what is it?
The Arsenal VB 10 was a French fighter-interceptor aircraft developed during and shortly after World War II. It was a low-wing monoplane with retractable tailwheel undercarriage and of largely orthodox configuration. The ultimate product of a design that began with the Arsenal VG 10 prior to the war, the VB 10 added a second engine behind the cockpit which drove a second propeller, coaxial with and contra-rotating to the propeller driven by the engine in the nose. In January 1937 Arsenal were given a contract to develop a twin-engined heavy interceptor built from wood, powered by two 590 hp Hispano-Suiza 12X engines mounted in tandem inside the fuselage, driving co-axial propellers in the nose.
How to recognise it: 2 piston engines with propellers · 15.5 m wingspan
base stats
Bars compare against all aircraft: 3,500 km/h, 20,000 km, 850 seats; size and number built on a log scale up to 640 t (An-225) and 45,000 built (Cessna 172).
fun facts
- First flew 81 years ago, in 1945.
- Top speed is 5.4× a car on the Dutch motorway (130 km/h).
- Wingspan of 15.5 m: about 3 cars parked nose to tail.
- Range of 1,700 km: 9× Amsterdam to Brussels.
- Can fly 1.2× higher than Mount Everest (8,849 m).
piston: A car-like piston engine turning a propeller: simple and cheap, the classic small plane.
spec sheet
- first flight
- 1945
- number built
- 6
- role
- fighter, interceptor
- makers
- Arsenal de l'Aéronautique
- engines
- 2× Hispano-Suiza 12Zars-15 / Hispano-Suiza 12Zars-16
- crew
- 1
- length
- 13 m
- wingspan
- 15.5 m
- height
- 5.2 m
- max take-off weight
- 9,523 kg
- top speed
- 700 km/h
- range
- 1,700 km
- ceiling
- 11,000 m
Specs are for the version in the Wikipedia article's specification section. Blank means the sources don't say.
Sources: Wikidata Q704531, Wikipedia: Arsenal VB 10 (CC BY-SA 4.0).Updated 2026-10-24.