In 1964 Hants & Sussex Aviation was contracted to build three Levavasseur Antoinette IV monoplane replicas of 1910 vintage for the film ‘Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines’. The Antoinette IV movie model closely replicated the slim, graceful monoplane that was very nearly the first aircraft to fly the English Channel, in the hands of Hubert Latham, and won several prizes in early competitions. When the Hants and Sussex Aviation Company from Portsmouth Aerodrome undertook its construction, the company followed the original structural specifications carefully, although an out-of-period de Havilland Gypsy I engine was used.
They were built in wood but the Antoinette’s wing structure proved, however, to be dangerously flexible, and lateral control was very poor, even after the wing bracing was reinforced with extra wires, and the original wing-warping was replaced with “modern” ailerons (hinged on the rear spar rather than from the trailing edge, as in the “real” Antoinette). The final configuration was still considered marginal in terms of stability and lateral control.
Both of the flying examples (one was static only) are thought to still exist. The first machine was noted in a hanger at Fairoaks in 1972 and the second machine was undergoing a rebuild in Geneva, Switzerland.
All Aero 