French fighter aircraft Morane-Saulnier MS.406 COBI 5724 - World War II

You know that:

• Morane-Saulnier was founded in 1911, at the dawn of aviation.
• M&S was the first to design shooting through a propeller. In 1915, a modified Taube crashed on German soil and ended up in the hands of Anthony Fokker.
• The factory test pilot was Roland Garros after whom the famous tennis centre in Paris is now named.
• The first MS prototype flew on August 8, 1938.
• After approval by the Air Force, 11 aircraft were produced per day.
• The MS.406 was the most numerous aircraft of the French Air Force with 572 units.
• The aircraft was extremely agile, but also slow compared to those of the enemy.
• The Saulnier had a retractable radiator and this allowed the designers to reduce the vulnerability of the machine.
• The MS.406 was also flown by 56 Czechoslovak pilots in France in 1940, shooting down over 40 enemy aircraft.
  One of the Czechoslovak pilots was Major General Karel Mrázek.
• A major weakness of the aircraft was the cannon, which often jammed, and the machine guns, which froze at altitudes above 6,800 m.

Technical parameters:

• wingspan 10.65 m, length 8.17 m, height 3.25 m
• weight (empty) 1 893 kg
• maximum take-off weight 2 426 kg
• engine gasoline 12 cylinder Hispano-Suiza HS-12Y-31 engine with 641 kW
• fuel tank capacity 406 l
• maximum speed 486 km/h 
• climb rate 12,8 m/s
• range 1 100 km
• range 10 500 m
• armament 2x MAC 1934 machine gun 7,5mm calibre (300 rounds) + HS 9 cannon 20 mm calibre (60 rounds)
• crew 1 person