Louis de Monge

Louis de Monge (Count Pierre Louis de Monge de Franeau) (1890–New York, 25 July 1977) was a notable Belgian engineer. He is mainly remembered as the designer of the Bugatti Model 100P racing aircraft.

Career

During World War I, de Monge engineered, designed and produced aircraft propellers, selling some 40,000 to the French government. de Monge then worked with one Mr. Buscaylet, making conventional parasol monoplanes like the Buscaylet-de Monge 5/2. Later, he designed twin-engined lifting wings, reminiscent of the Burnelli UB-14, such as his models 7.4 and 7.5. The rights to these were acquired by Bordeaux shipbuilders Dyle et Bacalan who wanted to develop transatlantic airliners from them, but nothing came of it beyond some prototypes like the Dyle et Bacalan DB-10 heavy bomber.

In 1925, de Monge joined car and motorcycle makers Impéria at Liège as chief research engineer. Some of his work there included torsion bar suspension and automatic transmissions.

de Monge left Impéria in 1937 to join Ettore Bugatti, to design the Bugatti Model 100P racing aircraft. This had been almost completed in Paris in 1940, but when France was occupied by Germany it was moved to the French countryside where it was hidden for the next thirty years. It eventually went to the US. where it is now in the EAA AirVenture Museum.