Heller 80392 Breguet 693/2 Heller Museum 1:72

 

 Bréguet established an assembly line with remarkable speed: the first production aircraft flew less than a year after being ordered and was in service before the end of 1939. As with the Potez 630, the Bre 691 was beset with engine difficulties. Hispano-Suiza had decided to concentrate on its V12 liquid-cooled engines and the 14AB engine was unreliable. The French authorities decided to order a new version, the Bre 693 powered by Gnome-Rhône 14M radials. Apart from the changed engines, which were of slightly smaller diameter, the two types were virtually identical. Orders for the Bre 691 were switched to the new type and more than 200 of the latter had been completed by the time of France's defeat. Late production versions of the Bre 693 introduced propulsive exhaust pipes that improved top speed by a small margin as well as, according to some sources, a pair of additional machine guns in the rear of each engine nacelle. Belgium ordered 32 licence-built copies but none were completed before the Belgian collapse. French engine makers had even greater difficulties than airframe manufacturers in keeping up with the frantic demands from 1938, and in 1939 the French government decided that all combat aircraft had to be adapted for British and US engines. Fewer than 250 Bréguet 690 series aircraft were completed. The Armée de l'air received only 211 examples: 75 Bre.691s, 128 Bre.693s and eight Bre.695s but the Germans captured a few dozen complete or near-complete aircraft at the factories.