Pusher (aircraft)

In a craft with a pusher configuration (as opposed to a tractor configuration), the propeller(s) are mounted behind their respective engine(s). According to British aviation author Bill Gunston, a "pusher propeller" is one mounted behind the engine, so that the drive shaft is in compression.

Pusher configuration describes this specific (propeller or ducted fan) thrust device attached to a craft, either aerostat (airship) or aerodyne (aircraft, WIG, paramotor, rotorcraft) or others types such as hovercraft, airboat and propeller-driven snowmobiles.

"Pusher configuration" also describes the layout of a fixed-wing aircraft in which the thrust device has a pusher configuration. This kind of aircraft is commonly called a pusher. Pushers have been designed and built in many different layouts, some of them quite radical.

The rubber-powered "Planophore", designed by Alphonse Pénaud in 1871, was an early successful model aircraft with a pusher propeller.

Many early aircraft (especially biplanes) were "pushers", including the Wright Flyer (1903), the Santos-Dumont 14-bis (1906), the Voisin-Farman I (1907) and the Curtiss Model D used by Eugene Ely for the first ship landing on January 18, 1911. Henri Farman's pusher Farman III and its successors were so influential in Britain that pushers in general became known as the "Farman type". Other early pusher configurations were minor variations on this theme.

...
Wikipedia