Yak-40 aircraft. Passenger aircraft of the USSR. KB Yakovlev

2024 Author: Harold Hamphrey | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 10:06

Usually, when we hear about civil aviation aircraft, we imagine huge airbuses capable of flying over thousands of kilometers of routes. However, more than forty percent of air transportation is carried out on local air lines, the length of which is 200-500 kilometers, and sometimes they are measured in only tens of kilometers. It was for such purposes that the Yak-40 aircraft was created. This unique aircraft will be discussed in the article.

Multiple first

Yak-40 (the photo in the article shows this aircraft) became the first passenger jet in the Soviet Union and in the world, which was designed for operation on local airlines. It became the first aircraft of the USSR, which received an airworthiness certificate in Western countries before a similar certification appeared in our country. The Yak-40 was the first of the domestic airbuses to receive certificates in Germany and Italy. He is also the first of the Sovietaircraft passed all airworthiness standards of England BCAR and USA - FAR-25. Work on the certification of this aircraft contributed to the acceleration of the organization of the aviation register in the USSR, the adoption of airworthiness standards, as well as the development by our industry of a number of units and materials that meet the standards of the "West". In addition, it became the first passenger airliner for the Yakovlev Design Bureau.

First customer and expert reviews

Italy became the first country in the world to purchase the Yak-40 aircraft. She also organized a presentation of the high performance characteristics of this machine. Piloted by test pilot M. G. Zavyalov and Italian pilots, the plane flew from the capital of Italy to Australia. This route was completed without any failures or breakdowns. In April 1970, the French Aviation Magazine noted that the Yak-40 was original in design, size and flight characteristics. In the West, there is practically no aircraft that could be opposed to the Russian newcomer. In the United States, such projects were only being developed, the implementation of which was to take place only in a few years.

All world experts gave the highest rating to the Russian aircraft and Yakovlev Design Bureau.

Creating an airplane

The engineers started developing the Yak-40 in April of the 65th year of the last century. The purpose of creating a new aircraft was to replace the outdated piston models Il-12, Il-14 and Li-2, which worked on local airlines. It took Soviet aircraft manufacturers only one year to designand building a prototype. And so, on October 21, 1966, test pilot Arseniy Kolosov first took to the air a prototype - the Yak-40. A feature of the aircraft was the ability to take off from unpaved airfields. This was facilitated by the excess safety margin of the aircraft structure, incorporated into it by the engineers of the Yakovlev Design Bureau.

"Kerosene Fighter", or "Iron Butt"

Yak-40 (photo above) is the simplest machine, designed for flight and ground personnel with medium qualifications. Two nicknames were attached to it - "Iron Cigarette" (for the relatively small size and abundant smoke of power units) and "Kerosene Fighter" (for high fuel consumption). This airbus is characterized by a very high reliability, as well as safety in operation. The Yak-40 is capable of taking off in case of failure of one of the three engines and flying on one of the power units. At unprepared airfields, the work of maintenance personnel is facilitated by an autonomous launcher, a folding ladder, and high controllability of the machine. The placement of engines in the rear fuselage significantly reduced the level of vibration and noise.

Employment achievements

In total, the Soviet aviation industry produced 1011 units of the Yak-40 model. The release was stopped in 1981, but the life of the aircraft did not end there. More than forty years on the world's air routes - is this not the best confirmation of the reliability of the machine, the correctness of the technical solutions to the complex problems that arose when creating this model! And the designers andThe technologists of the Minsk Aircraft Repair Plant not only ensured the second life of the aircraft, but also, together with the specialists of the Yakovlev Design Bureau, created new modifications - flying laboratories, which have recently acquired great importance in the national economy of the country. In Russia, the aircraft has found a very wide application. So, by the mid-seventies, the Yak-40 completely replaced the veterans Il-12, Il-14 and Li-2 from local airlines. Having mastered flights to more than three hundred settlements of the country, these hard workers by 1988 transported more than eighty million passengers. And the history of this aircraft is still not over. The experience of operating this model in our country and in eighteen foreign countries has definitely shown the fallacy of the decision to withdraw the Yak-40 aircraft from production. Thus, the replacement of power units with more economical modern engines would increase the production and export of this aircraft.

Export

The delivery of the first Yak-40 aircraft for export began in 1970, just four years after the prototype took off. Within ten years, 125 units of various layouts and modifications were sold to the countries of Asia, Europe and the Republic of Cuba. Export models, compared with serial ones, had a number of differences in the composition of household and flight and navigation equipment. The USSR supplied these passenger planes to eighteen countries of the world: Angola, Afghanistan, Bulgaria, Hungary, Vietnam, Zambia, Italy, Cambodia, Cuba, Laos, the Malagasy Republic, Poland, Syria, Germany, Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia, Yugoslavia. In 2000, the Kamchatka aviation enterprisesold one aircraft to Honduras. Since 1967, the Yak-40 has been a participant in all aviation salons in England, Germany, Japan, Italy, France, Sweden and other countries. This legendary aircraft, with demonstration flights of more than five hundred thousand kilometers, visited many states not only in Europe, but also in Asia, America, Africa, and Australia. It should be noted that the Yak-40 is the first Soviet airliner that was sold to capitalist countries with their own developed aircraft industry. These aircraft are still operated by airlines in sixteen countries around the world.

Technical portrait

Now consider the specifications. The Yak-40, according to passport data, is designed for flights with a length of one and a half thousand kilometers. The wing has a rather large area - 70 square meters, which made it possible to abandon the system of very complex multi-slotted flaps and slats. The cruising speed is 510 km/h. The main idea of the aircraft design was simplicity, a combination of three jet engines and a large wing, high takeoff and landing characteristics. The traction power of the power unit is one and a half tons. Another advantage of the power plant is the middle engine, which is located in the fuselage, it has a reverse thrust - a special device that allows you to change the direction of the exhaust gas jet when the aircraft is braking. This installation made it possible to reduce the mileage of the car when landing up to 400 meters. Moreover, the shields for the reverse are not an accessory of the engine, but of the aircraft. This is very important for the unification of powerinstallation and easy replacement of the middle unit. The chassis of the machine is equipped with a soft cushioning system, which reduces the pressure on the surface of the runway. All this allowed the aircraft to safely take off and land on unpaved airfields.

The cockpit accommodates two people: the commander and the co-pilot, but if necessary, you can install a third seat. Cabin windows have special electric heating. Salon Yak-40 has such that it can accommodate from 27 to 32 passengers. The aircraft is equipped with up-to-date avionics navigation equipment, which allows flying day and night, in rather difficult weather conditions. The equipment includes: an autopilot, an artificial horizon, a heading system, a magnetic compass, two automatic radio compasses, a heading gliding system for landing, a radio altimeter for low altitudes. The aircraft is equipped with a very efficient air-thermal system that prevents hull icing. The radio weather radar helps to detect the presence of thunderstorms along the flight path. According to the passport data, the resource of the airliner is thirty thousand hours, and the service life is up to 25 years.

Second youth

In 1999, Yakovlev Design Bureau engineers carried out studies and calculations that showed that the aircraft's service life could be doubled by strengthening the structure and refining the airframe. The life extension program will allow companies to defer the need to purchase new aircraft, resulting in significant cost savings. Programmodernization includes the replacement of engines with economical power units.

Disasters

A lot of people, and even those who regularly use the services of air carriers, are afraid to fly. And regular plane crashes contribute to the development of these phobias. It is useless for such people to show statistics, according to which, much more people die in car accidents than in plane crashes. Such an attitude is easily explained, because when an aircraft crashes, even if they occur very rarely, dozens of people die at the same time. It is always a shock, not only for the close victims, but also for strangers. Apparently, the fear is also explained by the fact that the passenger cannot change anything, nothing depends on him, he gives himself and his life into the hands of the pilot and the soulless machine.

So, let's look at the statistics of losses of Yak-40 airliners. Accidents and loss of aircraft for other reasons over the more than forty-year history of this model have exceeded the ten percent barrier. So, since the beginning of operation, 117 aircraft have been lost. Of these, 46 crashed for various reasons, most often due to pilot or air traffic controller errors. The remaining 71 Yak-40s were damaged for one reason or another, this includes aircraft destroyed during hostilities in various hot spots on the planet. By the way, the last such aircraft that was lost was an airliner damaged during the battle for Donetsk airport on May 26, 2014.

Yakovlev Aircraft

The Yakovlev Design Bureau has a rich history. From itmany different machines came out of the walls, from military aircraft to passenger airliners. Both sports and special-purpose models are produced here, for example, for training pilots. Let's consider some of them, for example, the Yak-42 aircraft. This model was developed in the mid-70s of the last century for flights on short-haul airlines of the USSR. Commercial operation of this aircraft began in the 80th year. During its serial production in 1980-2002, 194 aircraft were built. Of these, 64 units of the basic configuration of the Yak-42 and 130 - in the improved modification of the Yak-42D - increased takeoff weight and flight range. The cruising speed is 700 km/h. The aircraft is designed for a maximum flight range of four thousand kilometers. The passenger cabin is designed for 120 seats. This aircraft does not need advertising, its merits speak for themselves. After all, they set nine world records! So, in one of them, the Yak-42, designed for short-range lines, was able to overcome the distance from the capital of Russia to Khabarovsk without landing. Surprising is the fact that before the creation of the Yak-40 and Yak-42 models, the Yakovlev design bureau did not develop multi-seat passenger airliners at all. Their main specialization is training, sports and military fighter aircraft.

Yak-18 aircraft

This aircraft is a descendant of the UT-2L produced in the 44th year of the last century. It is intended for the initial training of pilots. In the postwar years, the Yak-18 became the first masseducational apparatus. In its concept, equipment and design, the idea of flying in difficult weather conditions and at night was expressed. The aircraft is equipped with a power unit with a capacity of 160 liters. with., with variable pitch aeromechanical propeller. The fuselage structure is a proprietary steel tube type. The bow is covered with maintenance hatches, and the tail is covered with canvas. The stabilizers and keel have a metal frame with very rigid profiled toes. Wing - two-spar, detachable, with a center section. Removable consoles and the entire center section up to the first spar has a rigid sheathing, and the rest is covered with canvas. In the Yak-18 model, all the shortcomings of its predecessor were eliminated, it is a very stable and easily controlled aircraft, and has good flight characteristics. The maximum speed of this aircraft is 257 km / h, the rate of climb is 4 m / s, the maximum flight altitude is four thousand meters, the flight range is one thousand kilometers, and the landing speed is 85 km / h. The Yak-18 is equipped with a number of various devices that make night and "blind" flights possible.

The Yak-18t is a modification of the Yak-18. This is a light multi-purpose aircraft. It is one of the safest aircraft used in flight schools. As was officially stated at one of the flight technical conferences, 650 Yak-18t aircraft flew more than one and a half million hours without serious incidents due to technical fault. In its modern version, this aircraft is distinguished by its versatility, it can bepassenger, training, sanitary, transport. In addition, it is used to patrol oil and gas pipelines, power lines, highways and forests, as well as to transport three passengers for a distance of up to five hundred kilometers.

Sport aircraft from Yakovlev Design Bureau

May 8, 1979, a small aircraft with bright red wings appeared in the sky near the Tushino airfield. The plane with a slight rumbling famously performed aerobatics: rolls, loops, coups. An experienced eye would immediately notice that this is not a single-seat sports Yak-50 familiar to local residents, but a different model. The large cockpit canopy extended forward indicated that it was a two-seat craft. When landing, it was possible to distinguish other differences: the landing flap and the nose landing gear. It was a new brainchild from the engineers of the Yakovlev Design Bureau - the Yak-52, an aircraft capable of satisfying the most diverse and conflicting requirements. And this is understandable, because a sports training apparatus requires minimal stability reserves, small efforts that the pilot must make to the control handle of the machine. He should easily perform spin aerobatic maneuvers. And as an aircraft for primary training, on the contrary, it should be very stable and difficult to fly and should not break into a tailspin.

A rather solid set of navigation and flight equipment should be installed on the device for training flights according to instruments, and for the sports version it will be just an extra load. With everyoneThese difficulties faced a group of engineers and designers. And yet, the aircraft designers coped with the task "excellent" and in the shortest possible time: the Yak-52 was built in less than six months. This is a two-seat all-metal monoplane. The fuselage is semi-monocoque, it has a working metal skin. It is connected to the frame with a hidden riveting. The wing is single-spar, equipped with landing flaps suspended on ramrod loops and controlled by pneumatic cylinders. The tail unit is free-carrying. The stabilizer and keel are made according to the two-spar scheme. The Yak-52 is equipped with a nine-cylinder piston star-shaped power unit with a capacity of 360 liters. With. with automatic variable pitch propeller. Navigation and flight equipment allows you to fly in very difficult weather conditions. In addition to the standard set of instruments, this model has a heading system, an ultra-short-wave radio installation and an automatic radio compass. If aerobatics are to be performed, then the excess navigation and flight equipment is dismantled.