AN-2

[justinhawxhurst 0]

The long ride give lots of time for shit talking and messin with the tandom students.

[jraf 0]

Gawd that looks awful - I saw a modified SkyVan with a nose radar dome at Destin Airport in Destin, FL last summer. That of course was even ugler.

Now when it comes to the AN 3 production, I think that the Turboprop engine might have been a slight overkill for the airframe i.e.: airframe modifications to tolerate the power must have made the production of this rather exotic plane financially prohibitive.

Also, think about the fact that it is a bi-plane. A larger engine might not make it that much faster due to the drag...I leave that one to aviation engineers though.

jraf

Me Jungleman! Me have large Babalui.
Muff #3275

[riggerrob 643]

Now when it comes to the AN 3 production, I think that the Turboprop engine might have been a slight overkill for the airframe i.e.: airframe modifications to tolerate the power must have made the production of this rather exotic plane financially prohibitive.


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I disagree. All you would need are a few firewall/longeron doublers to handle the extra horsepower, similar to all the DeHavilland Beavers and single Otters that have been converted to turboprops. Cost would be dirt cheap as long as you stuck with communist-built Walter turboprops.
If you got silly and installed too powerful a turbine, you would end up with the something like the first Turbine Cariboo. That prototype had so much excess horsepower that test pilots were afraid of pulling full power in level flight for fear of exceeding red-line!
Hee!
Hee!
After numerous modifications, the Turbine Cariboo evolved into the DHC-5 Buffalo which set several climb records.

Getting back to the AN-3, installing too powerful a turbine would invalidate the basic design concept: an airplane so docile that even a drunken collective farmer could not hurt it.

[jraf 0]

AN 2 Colt - Single-engine biplane utility transport. One 1000 hp. Shvetsov Ash-62IR radial engine. Take off mass 5250kg. First flew in 1947.
Fun club: phones: +7(0572)44-26-21, +7(0572)97-45-88; e-mail: eastga@kharkov.com; "General Aviation", Kharkov, UA.
A biplane transport, used since 1947 with great succes and in many countries, despite its apparent obsolescence. Over 18000 may have been built. The An-2 was used as STOL transport, for training, as firefighting aircraft, as agricultural aircraft, and in many other roles. The An-2 has also been built as floatplane (An-4); the normal wheeled landing gear can easily be interchanged with skis. There is a meteorological version with a cabin in front of the tailfin (An-6), and a An-2F experimental artillery spotter, with a extensively glazed aft fuselage and a slender tail boom with twin fins. For agricultural purposes a turboprop-engined version, the An-3 (SKh, "Selsko-Khosiajstwennij" = "Agricultural"), was created recently.
The prototype of the An-2, designed to a specification of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry of the USSR, made its first flight on 31 August 1947. In 1948 the aircraft went into production in the USSR as the An-2, with a 746 kW (1000 hp) ASh-62 engine. By 1960, more than 5000 An-2s had been built in the Soviet Union, as fully described in previous editions of Jane's. Licence rights were granted to China, where the first locally produced An-2 was completed in December 1957, as the Yunshuji-5 or Y-5. Limited production continues in China, as described under the SAP heading in that section. Since 1960, apart from a few dozen Soviet built An-2Ms (1971-72 Jane's), continued production of the An-2 has been primarily the responsibility of PZL Mielec, the original licence arrangement providing for two basic versions: the An-2T transport and An-2R agricultural version. The first Polish built An-2 was flown on 23 October 1960. Mielec has since built more than 11950 An-2s for domestic use and for export to the USSR (10427), Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Egypt, France, the then German Democratic Republic, Hungary, Iraq, North Korea, Mongolia, Netherlands, Nicaragua, Romania, Sudan, Tunisia, Turkey, the UK, Venezuela and Yugoslavia. They include 7777 An-2Rs. In 1989 AICSA of Colombia (which see) assembled two An-2s from kits supplied from PZL Mielec via Pezetel. Polish built versions have different designations from those built in the USSR. They include the An-2 Geofiz; An-2LW; An-2P, PK, P-Photo and PR; An-2R; An-2S; An-2T, TD and TP. Further details of these can be found in the 1983-84 and earlier editions of Jane's.

AN 3 Colt - The An-3 is a turboprop-engined (TVD-20 or TVD-1500SKh) development of old the An-2 transport biplane, first flown in 1984. A rather unique concept, the An-3 was built because the jet-engined M-15 biplane did not stand up to the rigours of agricultural work. Sertification expected by April'2000 in "Polyot" Enterprise, Omsk. Convertion price up to USD500K (TVD-20 engine costs about USD200K) at 30% prepayment and 5..6 monthes delivery. Estimated market about 2000 aircrafts from Latin America, Iraq, Cuba, Hungary, and Yugoslavia plus numerous An-2 from CIS.

jraf

Me Jungleman! Me have large Babalui.
Muff #3275

[riggerrob 643]

Yes.
Circa 1993, the FAA started restricting the importation of a variety of Communist-surplus airplanes.
At the time I was working for Butler Parachute Systems, packing pilot emergency parachutes for a bewildering array of military surplus airplanes (Antonovs, Beechcraft, DeHavilland, Drakens, Hawker, Gemsboks, Gnats, Iskaras, Magisters, Migs, North American, Northrop, Sokol Galebs, Sukhois, Supermarine and Yaks) that had recently fallen into civilian hands.

The FAA faced a two-fold problem, both related to flight safety. The FAA feared that too many comunist-surplus airplanes would crash, leading to a public outcry to ban them.
First off, circa 1990, the shortage of World War Two surplus warbirds had drivent he cost so high that only millionairs could afford to operate them. Millionairs in their fifties and sixties generally don't like high risk sports, so they maintained their WW2 warbirds to high standards.
Hint: the owner of the Grand Champion Warbird - at Oshkosh 1993 - quit counting after he invested $1.5 million dollars in over-hauling his P-51 Mustang.

When the Berlin Wall fell, the American market was flooded with communist-surplus warbirds that cost less than Bonanzas (i.e. $30,000) and suddenly thousands of nuvo-riche could buy fast airplanes, airplanes far faster than they had ever flown before. This tremendously increased the workload of the few warbird instructors available.
Remember that the majority of United States military airplanes were never certified for civilian use because they required far more skill to fly. Ergo, the FAA requires additional training for any warbird pilot.

But the other problem was maintenance. Not all of these neuvo-riche pilots could afford to maintain their airplanes properly. Spare parts were difficult to find and often lacked documentation.
Most of the production records had been lost decades ago along with most of the Albanian/Czech/East German/Polish/Russian Air Force maintenance records.
Hint: the long term maintenance program for many Russian airplanes involved returning them to the factory for a full over-haul after x number of hours, but the factory never allowed its overhaul records to leave the factory.
And remember that the FAA loves to cover its ass with paperwork. So without an exhaustive pile of paperwork, the FAA will not approve any airplane to fly.
Transport Canada requires an even larger pile of paperwork ... something about subsidizing the Canadian pulp and paper industry ... but I digress.
Ergo, most communist-surplus airplanes are only allowed to fly in North America with RESTRICTED or EXPERIMENTAL registration, preventing them from carrying paying passengers (i.e. skydivers).

Once all those communist-surplus airplanes arrived in the Western World, they became a maintenance nightmare for western mechanics. Few english-language manuals were available. Spare parts were widely available, but difficult to match to a specific airframe.
Many owners of communist-surplus warbirds found it easier to hire retired Polish Air Force technicians.
Hee!
Hee!

[FrogNog 1]

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I think the change control and quality control _at the time of manufacture_ was probably just fine. OK, they were built by an Evil Empire[tm] of Godless Communists[R] but they probably didn't like the idea of dying in a plane crash any more than Red-Blooded Americans[tm] did. This leads to a certain level of careful attention during design and manufacture.

I agree with your (not quoted right here) suggestion about protectionism - that might be a small or large part of it.

But while I also agree with your "nobody wants to die" perspective on the Russians' part _in theory_, it is my opinion (as an American raised during the Cold War) that Russian quality control nationwide had a tendency to lean more toward expendability of people than Americans were accustomed to. At least, that's how some overall quality control stuff looked at the time.

Whether that applies directly to the at-the-time engineering and manufacturing of the An-2, I can't say at all because I wasn't there and haven't researched it.

The bigger picture that makes me sad is just how hard / expensive it is to engineer any airplane to the standards (engineering or political) necessary to certify it, and as a result the low rate of introduction of new cool airplanes in our rough area of aviation.

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So, has anyone jumped an AN-3?

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Pull.

[niu 0]

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The long ride give lots of time for shit talking and messin with the tandom students.

If you`re ever in a lightly loaded An-2,ask the pilot to give you some real 0G it`s fun as hell in that spacious bird.

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[georgerussia 0]

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If you're going to Eloy, get on the DC-3 for the sunset New Year's Eve XC. Long ride, but a nostalgic experience.

Sure I will. Hope I'll get the first class seat, and order champagne :)

* Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *

[justinhawxhurst 0]

When I started this post I was not expecting this much info on the AN-2 Thanks everyone for the info it is fun to know more about the bird I go up in every jump. Not many people know much about it.

[jimp 1]

We jump this amazing (slow) bird...

An interesting note from the pilot's handbook:

"If the engine quits in instrument conditions or at night, the pilot should pull the control column full aft and keep the wings level. The leading edge slats will
snap out at about 64km/h (40 mph), and when the airplane slows to a forward speed of about 40km/h (25 mph), the airplane will sink at a parachute descent rate until it hits the ground"

[jraf 0]

Hey that is a stall rate close to that of a Fiessler Storch. I once flew in one backwords. The winds at 3,000 feet were faster than the forward speed of the plane giving us negative ground speed. It also takes 70 feet to lift it off the ground!

jraf

Me Jungleman! Me have large Babalui.
Muff #3275

[SansSuit 1]

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. joined the 'club' and did a WS jump out of an AN-2 at WFFC06 @5k.

This one. And for the record it has been jumped nekked.

Peace,
-Dawson.
http://www.SansSuit.com
The Society for the Advancement of Naked Skydiving

[sabre1700 0]

Here's a few shots of April jumping the AN-2 with Norm Kent, at the WFFC last summer.

Note the very nice interior with seats for all. Deluxe ride all around and they gave us extra altitude, due to a go around.

A very unique experience, all around.

Blue skies,
Jim Rasmussen

[piisfish 140]

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Deluxe ride all around and they gave us extra altitude, due to a go around.

you can see the altitude condensation in th e"exit" pictures

scissors beat paper, paper beat rock, rock beat wingsuit - KarlM