The Secret History of MiG Fighter (5)

MIG-17 is a high subsonic fighter developed by MIG Design Bureau of the Soviet Union on the basis of MIG 15. In the Vietnam War, he made great achievements, created a large number of examples of defeating the strong with the weak, and became a legendary classic fighter in the history of world air combat. Let's review the little-known story of MIG-17.

MiG 17 may not shock the world aviation industry like MIG 15, but it continues the glory of MIG Design Bureau: the total output exceeds 10000, of which 7999 are produced by the Soviet Union, and the total output of imitation models (China J-5, J-5, Polish LIM-5 and LIM-6) reaches 200. MIG-17 has been equipped in 40 countries and regions and participated in many local wars and armed conflicts.

R&D process

MiG-17 inherited the lineage of MiG-15. In a sense, this kind of aircraft is the "direct descendant" of MiG-15. This practice embodies the consistent scientific research strategy of mikoyan and Levich, leaders of MIG Design Bureau-"step by step".

For the successor models of MIG-15, mikoyan and GerLevich agreed to adopt the new 45 swept wing and VK- 1 turbojet engine. For MIG design bureau, this is the lowest risk development scheme; For the Soviet Air Force, this is the lowest cost development plan. Therefore, the original design code of MIG-17 is 1-330, and its original model is MIG-15bis45, where 45 represents a 45-degree swept wing.

Stalin greatly appreciated the idea of MIG-15 BIS 45. When the plane design was submitted to Stalin, the plans of Jakovleff Design Bureau and Lavochkin Design Bureau were delivered almost at the same time. Jakovleff and Lavochkin's friends in the Politburo of the Soviet Union also lobbied Stalin at this time. Stalin's answer to these lobbyists is simple: "Since we have such excellent fighters as MIG-15, there is no need to develop other types of fighters. It is imperative to concentrate on developing more advanced MIG fighters. "

Under Stalin's instructions, the Soviet Council of Ministers formally issued the order to develop the advanced and improved MIG-15 at the beginning of 1949. The development task is divided into two types-daytime fighter and all-weather interceptor equipped with radar.

In order to speed up the development, MIG Design Bureau gave priority to the development of the daytime fighter I-330. Previously, the engineering code of MIG-15 was Project S, while the engineering code of I-330 was Project SI. I mean to improve. Besides MIG-15bis45, I-330 is also called MIG-15bis "Arrow 45".

However, the SI project is not the first Soviet aircraft with 45 swept wings. In order to regain the dominant position in the fighter development field, Lavochkin Design Bureau launched the La- 176 verification machine based on the La- 15 fighter. La- 176 is the first Soviet jet with 45 swept wings. Moreover, the development progress of La- 176 is very fast, and it was put into test flight as early as 1948 in September. Soon after, an event that shocked the entire Soviet aviation community appeared: 1948 12.26 and La- 176 were piloted by test pilot Fedoroff, and broke the sound barrier in the test flight, reaching the maximum speed of 1.02 Mach, setting a record for the first supersonic flight of the Soviet Union. This flight speed record has greatly improved the status of Lavochkin Design Bureau, and the first pull 176 has the potential of "leading".

At this time, the 45 swept wing of the SI project is undergoing wind tunnel test in the Central Institute of Fluid Mechanics. In the face of the leading situation of La- 176, mikoyan and Ge Levich are particularly calm. They know that only by gaining the upper hand in the aerodynamic performance of the wing can they win the competition. Due to the limited wind tunnel test conditions of the Central Institute of Fluid Dynamics, in order to test the extreme aerodynamic performance of the 45 swept wing. Mikoyan and Levich decided to install the 45 swept wing on the B-5 rocket power testing machine for further testing. In fact, the B-5 was developed on the basis of the seized Nazi Germany DFS-346 rocket power research machine. The test results cheered the MIG Design Bureau-the maximum speed of the B-5 rocket power testing machine with 45 swept wings reached Mach 2.5.

SI project is very similar to MIG- 15 in appearance. The easiest way to distinguish the two is to add a pair of wing knives to the wing of the SI project, so that the aircraft has six wing knives, while the MIG-15 has only four wing knives. In addition, the wing area of the SI project has also increased, reaching 22.6 square meters. The wing area of MIG 15 is only 20.6 square meters.

In order to reduce the cost, the front fuselage (in front of 13 frame) of the SI project is exactly the same as that of MiG-15. The rear fuselage of the SI project was lengthened by 900 mm, making the fuselage length reach 8.805 meters (excluding vertical tail and horizontal tail). SISK engine has two fuel tanks, the capacity of which is 1250L and 150L respectively, and the maximum fuel load is 14 12L. In addition, two 400-liter auxiliary fuel tanks can be installed under the wing.

The weapon system of the SII shooting range is almost the same as that of MIG-15, including 1 door N-37 37mm cannon (40 spare guns) and two NR-23 23mm cannons (80 guns each). When carrying out the ground attack mission, two 100kg bombs or two 250kg bombs can be mounted on two pylons under the wing of the aircraft. In addition, the aircraft is equipped with 1 S- 13 camera gun (used to record the shooting effect of cannon) and 1 AFA-I reconnaissance camera. In order to protect the pilot, there are two armored plates 10 mm thick in the front of the cockpit, and the pilot also has an armored headrest 10 mm thick, and the bulletproof windshield is 60 mm thick. The avionics in SI project are the same as MIG-15bis, including Maple UHF radio system, Ba-M IFF, RPKO- 10M radio direction finder, OSP-48 instrument landing system, etc.

At the beginning of 1949, MIG design bureau 155 experimental factory began to produce two SI engineering prototypes. 1In July, 949, the first prototype Si- 1 was delivered. After the factory test, the plane was transported to zhukovsky Airport in the suburb of Moscow at 1949 and 12, ready to be tested by the Soviet Air Force Science Research Institute. In order to ensure foolproof, MIG Design Bureau invited Ivascenko, a famous test pilot of the Soviet Air Force. He was the winner of the title of Soviet hero and had participated in a large number of test flights of early Soviet jets. Ivashchenko is good at dealing with emergencies in the test flight. He also participated in the test flight of MIG 15.

Because the VK- 1 turbojet engine failed many times in the ground test, the first flight of Si- 1 was not completed by Ivashchenko until 195065438+ 10/4. Ivashchenko spoke highly of the first flight of SI- 1. He thinks the acceleration of SI- 1 is very good. He speculated that the speed of SI- 1 was at least 40km/h faster than that of MiG-15bis. Soon, driven by Ivashchenko, SI- 1 flew out with exciting high-speed performance on February 1 day: at an altitude of 2200m, the maximum speed was114 km/h; At the altitude of10200m, the maximum speed is1077km/h ... That is to say, the maximum speed of Si-I is close to Mach 1.0, only one step away from breaking the speed of sound.

After that, the flight test turned to test Si-I's aerobatic ability.1On March 7, 950, Ivashchenko climbed to L 1000m with Si- 1. When the altitude dropped to 5000m, Si-I suddenly dived, and the plane crashed into the ground like a meteorite, and Ivashchenko died on the spot. As usual, mikoyan took this serious flight accident lightly, and the cause of the accident is still unclear. To be precise, there is no accident investigation at all.