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The Ilyushin Il-46 was a jet-engined
bomber
A bomber is a military combat aircraft designed to attack ground and naval targets by dropping air-to-ground weaponry (such as bombs), launching aerial torpedo, torpedoes, or deploying air-launched cruise missiles. The first use of bombs dropped ...
produced in the
USSR
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...
during 1951-2, as the result of a directive to redesign the
Il-42 project (half the drawings had already been completed). The revised specification was for an aircraft with twice the range and 1 1/2 times the bomb load, with a prototype ready to be submitted for state acceptance trials in July 1952. The Ilyushin design bureau set about designing two versions of the same aircraft, the straight-wing (Il-46) and the
swept-wing
A swept wing is a wing that angles either backward or occasionally forward from its root rather than in a straight sideways direction.
Swept wings have been flown since the pioneer days of aviation. Wing sweep at high speeds was first investigat ...
(Il-46S), with as much as possible common to both aircraft. To meet the schedule for state acceptance trials Ilyushin built only the straight-wing version, fearing that the design, manufacture and flying characteristics of the swept-wing aircraft might cause delays.
Design and development
The airframe, constructed of
aluminium alloy
An aluminium alloy (or aluminum alloy; see spelling differences) is an alloy in which aluminium (Al) is the predominant metal. The typical alloying elements are copper, magnesium, manganese, silicon, tin, nickel and zinc. There are two principal ...
with steel used in highly stressed parts, resembled a large
Il-28, the long fuselage having swept tail surfaces, and a similar arrangement of cockpits for the crew of pilot, navigator and rear gunner. The wing, which had moderate taper but straight
leading edge
The leading edge of an airfoil surface such as a wing is its foremost edge and is therefore the part which first meets the oncoming air.Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Terms, third edition'', page 305. Aviation Supplies & Academics, ...
s, copied the layout of the Il-28, being mounted in the shoulder position at the midpoint of the fuselage. The flying controls consisted of the usual ailerons, elevators and rudder, all fitted with trim tabs for reducing loads on the pilots controls during flight in steady states, as well as "reversible" hydraulically-powered actuators.
Two
Lyul'ka AL-5 engines were fitted in long nacelles forward of the wings, exhausting through long
jetpipes at the rear of the nacelles, aft of the wing
trailing edge
The trailing edge of an aerodynamic surface such as a wing is its rear edge, where the airflow separated by the leading edge meets.Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Terms, third edition'', page 521. Aviation Supplies & Academics, 1997. ...
. The engines were mounted in this fashion to make room for the retracted main undercarriage legs, two on each side attached to the engine nacelles under the wings. The paired main undercarriage legs, side by side, retracted in opposite directions, inboard forwards and outboard rearwards, with the single mainwheels rotating 90 degrees to lie flat under the long jetpipes of the AL-5 engines. To boost takeoff performance, two
JATO
JATO (acronym for jet-assisted take-off) is a type of assisted take-off for helping overloaded aircraft into the air by providing additional thrust in the form of small rockets. The term ''JATO'' is used interchangeably with the (more specific ...
bottles could be attached to the rear fuselage. Performance was also improved when Lyulka AL-5F (forseerovannyy - afterburning) engines were fitted.
[
Flight tests and state acceptance trials were successful, with the Il-46 meeting all requirements. Production was not ordered because the Tupolev Tu-88 proved to have better performance, and was ordered into production as the ]Tu-16
The Tupolev Tu-16 (NATO reporting name: Badger) is a twin-engined jet strategic heavy bomber used by the Soviet Union. It has been flown for almost 70 years, and the Chinese license-built Xian H-6 remains in service with the People's Liberation ...
.[
The Il-46S swept-wing version was designed concurrently, but construction was not started, to ensure that resources were not diverted from the Il-46.][
]![Ilyushin Il-46 top-view silhouette](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0c/Ilyushin_Il-46_top-view_silhouette.png)
Variants
* Il-46
* Il-46S
Specifications (Il-46)
See also
References
External links
*
{{Ilyushin aircraft
1950s Soviet bomber aircraft
Abandoned military aircraft projects of the Soviet Union
Il-046
Twinjets
Aircraft first flown in 1952