The C.530 was a low wingcantilevermonoplane, wood framed and fabric covered. Its wing was tapered, round tipped and carried split flaps. Its fuselage was flat sided, with a deep, rounded decking running the full length. It had a aircooled 113 kW (152 hp) Renault Bengali Junior inverted four cylinder engine in the nose, driving a two blade, variable pitchpropeller. This engine was a version of the Renault 4P with its compression increased to 6:1 and running at the higher speed of 2,450 rpm. The Rafale's two seats were in tandem, one over the wing and the other just behind the trailing edge, under a long (about a third of the fuselage length), narrow multi-framed canopy with a blunt, vertical windscreen and sliding access. Behind the canopy a long fairing continued its profile to the straight tapered, round tipped vertical tail. The horizontal tail was mounted largely ahead of the fin on the top of the fuselage.[1]
The Rafale had a fixed tailskid, wide track undercarriage. Its wheels were on vertical, slender aerofoil section legs from the wings and were largely enclosed within magnesium alloy fairings.[1]
The C.530 first flew on 26 June 1934[2] and the other six examples built were registered soon after.[3]
Operational history
The C.530 Rafale was intended as competition aircraft and in 1934 it was very successful. On 8 July Rafales took the first three places in the Angers 12 hour event[4] and later that month filled the top six Esders Cup positions.[1][5] Late in August, one won the Zénith Cup with a flight over the prescribed 1,578 km (981 mi) course at 240 km/h (149.1 mph).
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