The Yakovlev AIR-12 was a long-range sport aircraft designed and built in the
Soviet Union
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 national ...
during the late 1930s.
Design and development
In 1936 Yakovlev designed a long-range sport aircraft, intended to perform record-breaking long-distance flights. Adhering to his established design methods, the AIR-12 had a welded steel tube covered by removable aluminium panels at the nose, plywood skinning back to the wing trailing edge and fabric fabric-covered rear fuselage. The plywood skinned wooden wings had a high aspect ratio and were sharply tapered with leading-edge sweep and straight trailing-edges. Control surfaces and tail unit were built up with D1 (
duralumin
Duralumin (also called duraluminum, duraluminium, duralum, dural(l)ium, or dural) is a trade name for one of the earliest types of age-hardenable aluminium alloys. The term is a combination of '' Dürener'' and ''aluminium''.
Its use as a tra ...
) and covered with fabric.
[
Accommodation was provided for pilot and passenger/navigator in two closed cockpits. The pilot sat in the rear cockpit aft of the wing trailing-edges under a small forward-sliding canopy and flip-open side panels. The passenger/navigator's cockpit had a flush glazed roof and was situated over the centre-section.][
Power was supplied by the ubiquitous Shvetsov M-11 5-cylinder air-cooled radial engine, driving a two-bladed wooden fixed pitch propeller. Fuel was carried in a single large tank in the fuselage forward of the front cockpit and an auxiliary tank could also be fitted in the front cockpit.][
The AIR-12 was fitted with a retractable tail-wheel undercarriage with the main-wheels retracting inwards, operated by cables, torque shaft and hand crank in the pilots cockpit.][
After initial flight testing and Piontovskiy's long distance flight in September 1936, the AIR-12 was re-engined with a M-11Ye.][
]
Operational history
Flight testing of the AIR-12 commenced in August 1936, including a long-distance non-stop flight, flown by Yulian I. Piontkovskiy on 21 September 1936, from Moscow to Kharkiv
Kharkiv ( uk, wikt:Харків, Ха́рків, ), also known as Kharkov (russian: Харькoв, ), is the second-largest List of cities in Ukraine, city and List of hromadas of Ukraine, municipality in Ukraine.[Sevastopol
Sevastopol (; uk, Севасто́поль, Sevastópolʹ, ; gkm, Σεβαστούπολις, Sevastoúpolis, ; crh, Акъя́р, Aqyár, ), sometimes written Sebastopol, is the largest city in Crimea, and a major port on the Black Sea ...]
, returning to Kharkiv, in a time of 10 hours 45 minutes, covering . On 24 October 1937 the AIR-12, flown by Valentina Grizodoobova (pilot) and Marina Roskova (navigator), flew from Moscow to Akhtoobinsk but the flight was not recognised by the FAI due to no official observer being present.[
]
Specifications (AIR-12, M-11)
References
{{Yakovlev aircraft
1930s Soviet sport aircraft
AIR-12
Single-engined tractor aircraft
Low-wing aircraft
Aircraft first flown in 1936