The first official flight
of F-AZCT was on 20 th July 1985 - after 5 years and 7
000 hours work.
At the beginning of
the century in the Department of the Somme, near to the
village of Crotoy, two brothers, Gaston and René CAUDRON
built an aeroplane that they wanted to fit with two
FARCOT engines. It is the summer of 1908. In the spring
of 1909, the engines were still not delivered, and the
two brothers no longer have the patience to wait. Their
parents are farmers and have in their stable a mare, with
a reputation for cussedness, her name ? Luciole. And it
is she, in place of the missing engines, who pulled the
aircraft to enable it to take off for it's first flight !
Thus it came to pass in the 30's, the Caudron
Company proposed for sale a biplane which received the
name Luciole, in memory of the brave mare. The Luciole
won first prize in the competition organised by the
Government, to find an aircraft easy to maintain and
simple to fly, to equip the flying schools of the
Aviation Populaire. This organisation would train many of
the pilots of the Second World War.
The first Caudron Luciole offered for
sale was the C230, in 1930. In total there were
720 examples built, all types of Luciole
included. The end of building came with the
beginning of WWII. ( The Aero Club of La Baule
had a Luciole F-ALXO fitted with a Salmson engine).
The basic difference between the models lay
with the power plant. There was for example, the C270/1
with the Salmson 7ACA of 105 hp, the C275 with the
Renault 4Pgi Bengali of 100 hp, and the C277 with the
Renault 140 hp.
There were a total of 433 Renault
C275 Lucioles built, the most numerous. In this
tandem bi-place, the pilot sits at the rear,
there is a baggage locker and a tool locker. The
fuselage is 7,67 m long and is made of spruce.
The four half-wings, with a span of 9,9 m, are
foldable and are also in spruce. It is an
aircraft of very simple construction without
extras ( flaps, compensator ) it was a basic
trainer.
Even if it was not capable of aerobatics, the
aircraft made no concessions to piloting. ( see flight
test Luciole ) The success of the Luciole was due to the
fact that it won the competition organised in 1936 to
make available to the aero clubs, an basic trainer,
simple to maintain and cheap to operate. It is the era of
the Aviation Populaire. In March of 1936 it cost 46 500
Fr, and there was a waiting list of four months. (
Luciole n° 71 ) At the outbreak of WWII, production was
stopped and many aircraft went south to the Unoccupied
Zone
Remember that the full name of the
Luciole is : - Caudron-Renault C275 Luciole.
Caudron having Louis Renault as a partner at this
time. As far as we know, only the following aircraft
are still existing :
- C272/5- F-PAPI ( ex F-AMMI, F-PMMI )
-C275 F-AZCU ( to be checked, at Beauvais )
-C275 F-AZAL ( ex F-AOBS, F-PJKE ) Aéro
Retro, St. Rambert d'Albon
-C270 G-BDFM ( ex F-ALVO, F-BBPT ) Toulouse
1932. Radial engine Salmson of 95 hp. The oldest known
Luciole, which is due to return to France in 1998, to
.....Toulouse.--
-Aircraft Collection 
-
