Forgotten Soviet aircraft
Inheritance
The Workers 'and Peasants' Red Air Fleet would not have taken place without the Air Force of the Russian Empire, it was from the old army that the structure and equipment of 33 (out of 96) air squads passed. 2300 aircraft passed through it during the entire Civil War, but by its end only 300 of them remained in service, moreover, foreign models, and often outdated ones. The main problem was not losses, the main problem was the wear and tear of equipment. After the war, the structure was reformed:
“According to the peacetime states introduced on September 12, 1922, the aviation detachment had 8 active and 2-4 spare aircraft. Three detachments were reduced to a squadron, which was a military unit, two squadrons - to a squadron. There were also separate detachments and squadrons. All air units on the territory of the military district were subordinate to the assistant commander of the district for aviation. There were also parts of the central subordination that performed special functions.
But it required machines. Machines preferably domestic, so as not to depend on potential opponents, and machines based on the experience of the war, at the best world level. There were factories and design bureaus in Russia, there was no engine building, and the post-war devastation with the loss of part of the designers did not add optimism. However, work began already in 1923. The motors were still foreign, but the planes were their own. And these cars of the 20s - early 30s became a school. A school for designers, a school for production workers, mechanics, pilots, military leaders. Some of them are in third roles, but managed to make war.
Fighters
About Polikarpov - the king of fighters, and his difficult fate should be written separately. Now only about his cars, which came with the index "I", from one to 16, the same Ishak, who pulled out the pre-war conflicts and the beginning of the Patriotic War. And the first was the semi-serial I-1. The plane of a difficult fate.
The development of the first-born began in March 1923 and was carried out at a rapid pace. The result was a plane with a 400 hp engine. with. Liberty, with a speed of 264 km / h at altitude, a range of 650 kilometers and a ceiling of 6750 meters. They armed him with two 7,62 mm machine guns, which at that time was quite up to par. On July 18, 1924, the first flight took place, and then there was a stopper. The plane was finalized, processed, improved, modified ... In total, 14 aircraft were produced (12 serial ones). The idea of building monoplanes was too premature for that era. And the age of the firstborn also did not please - I-1 survived only until 1933.
At the same time, Polikarpov was manufacturing the 2I-N1, a two-seat fighter, but the disaster on March 31, 1926 put an end to the project:
“Suddenly, a cloud seemed to rise above the upper right wing and the wing seemed to explode - this was a breakdown of its plywood sheathing, first from the upper side of the wing, then from the bottom. Behind the upper wing, the lower right wing collapsed, and the plane, having passed another five hundred meters, fell to the ground. The crew is dead."
The materials and technologies of the First World War at a speed of 300 km / h were no longer suitable ... The I-2b Grigorovich turned out to be more successful, which were built by 107 units, but the plane turned out so-so:
“The I-2bis aircraft, having low speed, rate of climb, ceiling and poor maneuverability, cannot be recognized as a modern fighter. Compared to the I-2, it is inferior in its flight performance, but design and operational improvements make the I-2bis aircraft more desirable. After eliminating all the shortcomings, the I-2bis can be used as a training-transitional one.
Although it was sold to Persia. By the mid-30s, he left the combat units. But Polikarpov was successful with the I-3 one and a half plan, adopted in 1929, far from being a record one (263 km / h at altitude and still the same two machine guns), it turned out to be reliable and unpretentious. 389 units in the series at that time is a lot. He served until 1934, having managed to become the first mass fighter of our Air Force. The BMW motor, better known to us as the M-17, was also the first to receive it.
More modest was our all-metal first-born Sukhoi - I-4, of which as many as 177 units were produced. Having received the M-22 engine (British Bristol), it was hard for production workers and pilots, and as a result, in 1935 it was quietly withdrawn from service. But they tested it to their heart's content - both as a hydroplane, and in the "Link" project, and with jet boosters, and even with a Kurchevsky dynamo-reactive cannon. And so about 250 km / h and a bunch of design flaws, the middle peasant is closer to the bottom of the table.
An attempt to do something foreign gave the I-7 aircraft, aka Heinkel in girlhood. 131 units were built, and even transferred to the troops, but their life span was short - until 1934. 258 km / h and a range of 700 km made it obsolete immediately after the launch of the series. Something similar happened in the USSR, without payments to the Germans. In the end, the mass model was never found. Although the search continued - Polikarpov's I-5, designed in prison, turned out to be exactly the machine that they had been looking for for eight long years. An ordinary polutoraplan with an M-22 engine, it accelerated to 278 km / h and already carried four machine guns. Like most of Polikarpov's cars, it was not a record, it was massive and reliable, having served in combat units until 1939. And having managed to fight in the skies of the Patriotic War - as a night bomber and attack aircraft on the Crimean front. Not because of the qualities he fought, out of need, but still ...
The time has come for other machines, they were being worked on. And the Polikarpov bureau made two of them - I-15 and I-16, it was their modifications that became the main aircraft at the beginning of the war. But they would not exist without the entire line and the search for the ideal, which began back in 1923. And the winner in this race was not a record holder, not an all-metal aircraft, and not even miracles with dynamo-reactive guns, the middle peasants won. It was the I-3 - I-5 - I-15/16 line without outstanding characteristics that formed the basis of our Air Force. But the I-17 Polikarpov with a liquid-cooled engine remained an experimental aircraft. The country needed a massive air force, and the records are good for parades. And in the face of problems with engine building, aluminum and qualified personnel, the state preferred simpler, but cheaper cars.
Bombers
Their path was shorter and less tortuous. And if the fighters were eventually made by Polikarpov, then the bombers were made by Tupolev. Although it all started at GAZ with a completely forgotten aircraft - B-1 in 1924. The all-wood biplane could lift 500 kg of bombs and deliver them 800 km at cruising speed, climbing 4000 meters. Long tests showed a simple thing - a wooden plane with a speed of less than 200 km / h is no longer suitable for the Air Force. Moreover, Tupolev showed his ANT-4 (aka TB-1) in operation. The twin-engine all-metal aircraft was originally carried out as a torpedo bomber, and became the first strategic bomber of the USSR. 207 km / h, a thousand kilometers of range, a ton of bombs ... Plus durability. Metal is not wood, there is no rapid wear, and the transition to M-17 engines guaranteed the replacement of components. Their century was long, first as combat, then, after the start of construction of TB-3, as transport and airborne. The last one was written off in 1947. They were replaced by the equally successful TB-3, which served the country for many years. And who fought the war as a transport and night bomber. Fortunately, 197 km / h and 1350 km of practical range, supplemented by 5000 kg of bombs at maximum load, were impressive.
But these are all serial and well-known models, and in addition to them, the search continued for something simpler and something heavier. What is simpler - they tried to buy from the Germans. Their civilian Junkers in the version of the Yug-1 bomber went to the Air Force from 1926. But as bombers, they were still imperfect, and as transport workers, they did not have engines. As a result, in 1931, the Yug-1s were decommissioned, and in 1935 they were decommissioned at Aeroflot, where they were handed over to the Air Force. But more abruptly ... The Douai doctrine owned the minds, and the creation of superplanes began, here is Tupolev's TB-4:
“With a wing span of 54 m, a length of 32 m, a height of 11,73 m, a wing area of 422 m2 during tests of TB-4 with M-34 engines, we received a maximum speed near the ground - 200 km / h, a maximum speed at an altitude of 2000 m - 187,5 km / h, a climb time of 2000 m was 33,32 minutes, a practical ceiling - 2750 m, it took 84 minutes to achieve it, the takeoff run was 800 m, it took 36 seconds to take off, with 4000 kg of bombs the aircraft had a range of 1000 km. All this was far below the requirements of the Air Force."
He became a greatly enlarged TB-3, from which the military simply disowned. But the designer Kalinin went the farthest. His K-7 is:
“K-7 was a giant elliptical wing of a thick profile with a span of 53 m and an area of 452 m2, from which there were two tail beams of a trihedral section, carrying the tail horizontal and vertical plumage with a mechanism for turning.
It had six engines, up to 1 ton of bombs and a range of 1000 km. The miracle did not work, and the experienced K-7 crashed. The car was ahead of its time, it was too early to calculate such designs. But Kalinin did not stop and began building the K-1933 flying wing in 12. Much more modest in size, it was ready only by the second half of the 30s, when its technical characteristics were no longer impressive, and Kalinin’s arrest put an end to the project ... In general, an interesting topic of Kalinin’s car, they were undoubtedly ahead of their time, but with they couldn’t go into the series - it’s expensive and difficult, and it’s not always clear why. And his successes were the usual cargo-passenger K-4 and K-5, the planes are simple and reliable.
As a result, the disputes ended in 1934 with the flight of the ANT-40, aka the Tupolev Security Bureau. As in the case of fighters, the winding road led to a simple, reliable and successful machine, numbering 6616 pieces, which fit for export, and in wars, and in the Civil Air Fleet. And the heavy bomber niche was also occupied by Ilyushin's non-record DB-3 (IL-4).
Summing up, the 20s, on a wave of enthusiasm, brought a number of models of unusual and advanced aircraft, often ahead of their time. But design romanticism did not survive the collision with the harsh reality of the Land of the Soviets. Neither the industry nor the treasury of the model, which has no analogues, did not pull, and the army did not demand miracles with 16 tons of bombs or dynamo-jet cannons, but workhorses in order to close the sky of a huge country. So in the end it happened - evolution did not lead to record-breaking, but massive aircraft. This, of course, can be regretted, but we would not have won the war with a small number of record cars. Time and logic put everything in its place.
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