The big twin-engine Farman 60 Goliath biplane originated from a military aircraft, a heavy bomber that had a very long range of up to 1000 km and a bomb load of up to 2 tons. Its maiden flight took place in October 1918, but production was interrupted in November following the armistice. The brothers Maurice and Henry Farman decided to convert the bomber to civilian use with considerable success. Production of military aircraft started up again in 1921 and only came to an end in 1929.
The “Goliath” was therefore mainly a civil passenger aircraft and was also France’s first airliner.
The open cockpit communicated directly with the cabin which was designed to accommodate 12 passengers. The panorama passenger cabin with large sliding windows was furnished with rattan chairs. The interior fittings were very Spartan and the cabin was made of thin plywood panels. The plane was not heated and not very well sealed so that passengers were subjected to very strong draughts. The large upper and lower wings, the low cruising speed (maximum 150 km/h) and the low wing loading increased the aircraft’s susceptibility to turbulence. The first scheduled flight between Paris and London took off on 8 February 1919. Later, aircraft of this type saw service with almost all French aviation companies. They were built in large numbers under licence in Belgium and even in Czechoslovakia by the aircraft companies Avia and Letov.
These aircraft were regarded as very reliable, mainly because of their very large wing area (161 m2 for a total mass of only 4770 kg), which allowed them to fly at an exceptionally low speed despite their gigantic size. They took off and landed on short runways. Their stability during flight was rather mediocre because of the small area of the rudder (at the time a common design fault). However, the Goliath, or Golly in English, was extremely popular. In France, Belgium, Romania and Czechoslovakia, the aircraft was the epitome of luxury and advanced engineering.
The aircraft broke a number of world records for endurance and altitude and set up a non-stop long-distance record of 1915.20 km on 3 and 4 May 1920 (more than 24 flight hours). On 14 and 15 October 1922, the aircraft set up an endurance record of 34 hours 14 min and 15 sec. A single-engine version set up an endurance record of more than 37 hours in July 1924. In July 1927, a Goliath F-ADFN was used to cross the South Atlantic, but the attempt failed tragically. The remains of the aircraft were sighted in the sea and the aircraft appeared to have crashed on the Brazilian coast and the crew were posted as missing.
From 1921, the Goliath served as a night bomber with a two-man and later four-man crew. It was deployed in the navy as a three-seater or four-seater torpedo carrier. Unfortunately, the aircraft’s career ended less gloriously. After a number of accidents, its airworthiness licence was withdrawn and the last model built in 1929 was scrapped after delivery.
Only the restored fuselage of the civil version with four-wheel landing gear can be seen in the Musée de l'Air et de l'Espace du Bourget.
