After assisting
Ernest Archdeacon with his gliding experiments in 1904 Gabriel Voisin briefly entered a partnership with
Louis Blériot in 1905. After the failure of their second aircraft, the
Bleriot IV, the partnership was dissolved in November 1906. After parting from Blériot, Gabriel Voisin set up his own aircraft construction company, Les Frères Voisin, in partnership with his brother Charles. The first powered aircraft designed by the Voisin brothers was built for
Henry Kapferer,
Henri Deutsch de la Meurthe's nephew. It was completed in March 1907 but never flew. since the focus of attention was indeed generally on the pilots rather than on those who were responsible for the design and construction of the aircraft. Powered by a 50 hp V8
Antoinette engine, it was a
pusher configuration two-bay biplane with a wingspan of . A biplane elevator was carried in front of the wings on the end of a short
nacelle and a
boxkite-like biplane
empennage of half the span of the mainplanes with three vertical surfaces each carrying a trailing-edge rudder was carried on booms behind the wings. The undercarriage consisted of a pair of wheels on v-struts under the trailing edge of the wings and small wheels mounted at the ends of the lower tailbooms. There was no provision for direct lateral control. Before Wilbur Wright's flying demonstrations in France August 1908 the importance of
roll control to make controlled turns was not appreciated by European experimenters, who concentrated on attempting to produce inherently stable and practical aircraft. The first attempt to fly the aircraft was made by Gabriel Voisin on 28 February 1907 at the
Polygon de Vincennes, but the lower booms supporting the tail failed when he attempted to lift off. After repairs a second attempt was made on 16 March, but on lifting off the engine torque drove the left-hand wing onto the ground, ending the attempted flight. This problem was overcome by adding ballast to the right wing. Thus modified, three flights, the best of were made by Charles Voisin on 30 March. The aircraft was then fitted with floats and a series of unsuccessful trials were made on the
Lac d'Enghien, following which the wheels were replaced. Delagrange made two short flights at
Issy les Moulineaux on 2 November 1907, but on 6 November another flight ended in a crash in which the aircraft was damaged beyond repair. Delagrange promptly ordered a second aircraft, later called the
Delagrange II.
Farman's successes (left) with Gabriel Voisin A second machine, identical apart from slight changes to the undercarriage, was ordered by
Henry Farman in July 1907 and first flew on 30 September 1907. Named
Henri Farman n°1 (as painted on the vertical tail), this became known as the
Voisin-Farman, he set a new official world record for distance with a flight of . This flight won prizes awarded by the AeCF for flights of over 300 and 500 metres and also gained the Archdeacon Cup for the greatest distance flown. Later that year Farman made some modifications to the aircraft, replacing the biplane front elevator with a single surface and reducing the span of the rear horizontal surfaces. In the original tail assembly, the upper surface was a lifting surface, while the lower was a non-lifting surface intended to act as a stabiliser: in the new arrangement both surfaces contributed lift. The wings had been re-rigged with
dihedral to give lateral stability and allow some roll control despite the lack of ailerons or wing warping. Further flights were made in November, in which he made his first turns, and on 13 January 1908 he won the 50,000 francs Deutsch de la Meurthe-Archdeacon ''Grand Prix de l'Aviation'' for being the first aviator to complete an officially observed 1-kilometre closed circuit flight, including taking off and landing under the aircraft's own power.
Development in 1908 In March 1908 a period of intense competition between Farman and Delagrange began, Delagrange now flying the new
Delagrange II incorporating the modifications that had been made to Farman's aircraft, now renamed the '
Farman Ibis''''' and with a new covering of "
Continental" brand rubberised balloon fabric replacing the original varnished silk. On 21 March Farman set a new
Aéro-Club de France record with a flight of just over 2 kilometres (1.25 miles). In the evening of the same day, Delagrange took Farman back to the hangar, making Farman the first fixed-wing aircraft "passenger". At the end of May Farman had also made the first flights in Europe with a passenger, carrying
Ernest Archdeacon for at
Ghent. This time was bettered by Farman on 6 July, when he made a flight lasting 20 min 20 sec, a new record and winning Farman a 10,000 franc prize for the first officially observed flight lasting more than fifteen minutes. The distinctive 'side curtains' between the outer two sets of
interplane struts that were to become characteristic of subsequent production aircraft were added to both aircraft by the end of September. By 30 October, when Farman made a flight from
Bouy to
Reims, the first cross country flight in aviation history,
ailerons had been added to his aircraft. Farman's last modification was to fit a third, shorter wing, in which form it became known as the
Henry Farman Triplane.
Roll control When Farman made his full-circle flight in January 1908 he had only rudder control, and made long, flat turns with the wings remaining nearly parallel to the ground. Gabriel Voisin, who was present, gives a different account in
Revue Aeronautique Trimestrielle des Vieilles Tiges, reporting that it involved fairly steep banking and that it was Farman's experience in bicycle racing around steeply banked
velodromes that gave him the courage to do the same in his aircraft. In August 1908
Wilbur Wright demonstrated the importance of coordinated use of yaw (rudder) and roll (wing twisting) control for making non-slipped turns during his first flights in France at Le Mans. Consequently, when the
Grande Semaine d'Aviation was held at
Reims in August 1909 the Voisin biplanes were the only participating aircraft that lacked direct roll control thus demanding pilots trained to induced roll (by rudder input). Although the best-represented type at the event, the Voisin biplanes achieved little success at the meeting. Subsequent Voisin designs, such as the
Voisin Type de Course of 1910 and the
Voisin Canard incorporated ailerons. ==Production aircraft==