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Il-16

The IL-16 was an experimental attack aircraft, work on which began in 1944, but due to major defects in the design of the propeller unit and the end of World War II, the project was finally closed in 1946. This aircraft, which was a further development of the Il-10 attack aircraft, was never mass-produced. Therefore, until the 1960s, the entire ground attack aviation of the USSR, up to its abolition, consisted of the Il-10 and Il-10M attack aircraft.

The IL-16 was a further development of the Il-10 attack aircraft, while the new aircraft was supposed to become shorter and lighter (due to a certain decrease in the thickness of the armor). The firepower of the offensive and defensive armament of the aircraft remained comparable to the IL-10, but at the same time the new attack aircraft significantly exceeded its predecessor in speed and maneuverability characteristics.

Immediately after the end of state tests, during the “window” between May and August 1944, Ilyushin very actively began to modify the IL-10, creating on its basis two different branches of his descendants. The first of them was represented by IL-8 No. 2 (on which work had been going since March 1944). and the second - a completely new IL-16.

The prototype of this aircraft was equipped with a more powerful version of the AM-42 engine - AM-43NV with an AB-9L-70 propeller, and in order to achieve additional advantages, such as better speed and maneuverability, it was slightly reduced (“cut off” by about a meter along the length and in scope, and lightened (starting weight decreased to 5780 kg), thanks to which the speed reached 625 km / h.

In order to enable the pilot to perform all aerobatic maneuvers and conduct air combat, its design was strengthened, and to reduce the mass of the fuselage, the thickness of the booking of its side walls was reduced and the area of ??the unarmored upper front part of the armored hull was increased. As in the IL-8 number 2, the armament on the IL-16 was similar to that of the IL-10 (the UB-20 gun had to defend the aircraft from behind).

The aircraft received approval, and even before its first departure, it was decided that it would be put into mass production as a replacement for the IL-10 at the end of winter, early spring 1945. However, when the first three copies were assembled and the first of them made a trial departure, it turned out that the AM-43NV engine was still very crude, as a result of which the project was frozen, and official factory tests were carried out only in August 1945. Besides the engine’s lack of control, there was another problem: its power and weight turned out to be so great that -for shortened tails that plane lost stability in flight. Therefore, it became inevitable lengthening the fuselage by 0.5 meters, just had to increase the area of ??the vertical tail, and on the steering wheel set the trimmer.

The IL-16 had every chance of repeating the success of the IL-10 and even, perhaps, of greater success. The plane had unprecedented speed and maneuverability for the attack aircraft of those times, which could well make it the glory of the “fighter-attack aircraft”. However, the IL-16 appeared already at the very end of the war, in which he could “become famous” and deserve the same love as, for example, IL-2 - in early 1945.

After these modifications, the IL-16 was already much better in the air, but its engine was completely unsuitable for further modernization, and in the end, in the summer of 1946, work on the IL-16 was finally stopped. All efforts were directed to the modernization of the IL-10. Another factor that actually determined the fate of this aircraft was the poor quality of the engine that was installed on it. It is for this reason that the mass production of the IL-16 was first moved away, and then, a year after the Great Victory, was completely canceled.