Pioneers The tandem wing configuration predates successful crewed flight. As far back as the fifteenth century,
Tito Livio Burraitni experimented with a tandem-wing model. Four sets of wings in tandem variously provided lift and propulsion, and Burraitni's cat became the first aeronaut to fly in a tandem design. Several pioneers had long made successful gliders. In 1905
John J. Montgomery flew a tandem monoplane glider, confirming that the aerodynamic principle was sound. Powered flight followed two years later. In 1906
Louis Blériot built his
third aeroplane with tandem elliptical closed wings, later modifying it as his type IV with the fore wing converted into a conventional biplane. But it was not until the next year that his
type VI, a wheeled tandem monoplane of broadly similar configuration to Langley's Aerodrome, became the first tandem-wing aeroplane to fly. Between 1907 and 1911, the aerodynamics studies of
Gustave Eiffel showed that the tandem layout was inherently less aerodynamically efficient that the more conventional. Overlapping with Eiffel's work, Stefan Drzewiecki developed and wind-tunnel tested an inherently stable tandem-wing design. He then built and successfully flew a full-sized example at the end of 1912. The tandem Lysander was not completed until 1941, when Penrose began test flights. Although it performed flawlessly – he wrote that "here was a military prototype that needed no alteration" – it was not ordered into production.
George Miles saw the tandem Lysander at
RAF Boscombe Down and realised its potential as a short-span, short-take-off Naval fighter. The ensuing
Miles M.35 Libellula test aircraft differed from the Delanne design in having wings of approximately equal span, but with the rear wing given a longer chord and swept back. Although the design was rejected, it flew well enough to prompt development of the larger
M.39B, a subscale test aircraft for the proposed M.39 high-speed bomber to meet Specification B.11/41. This time the fore wing was smaller and mounted low, while the swept rear wing was high-mounted with twin engine nacelles slung beneath. Flying in 1943 it performed well, but the bomber requirement was subsequently cancelled.
Postwar After WWII, interest returned to the Flying Flea's tilting forewing concept and, with its worst dangers now understood and fixed, designers have continued to develop the idea, typically still for home construction. The
Curtiss-Wright X-19 of 1963 marked the entry of the tandem wing configuration into the VTOL arena, as a quadrotor convertiplane, with large tilting proprotors mounted on each wing tip. It proved overly complex and unreliable for the technology of the day. Other tandem approaches such as the Delanne were largely forgotten, until David Lockspeiser conceived of his Land Development Aircraft, a low-cost utility transport. It was to utilise three interchangeable wing component; one each mounted high up for the left and right rear wings, and a third fore wing mounted centrally beneath the nose. His prototype
LDA-01 flew in 1971. It proved successful enough to develop for production, but the project ended before it could be modified. (1998) The next breakthrough to manufacture came once again in the homebuilt market. Up-and-coming maverick designer
Burt Rutan was working on a low-powered but highly efficient plane for home construction. The tandem layout offered a low-drag fixed undercarriage installation, by placing the main wheels in housings at the tips of the fore wing and applying anhedral to raise the fuselage high enough for a propeller. The high-mounted rear wing had compensating dihedral. The Quickie first flew in 1977 and the next year won the EAA's Outstanding New Design Award at Oshkosh. It became popular, and several variants subsequently appeared. Rutan set up
Scaled Composites and some of the company's later designs were also tandems. ==List of tandem-wing aircraft==