This single-seat machine was introduced by Louis Wagner at the Budapest meet (No.3) in June 1910. Later that month Marcel Hanriot piloted such a type at the meeting of Rouen (No.20).

The VI seems to be the most successful and popular of all the Hanriots. A triangular-section fuse that is wood planked in front and fabric-covered in rear, six-legged undercarriage with an auxiliary diagonal inverted-V brace in the forward bay, no tank suspended from the pylon and what appears to be a small wheel at the end of the tailskid.

But the Type VI was then the high praised machine and entered to most of the important and less important meetings. The type V and type VI were used in 1910 by Marcel Hanriot in air meets.

The 1910-type Hanriot was flown by Georges Bathiat at the September 1910 Maubeuge meeting.

By the end of 1910 the Type VI had lost its tiny tailwheel and was eventually fitted with an 8-cylinder ENV (60 hp).

Engine: Grégoire-Gyp / 8-cylinder ENV, 60 hp
Wingspan: 43 feet
Wing area: 300 square feet
Total weight: 1,120 pounds

The type V and type VI were used in 1910 by Marcel Hanriot in air meets.
There is a postcard titled “Marcel HANRIOT – Monoplan № 5.” Unfortunately, it’s a closeup of Marcel in the cockpit and doesn’t show any identifiable features of the aeroplane. There are also a few photos of a machine with an all-wood fuselage and six-legged undercarriage (matching the Old Rhinebeck repro in most respects) marked with a large “5” on the fuse.

Although Hanriots first airframe had sustained damage during landing, it had nevertheless provided the foundation for a smaller, but similar monoplane which had sported a simple, elegant, aerodynamically-clean configuration when it had appeared in July of 1910. Constructed of ash, spruce, and steel tubes, the aircraft had a mahogany ply-covered, inverted, A-frame, and racing skiff-like fuselage.
On June 4, 1910, a sixteen year boy, Marcel Hanriot, takes off in a graceful aeroplane designed by his father, Rene Hanriot.
The light, but strong structure eliminated the need for the number and complexity of bracing wires traditionally required by box frame or girder build-up assembly. The main spars for the planes are made of wood in three layers and are 3 inches deep. The skids are fixed at the bottom of an A-type frame, the upper part of the A forming a triangular frame above the planes, to which the latter are fastened by stout wires.

The landing gear is mainly on two strong skids at the front supported by three uprights of the A-type frame work; the axles of the two wheels are carried on vertical guides, and are suspended by rubber springs anchored to the skids. There is a small skid at the rear.

Cambered, rounded-tip wings, formed by two laminated spars and multiple ribs and covered with unbleached cotton fabric, were steel tape lashed to the fuselage and hinged, like those of the Wright Flyer and the Bleriot XI, to induce in-flight banking by means of wing-warping. The 30.5-foot span and seven-foot chord resulted in a 183 square foot area.

The large, triangular-shaped, fixed horizontal tail, measuring 9.3 feet long by eight feet wide and was also covered with unbleached cotton, extended to two separate, longitudinal-controlling elevators, while the fixed surface had been tightly stretched with the aid of two transverse spars and sported both unmoveable, dorsal and ventral, triangular-shaped fins to increase stability.

The laced fabric, scalloped, vertical tail was hinged to provide control about the yaw axis.

Power was provided by a 35-hp, eight-cylinder, water-cooled, V-type, E.N.V. engine, mounted on, and partially supported by, the A-frame struts, its two rows of cylinders set at 45-degree angles to the vertical and sharing a common crankshaft. It drove a single-bladed, mahogany propeller. The type also flew with a Clerget engine.
A four-cylinder 50 horse-power Clerget at 1.203 r.p.m with a Chauviere propeller, 7.2 feet in diameter and 3.8 feet pitch.

With a 27-foot, 3/4-inch airframe and a seven-foot, 5/8-inch height, the pioneer aircraft had a 500-pound gross weight.

The shallow cockpit featured little more than engine and axis-control levers. The right side stick moved forward and aft to actuate the hinged, fabric-covered elevators for pitch control, while the left side stick, moveable in a sideways direction, activated the wing-warping mechanism for in-flight banking, or lateral axis control. The rear spars are hinged, to permit of this. The elevators are 2 feet deep. The coupe atop it, informally known as a “blip switch” provided engine control, usually replacing the left-located throttle, since a hand was seldom free to operate it.

Fuel, stored in the cylindrical, metal tank, directly behind, and on the same level as, the engine, often required pressure to ensure continued flow, initiated by the squeezable rubber ball mounted on top of the right, pitch-control stick.

The scalloped single surface rudder, ensuring yaw-axis stability, was moved by means of a foot-depressed bar.
Initial taxi and direction were usually aided by the ground crew, who lifted the tail from the grass, but a significant power application made the vertical and horizontal tail surfaces effective.

Although there were no incremental throttle settings and the aircraft therefore flew at full, continuous power, its original, 35-hp engine had been inadequate to exert other than a sluggish, wing-warping created banking response.

Descent, induced by a combination of blip switch power interruptions and backward-stick, downward pitch, enabled the Hanriot to return to the ground.

The Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome has a reproduction constructed by Cole Palen, Mike Lockhart, and Andy Keefe with the aid of drawings published in Flight during the winter of 1974 in Florida, had originally been powered by a 1910, two-cycle, water-cooled Elbridge Featherweight engine, but it had later been retrofitted with a more capable, water-cooled, 50-hp Franklin after it had sustained connecting rod damage.

Reproduction:
Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome Hanriot V

Wingspan: 30.5-foot
Length: 27-foot, 3/4-in
Height: 7-foot, 5/8-inch
Wing chord: 7-foot
Wing area: 183 square foot
Tailplane span: 8 ft
Tailplane length: 9.3 feet
Gross weight: 500-pound
Speed: 51 mph approx
Total weight: 760 pounds
Aspect ratio: 4.2 to 1.

Exhibited at the January 1910 Brussels show, the III was larger than the II, with a fabric-covered rear fuse and Clement-Bayard powered, intended for the competitions.

In a few months, Hanriot and Ruchonnet designed a new lighter monoplane, the type II. Baptized “Dragonfly” it flew at Bétheny in April, equipped with a 40hp Clément-Bayard. Exhibited at the January 1910 Brussels show, the II has an all-wood fuselage and upright Gregoire engine.

In 1908, while the automobile races are in full swing, René Hanriot wins the World Championship (unofficial) in a Benz of 150 hp. In May he bought one of Léon Levasseur’s Antoinette monoplanes with a 25 hp motor. But by the end of 1908, the monoplane was not yet delivered and René Hanriot lost patience. This was when he decided to make his own machine. In February 1909 he creates the Hanriot Monoplane Corporation with 500,000 Francs capital. A shed was used as a hangar, workshop and office. His son assisted with the building of the aeroplane. In the summer of 1909, the first Hanriot I proudly left the workshop for its first flight. The motor seemed questionable as early as the departure. Hanriot bought a 6-cyl Buchet, that develops 45 hp and weighs 155 kg.
The machine was subsequently displayed at the Salon de la Aeronautique in 1909.

The aircraft, powered by a single, 50-hp Buchet engine, featured an open framework fuselage mated to two rectangular wings of 31.2 feet span.
Its slender lines and good looks instill confidence and Hanriot receives orders for about twenty of his machines, although it did not again fly. In October, the flights to Bétheny and those carried out at Reims by René and Marcel show that the motor is too heavy! The machine is unable to do more than short hops. He looks for another motor. A virtually unknown engineer by the name of Pierre Clerget, from la Maison Clément-Bayard, that he knows from his auto racing days designs a four cylinder in-line engine of 40 hp.
Although Hanriots first airframe had sustained damage during landing, it had nevertheless provided the foundation for a smaller, but similar monoplane which had sported a simple, elegant, aerodynamically-clean configuration when it had appeared in July of 1910.