Morane-Saulnier M.S.430 / M.S.435

Drawing heavily on components of the M.S.405 fighter, the Morane-Saulnier design team put forward an advanced trainer under the designation Morane-Saulnier M.S.430, the prototype flying for the first time on 3 March 1937. A cantilever low-wing monoplane with inward-retracting landing gear, the M.S.430 located its pupil and instructor in tandem cockpits beneath a continuous glazed canopy, and power was provided by a 291kW. Salmson 9Ag radial engine. Tests continued into 1939, and a single-seat version was evaluated with the designation M.S.408A version with a Gnome-Rhone 7Kfs radial, designated M.S.433, was never completed.

The M.S.435.01 took off for the first time on 6 December 1939. Powered by a 410kW Gnome-Rhone 9Kdrs engine, it had a redesigned fuselage of increased cross-section. An order for 60 series machines had been received from the French air ministry six months earlier, but priority in production went to the M.S.406 fighter, with the result that no series M.S.435 P.2 category (two-seat advanced trainer) aircraft were delivered before the French collapse in June 1940.