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Aviation History
1960
1960 - 0832.PDF
840 FLIGHT, 17 June 1960 FRANCE'S AIRCRAFT INDUSTRY The Equipment Industry - .? The four-wheel Messier undercarriage for the Das- sault Mirage IV supersonic attack aircraft. The lower airbrake surface is ex- tended ahead of the well AT least 200 companies produce aero-/\ nautical equipment in France, but •L -^- for the majority of them the aircraftindustry is not the main outlet. The total manpower in these companies is between80,000 and 100,000 but only 18,000 to 20,000 are engaged on aircraft work—about one quarter of the total manpower of the aircraft industry itself. These figuresgive only a broad indication, partly because the border between aircraft and other fieldscan hardly be defined—for example, in such areas as metallurgy—and partly be-cause the distinction between aeronautical and other work is rarely clearly distin-guished within the companies themselves. There are several industrial associationsfor the equipment producers, including the equipment section of the Union Syndicaledes Industries Aeronautiques (equivalent to the British SBAC) and SEMA (Syndicatdes Equipements et Materiels Aero- nautiques), of which all the relevant com-panies are members. The SPER is an organization reserved for the electronicscompanies. Financial results are difficult to deter-mine, bat the estimated turnover of 50,000,000,000 old francs per year accordsreasonably well both with the number of people employed and the funds allocatedin the Government budget and by private customers. According to the proportion of theirtotal activity devoted to aircraft products, the companies may be divided into threecategories. At the head of the list are those companies which are 100 per cent aero-nautical, among them the makers of flight instruments, autopilots and related equip-ment, such as SFENA, SFIM, Intertech- nique and St Chamond Granat. Thesecompanies together do not represent more than 10 per cent of the industry. SFENAconcentrates mainly on gyroscopic equip- ment for flight control and navigation andemploys between 500 and 600 people. Its turnover last year was 1,600,000,000 oldfrancs. Next come the companies whose aero-nautical activity accounts for anything between 10 and 90 per cent of their busi-ness and who often use their aeronautical experience in their other activities. Forexample, Messier devotes 90 per cent of its activities to the design and productionof aircraft undercarriages and hydraulic equipment. It has 2,000 employees. Zenith,another example, specializes in engine fuel- supply and divides its attention more orless evenly between aircraft and motor cars. Equally in the 50 per cent aeronauticalcategory are ABG, Air Equipement, Ermeto Guiot, Jacottet, KLG, Le Bozec et Gautier,Radio Energie, Simmonds, SKF, Tecale- mit, AMA, Ducellier, Faure Hermann,Jaeger, Labinal, Paris Rhone, Ragonot, SGE, Souriau, SEMCA and others.SAMM, Alkan and others concentrate partly on armaments. The final category could be said to coverthose companies whose aeronautical activ- ity represents a very small fraction of thetotal, but who are necessarily involved because they possess certain vital tech-niques and skills. Kleber-Colombes and Dunlop, for example, make aircraft tyres.There are the battery manufacturers: COMPANIES AND THEIR PRODUCTS ABG, 3 Impasse Thoreton, Paris IS: Ignitionequipment for piston and jet engines; fire detec- tors; fuel-heating regulators.Accumulateurs Fixes et de Traction, Route Nationale, Romainville, Seine: Voltablocbatteries. Accumulateurs Tudor, 16 Rue de la Beaume,Paris 8: Lead-acid batteries. Aerazur, 58 Boulevard Gallieni, Issy-les-Moulineaux, Seine: Parachutes; pressurized and anti-g suits; inflatable liferafts.Air-Co, 240 Rue Gabriel-Peri, Colombes, Seine: Electrical connectors. Air Equipement, 18 Rue Basly, Asnieres, Seine:Generators, starters, motors and electrical equipment; accessory gearboxes and jacks;de-icing equipment; winches; radio and navi- gation equipment; Bendix Corporation licence.Aivaz, 11 Rue Jules Ferry, Suresnes, Seine: Tanks, radiators and light metalwork.Alkan et Cie, 50 Rue Claude Vellefaux, Paris 10: Flight controls, autopilots; armament.Alsthom, 24 Rue des Petits Hotels, Paris 10: Plexiglas. AMA, 1 Boulevard Bineau, Levallois Perret,Seine: Engine controls and instrument panels; oil systems; cooling, air-conditioning, filtration,heat exchangers. Amortisseur Apex, 4-6 Rue Duhesme, Paris 18:Shock mountings. Appareillage Aeronautique, 16 Rue Nansouty,Paris 14: Pressure flight-instruments, pressure heads; engine thrust-loss indicators; air-drivengyro instruments, suction systems, instrument panels; Sperry licence for air-driven gyros andSpecialties IVSI. Applications du Roulement, 2 Rue Breguet,Paris 11: Roller bearings and joints for controls and engines; normal and high-precision bear-ings for gyros, radars and generators. Artus, 25 Rue Ganneron, Paris 18: Electricmotors; static and rotary convenors. Auxilec, 188 Rue d'Estienned'Orves, Colombes,Seine: AC electrical apparatus; convenors, alternators; current and frequency regulators;motors and transformers. Aviac, 26 Avenue Trudaine, Paris 9: Mechani-cal and electrical remote controls; rivets. Avialex, 85 Boulevard de la Republique,Chatou, Seine-et-Oise: Air-conditioning, heat- ing, de-icing and anti-icing; safety devices,ground heaters; sheet-metal work; electrical, electro-mechanical and electronic equipment;SFI flight-control system under US licence. Barbier Benard et Turenne, 82 Rue Curial,Paris 19: Aerodrome lighting and beacons. Bergougnan, 9 Rue Villaret de Joyeuse, Paris17: Industrial rubber and inflatable equipment. Blanc et Cie, 12 Rue Soleillet, Paris 20:Assembly equipment; precision bolting matrices. Bonlonnerie Calibree, 347 Avenue VictorHugo, Valence, Drome: Bolts and fastenings for aircraft. Boor, 14 Rue des Annelet, Paris 19: Electriccables and wiring. Brion, Leroux et Cie, 40 Quai de Jemmapes,Paris 10: Electrical measuring equipment and flight instruments; transducers and magneticamplifiers. Le Bronze Industrie! Rene Loiseau et Cie,49 Rue de Paris, Bobigny, Seine: Copper alloy components for engines, nacelles and under- Chausson and its specialized departmentSECAN provide their particular skill with heat exchangers; Triplex and Alsthom con-tribute glass and transparent plastics and the Compagnie Generate du Duralumin etdu Cuivre metals. Particularly significant has been thedevelopment, by Government-sponsored programme, of a complete range of French-built aircraft equipment since World War 2, making the aircraft industry vir-tually independent of directly imported items. More recently, this activity has beenconsiderably expanded by the acquisition of numerous production licences fromAmerica and Britain, but production licences have also been sold abroad andexports are being energetically encouraged. In many fields the French companies haveshown themselves to be second to none. There is now close co-operation betweenFrench, British and Italian companies. Exports for the whole equipment industryincluding electronics during 1959 were about 6,500,000,000 old francs. Producers of electronic equipment num-ber probably about ten, the largest being CSF and Compagnie Francaise Thomson-Houston. Both have made considerable advances in radar, produce fire-control andground-based surveillance radars and both are associated with major British electroniccompanies. CFTH is the co-ordinating company for the production in Europe ofthe electronic components of the Raytheon Hawk missile. Responsible for flight simu-lators is LMT; and AME makes VOR beacons under licence both for the wholeFrench community and for export. SEA is one of the most advanced electronicsresearch companies in Europe. The electronics industry perhaps morethan other sections is affected by the fact that its main customer is the Government.French electronics companies realized a turnover of about 20,000,000,000 oldfrancs during 1959, about 8 per cent of it accounted for by exports. CFTH Lynx radar, specially designed to meet a NATO requirement for spotting air-dropped sea mines; also serves as harbour radar
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