of the most simple. The tail of the machine is large; it spans 10 ft. and has a chord of 5 ft. 3 ins. More important than this is the fact that it is designed to warp in unison with the main planes for the purpose of lateral control, and the warping arrangements are facilitated by the outrigger type of support, by means of which the tail-member in the Caudron biplane is attached to the forward part of that machine. Glancing for a moment at the composite page of sketches that accompany this article, the drawing (5) in the centre thereof illustrates the simple vertical lever that is arranged in front of the pilot, and by means of which he controls the machine in flight. Moving the lever to the left or to the right from its neutral vertical position rocks a shaft that carries the main wing warping-wires attached to it by means of quadrants illustrated in an adjacent sketch (4). At the same time that the handle of the lever moves over, say to the right, the lower extremity of the lever, which projects below ^D El-CVRTO!* details in the warping the Caudron biplane. Front view of the Caudron biplane. 1104 "Flight" Copyrighi
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