In addition, 1973, the picture of the ongoing flight show at the Paris International Air Expo-144 supersonic transport plane suddenly disintegrated, which surprised the audience present. This "big bird" tragedy, which looks almost exactly like the British Concorde, undoubtedly adds a bit of tragedy to human aviation industry.
But on the whole, the limitation of national strength still makes the Soviet Union slightly inferior. A representative example is that after World War II, the United States developed a new type of long-range strategic bomber B-52, 1955 equipped with troops. The Soviet bomber Tu -95, which has the same weight, speed, range and bomb load as the B-52, was equipped with troops more than a year later.
In this case, it has become the practice of Soviet aviation industry to combine existing aircraft with new scientific and technological achievements to produce a new generation of fighters. Because this method does not need to start a new stove, it avoids the high risk of developing new aircraft, and at the same time, it can increase the frequency of aircraft generation renewal and keep the aviation combat effectiveness at a certain level at any time, so this method has always been strictly followed by the Soviet aviation community-the last fighter MiG -23 designed by Akham Ivanovich mikoyan himself before his death.
1967, 10 In June, a new fighter entered the service of the US Air Force, which was F-1/"aardvark". It is the first practical variable swept wing fighter in the world. The so-called "variable swept wing" means that each wing is divided into two parts: a fixed wing section and a movable wing section. The fixed wing section and the front fuselage are combined into a whole, while the movable wing section can be swept back and forth.
In this way, by adjusting the grazing angle, the contradiction between high-speed flight and low-speed flight is solved-high grazing angle is used in high-speed flight, the aircraft resistance is small and the acceleration is good; When flying at low speed, it adopts small sweep angle and large wing aspect ratio, which has long endurance, good economic performance and safe take-off and landing.
Americans were the first to eat crabs, so it is natural for the Soviet Union to catch up with fashion. But at that time, the Soviet Union did not actually have the technology to realize the optimal matching of sweep angle, aerodynamic control surface and flight conditions. In order to reduce the technical risk, MGD simply found another way: the wing sweep angle of MIG -23 has only three fixed positions, namely 16 degrees, 45 degrees and 72 degrees. This is not automatically set by the computer flight control system according to speed, altitude and maneuverability, but manually set by the pilot.
Its hinge mechanism simply uses a bolt with a thickness exceeding100 mm. In the eyes of the Soviets, there are actually not many commonly used flight conditions. Nothing more than taking off and landing, cruising, air combat, sprinting at full speed or running away.
Take-off, landing and low-speed flight require small grazing angles, high-speed cruise and air combat require medium grazing angles, and full-speed sprint or low-altitude penetration requires maximum grazing angles. Manual control of three fixed positions can achieve most of the effects of stepless adjustment. A more subtle choice does not necessarily have a great effect on common situations. On the contrary, adopting automatic control will greatly increase the complexity of the system, which is not worth the loss.
This seemingly simple and rude technical obstacle solution is not the patent of MGM Design Bureau. 1in July, 967, the first Soviet vertical take-off and landing jet fighter appeared at the Soviet Aviation Festival. It rose vertically to a height of 50 meters without taxiing, gradually began to accelerate horizontally, put away the landing gear, and then passed the observation deck like a whirlwind. After flying a circle, the plane began to slow down again, and after approaching the landing point, it descended vertically and landed smoothly.
This is Jacques -36 (called Jacques -38 after formal service) "Blacksmith" fighter, which was developed by Jakovleff Design Bureau. It is also the second vertical take-off and landing jet fighter in the world after the British Harrier fighter. The key for Harrier fighter to take off and land vertically is its specially designed Pegasus MK 104 thrust steerable turbofan engine. When the plane takes off vertically, the front and rear four nozzles of this engine turn to the vertical downward position, and under the action of jet reaction force, the plane pushes upward to achieve vertical rise.
Thrust steering gear similar to Pegasus was also a technology that the Soviet Union did not have at that time. In order to realize the function of vertical takeoff and landing, the solution of Jakovleff Design Bureau is the same as MGM Design Bureau: since it is impossible to build a thrust controllable engine, it is not necessary at all.
So, a blacksmith is actually equipped with three engines: two are special lift engines for vertical takeoff and landing; One is Tumanski R-27V-300 turbojet engine, which is used as the main thrust and started when flying forward.
Due to the "division of labor" of Blacksmith engine, the transition process from vertical takeoff to forward flight is more complicated, and the aircraft consumes 1/3 of the total fuel in the aircraft during takeoff and landing. This "simple design" led to Jacques -36' s only 2000 kg bomb load, 100 km combat radius and limited airborne electronic equipment, so that it was ridiculed as "mast guardian" or "dove of peace", but after all, the success or failure of letting the Soviet Union own an aircraft carrier (called "carrier cruiser" by the Soviet Union) can only be a matter of opinion.
On the other hand, the Soviet aviation industry not only followed the Americans or the West, but also had its own pride, such as 1969 MIG -25 equipped with troops. This is a 22-ton high-altitude high-speed interceptor fighter, and its performance can reach "double three" (flying at three times the speed of sound and at an altitude of 30,000 meters). NATO gave it the code name "Fox Bat".
In the 1970s, the illusion of flying fox became a lingering nightmare for NATO. At that time, the highest speed of the American SR-7 1 Blackbird high-altitude high-speed reconnaissance plane could reach three times the speed of sound, which was beyond the reach of ordinary interceptors, but the flying fox could easily follow its course and give a warning at any time.
197 1 on the eve of the fourth middle east war, four Soviet MIG-25rs stationed in Egypt and sent planes to spy over Israel from time to time, which made the Israeli army very headache. On one occasion, the Israeli Air Force sent the best fighter plane in the West at that time-the American F-4 "Ghost" to intercept it. Who knows that the "flying fox" opened its afterburner and abandoned the "ghost" of the tail chase in the blink of an eye. In desperation, the latter launched a "rattlesnake" in the air to guide fear. How do you know that "Flying Fox" is so fast that it can't even scatter missiles?
At this time, Israel's ground radar station found that the speed of this "MIG -25" has exceeded 3.2 times the speed of sound! This is enough to make Americans exclaim, "This may be the best interceptor produced in the world today." Americans simply can't understand how the Soviet Union built a fighter plane with a top speed of more than three times the speed of sound and four powerful heavy missiles at an altitude of 27,000 meters in just a few years. After all, the F- 15 fighter developed by Americans themselves in the 1970s could not reach this performance index.
As for the Soviet Union, "MIG -25" is regarded as the most terrible weapon in the arsenal with the strictest security measures. This fighter has been deployed only in the Soviet Union's local air defense forces and has not been supplied to satellite countries in Eastern Europe; In the official documents of the Soviet Union, you can't even directly call MIG -25 fighter, but you must call it "Product 84".
However, no one expected that on the afternoon of September 6, 1976, 1 30, a flying fox fighter plane defected from the Soviet Union landed at Hakodate airport at the southern tip of Hokkaido, Japan. Victor Ivanovich belenko, captain of the Soviet Air Force, gave the West a gift that he never dreamed of.
A few days later, the MIG -25 with its wings removed was transported to an air base on the outskirts of Tokyo by a US military transport plane. Because Soviet fighters were still hovering not far from Hakodate, the Japan Air Self-Defense Force mobilized 40 fighters from the 2nd, 6th and 7th air regiments to escort the 800km route and the two-hour secret night flight. Subsequently, the "flying fox" was dismantled into eight pieces, and more than 200 American experts in aircraft manufacturing, weapons and equipment, electronics, metallurgy and aerodynamics studied the aircraft carefully.
The "MiG -25" fighter that unveiled the mystery made the Americans somewhat disappointed. Experts said afterwards that 70% of the parts of "Flying Fox" are made of nickel alloy steel, with heavy structure and poor combat performance. Although the limit speed is very high, it is not as terrible as expected, and it is surprisingly rough in some places: its cockpit is very small and its vision is not good; As a fighter, it lacks maneuverability to adapt to air combat; As an interceptor, its radar does not have the ability to look down, nor does it have the ability to intercept the aircraft that the other side uses low-altitude penetration tactics.
However, Americans also have to admit that Soviet engineers produced MIG -25, a fighter with outstanding performance in some aspects, with relatively backward technology. Flying at 3 times supersonic speed will cause high temperature on the surface of the aircraft. For this reason, the United States had to give up the commonly used aviation aluminum alloy and use the titanium alloy with heat resistance 10 times to manufacture SR-7 1. However, titanium alloy is not only expensive, but also difficult to process, which leads to the poor maneuverability of the expensive "Blackbird" and the difficulty of turning at high speed like a rocket. The "simple and rude" Soviets only used nickel alloy steel to reach the target of 3 times supersonic speed.
80% of MIG-25 is made of steel, and the other main materials are high-temperature resistant D 19 aluminum alloy, while titanium alloy accounts for only 8%. The steel structure is relatively heavy, which is the main reason why the empty weight of "Flying Fox" exceeds 20 tons. Steel is not only strong, cheap and heat-resistant, but also relatively small in thermal expansion and contraction, and easy to weld, thus avoiding the problems of high-temperature rivets and seals.
The electronic equipment on MIG -25 still uses electron tubes, which is outdated in the eyes of Americans who have adopted transistor solid-state circuits. However, what the Soviet Union values is that in addition to being mature and reliable, the electron tube has a particularly large current output and a particularly wide frequency band, and it is not afraid of strong electromagnetic interference caused by nuclear explosions.
In fact, the design index of "Flying Fox" radar is to "burn through" all known electronic interference at a distance of 80 kilometers. Faced with such harsh requirements, the technical strength of Soviet transistors was not enough at that time, and finally the "brute force" of electron tubes solved the problem. The antenna of this "cyclone" radar is as high as 900 mm in diameter, weighs 500 kg and has a power of 600 kW. Because the transmitting power is too strong, the Soviet military forbids MIG -25 pilots to turn on the radar on the ground, because the microwave emitted by this radar can cook a rabbit running over a runway 300 meters away on the spot, so the ground crew are afraid of being involved in this terrible electromagnetic whirlwind when maintaining the radar.
Soviet aviation people created the miracle of MIG -25 with simple and rude technical means and won the praise of their opponents. "The manufacturing process of this kind of aircraft shows that Russians are very good at using inexhaustible intelligence to make up for the limitations of resources. They skillfully combine old and new technologies to create this kind of aircraft with technical and tactical performance in a short time and at low cost, and the West needs to invest huge sums of money to achieve such performance. "
From the bystander's point of view, this American comment is tantamount to praising the designer of MIG -25.
199 1 At the end of the year, the Soviet building collapsed, and the Russian aviation industry in the post-Soviet era was declining like Russia's overall national strength. Fortunately, before this, there has been a legendary fighter, which is still impressive Su -27 fighter.
As the name implies, this fighter was developed by Sukhoi Design Bureau. The full name of the founder of the Design Bureau is Barville Osipovich Su Huoyi. 1938, he established the Aircraft Design Bureau named after himself and started his career in aircraft design, but the development was extremely unsatisfactory.
As of 1949, Sukhoi Design Bureau * * * designed 13 aircraft, but only a few of them were put into production, and the rest were either abandoned halfway or not adopted after completion. During this period, Su Huoyi's achievements and fame were far behind those of mikoyan, Polikarpov and La Voshkin, and his design bureau was forced to close and dissolve at 1949.
Surprisingly, in the early 1950s, Su Huoyi made a comeback, set up a design bureau for the second time, and rose rapidly. Before "Su -27", the Su-15 fighter developed by Sukhoi Design Bureau was considered as the first real all-weather fighter in the Soviet Union, which could fight day and night-but it never participated in the war during its service, but what really made it famous in the world was that it accidentally attacked Korean passenger planes twice in 1978 and 1983. Therefore, the Su-15 fighter was dubbed as the "civil aircraft killer", especially hated by Koreans.
In contrast, the appearance of Su -27 is also somewhat legendary. 1987 September 13, the P-3B "Olian" anti-submarine patrol aircraft belonging to the 333rd squadron of the Norwegian Air Force flew eastward along the Soviet coast only 90km above the Barents Sea. The Soviet airborne early warning radar immediately found this "uninvited guest" and immediately sent a new type of "Su -27" fighter to monitor it.
The pilot who followed and monitored 17 minutes took a strange warning measure: flying the plane quickly through the lower right of P-3B. I saw that the vertical tail tip of the Su -27 cut a big hole in the outboard engine nacelle of the P-3B aircraft, forcing the injured P-3B to escape. Su -27 entered the public eye with such a beautiful "surgery" posture.
In fact, Su -27 is an all-weather heavy air-to-air fighter developed by Sukhoi Design Bureau from 1969, which belongs to the work of the Soviet Union to catch up with the world's third generation (Russian standard is the fourth generation) fighters.
1On May 20th, 977, the first prototype was successfully tested. Three years later, the first prototype was pre-produced, then modified, finalized and mass-produced before being delivered to the army. By 1986, the combat capability has begun to take shape.
1June 8, 989, the 38th Paris Air Show opened. As a new product of the Soviet Union, two Su -27 fighters made their first public appearance. The Su -27, which made its debut on the stage, presented a difficult and unconventional maneuver flight to the French audience, which made the audience dumbfounded-I saw the fighter plane flying from one end of the airport runway at a speed of about 400 kilometers per hour.
Suddenly, an unexpected scene happened, only to see the Su -27' s nose suddenly lift up and tilt up all the time. When the angle of attack is pulled from 0 degrees to 120 degrees, the tail rushes forward, and the "belly" is facing the sky, almost flying flat on the back, and the speed also drops to about 1 10 kilometers per hour, forming a short tail behind the nose. After a few seconds, the nose slides forward again, maintaining the original normal level flying state, but the flying height has hardly changed.
The founder of this unconventional maneuver is test pilot Victor pugachev. Because the Su -27 plane is safe and comfortable when flying flat, the action of pulling the nose forward instantly is strange like a furious "cobra", so this action is named "Pugachev Cobra Maneuver". Although some people still doubt the practical value of this stunt in the era of air-to-air missiles, no one can deny the excellent maneuverability of the Su -27 fighter.
In the post-cold war era, the national strength of the Russian Federation is not as good as before. Su -27 fighter and its dazzling derivative models (Su -30, Su -33, Su -34, Su -35, Su -37) have become the fist products of aviation industry.
To this day, the new generation fighter Su -57 developed by Russia still bears the strong imprint of Su -27, and some people ridicule it without reason. Su -57 is actually a flat Su -27. It is no exaggeration to say that this fighter named "flanker" by NATO is actually the last aviation "black technology" of Soviet countries. ■