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The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 was extremely
simple although advanced in concept. The MiG-15
was the Soviet Union’s first operational swept
wing aircraft. It had a better rate of climb,
ceiling and high-altitude radius of turn than
any Allied jet aircraft at the time. It came as
a shock to the American pilots who first
encountered it in combat over Korea. Its
appearance over Korea in late 1950 shattered the
complacency of Western air forces that, until
then, had dismissed Soviet fighters as second
rate.
Conceived in 1947, the design lacked a suitable
engine until the British Government made a gift
of an example of their latest turbojet, the
Rolls-Royce Nene, to the Soviet Union. It was
immediately stripped and copied and went into
production for the new fighter and within eight
months the prototype MiG-15 was flying.
Deliveries began in the winter of 1949 but early
aircraft soon revealed various minor
deficiencies that were corrected in the more
powerful and robust MiG-15bis. By the time
production ended, some 16.000 MiG-15s of all
types had been built in the Soviet Union,
Czechoslovakia, Poland and China. They served in
almost forty countries. A
number of improvements were added to the
MiG-15bis during production, including
replacement of the NS-23 23-millimeter cannons
with NP-23 23-millimeter cannons, providing a
50% higher rate of fire; a modified canopy
providing a better field of view; cockpit
pressurization bleed for a gee-suit; bigger dive
brakes; more cockpit armor; a Sirena-2 radar
warning system; and an electrical engine
self-starting system, eliminating the need for a
ground cart. A small number of MiG-15bis
Fagot-Bs were built with a brake parachute and
antiskid braking system, though this was not
standard kit.
- I-310 : Prototype.
- MiG-15 : Single-seat jet fighter.
The first production version.
- MiG-15P : Single-seat all-weather
interceptor version of the Mig-15bis.
- MiG-15SB : Single-seat fighter
bomber version.
- MiG-15SP-5 : Two-seat all-weather
interceptor version of the MiG-15UTI.
- MiG-15T : Target-towing version.
- MiG-15bis : Improved single-seat
fighter version.
- MiG-15bisR : Single-seat
reconnaissance version.
- MiG-15bisS : Single-seat escort
fighter version.
- MiG-15bisT : Single-seat
target-towing version.
- MiG-15UTI : Two-seat dual-control
jet trainer.
- J-2 : Chinese designation of the
MiG-15 single-seat fighter.
- JJ-2 : Chinese designation of the
MiG-15UTI two-seat jet trainer.
- Lim-1 : MiG-15 jet fighters built
under licence in Poland.
- Lim-1A : Polish built,
reconnaissance version of MiG-15 with AFA-21
camera
- Lim-2 : MiG-15bis built under
licence in Poland.
- Lim-2R : Polish-built ground
attack-reconaissance version of MiG-15bis
with place for camera in the front part of
the canopy
- Lim-2A : Polish build biplace
ground attack-reconnaissance version
- SB Lim-1 : MiG-15UTI with RD-45
engine jet trainers built under licence in
Poland.
- SB Lim-2 : MiG-15UTI with VK-1
jet trainers built under licence in Poland.
- S-102 : MiG-15 jet fighters built
under licence in Czechoslovakia.
- S-103 : MiG-15bis jet fighters
built under licence in Czechoslovakia.
Most MiG-15 family aircraft originally flew
in natural metal colors, though there were some
special bright paint jobs for airshow
demonstration machines. In the late 1950s, many
MiG-15bis fighters were shoehorned into the
fighter-bomber role, being fitted with an
additional stores pylon under each wing for
carriage of a bomb or unguided rocket launcher.
These machines were often painted in disruptive
camouflage color schemes. Of course there were
special color schemes, such as the overall red
color for the "Red Five", and one American pilot
even reported shooting down a MiG-15 during the
Korean War that had a dragon painted along the
full length of the fuselage!
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