The Potez IX was an early airliner produced in France in the 1920s, a further development of the SEA IV that Henry Potez had co-designed during the First World War.Taylor 1989, p.747The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Aircraft, p.2760
Design and development The design mated an entirely new fuselage to the wing and tail structures of the earlier military aircraft."The Paris Aero Show 1921" 22 December 1921, p.841 This fuselage was very deep, nearly filling the interplane gap, and carried within it a fully enclosed cabin with seating for four passengers. The nose area was carefully streamlined with curved aluminium,"The Paris Aero Show 1921" 17 November 1921, p. 764 but other aspects of the construction were conventional for the day; wooden structures skinned in plywood (the passenger cabin) or fabric (the rest of the aircraft)."The Paris Aero Show 1921" 22 December 1921, p.842 The pilot sat in an open cockpit aft of the cabin.
The prototype flew in 1920,Stroud 1966, p. 176 and was followed by around thirty production examples that differed from it in having a larger tail fin and rudder. The Compagnie générale transaérienne operated Potez IXs on cross-channel air services between Paris and London. The Compagnie Franco-Roumaine de Navigation Aérienne flew these on routes linking Paris to Warsaw via Strasbourg and Prague, and from Paris to Budapest via Strasbourg and Vienna, later extending its services to Bucharest and Constantinople. Franco-Roumaine, and its successor airline CIDNA operated the Potez IX until 1928.Stroud 1966, p. 177
The Potez IX S, a one-off modified version with wings of larger area, flew in the Grand Prix de l'Aéro Club de France in June 1921 with Gustave Douchy at the controls."The French Aero Club Grand Prix", p.430 Douchy was disqualified in the third stage of the competition.
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