The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 : Микоян и Гуревич МиГ-15; : Type 14; : Fagot is a developed by for the. The MiG-15 was one of the first successful jet fighters to incorporate to achieve high speeds. In combat over , it outclassed straight-winged jet , which were largely relegated to ground-attack roles, and was quickly countered by the similar American swept-wing. The MiG-15 is often mentioned, along with the F-86 Sabre, as the best fighter aircraft of the. The MiG-15 is believed to have been one of ; in excess of 12,000 were manufactured. Licensed foreign production may have raised the production total to almost 18,000. MiG-15 UTI Trainer version, Chino Planes of Fame Air Museum The first turbojet developed by Mikoyan-Gurevich OKB was the , which appeared in the years immediately after. It used a pair of German engines. The MiG-9 was a troublesome design that suffered from weak, unreliable engines and control problems. Categorized as a , it was designed with the straight-style wings common to piston-engined fighters. The Germans had been unable to develop turbojets with thrust over 1,130 kiloponds 11,100 N; 2,500 lb f running at the time of the surrender in May 1945, which limited the performance of immediate Soviet postwar jet aircraft designs. They did inherit the technology of the advanced axial compressor Junkers 012 and engines, in the class of the later , that were some years ahead of the currently available British engine. The Soviet aviation minister and aircraft designer suggested to Premier that the USSR buy the conservative but fully developed Nene engines from Rolls-Royce for the purpose of copying them in a minimum of time. To Stalin's amazement, the British Labour government and its Minister of Trade, Sir , were perfectly willing to provide technical information and a license to manufacture the Rolls-Royce Nene. Sample engines were purchased and delivered with blueprints. Following evaluation and adaptation to Russian conditions, the windfall technology was tooled for mass-production as the to be incorporated into the MiG-15. MiG-15bis at Monino Aircraft Museum To take advantage of the new engine, the ordered the Mikoyan-Gurevich OKB to build two prototypes for an advanced high-altitude daytime interceptor to defend against bombers. It was to have a top speed of 1,000 kilometres per hour 620 mph and a range of 1,200 kilometres 750 mi. Designers at MiG's OKB-155 started with the earlier MiG-9 jet fighter. The new fighter used Klimov's British-derived engines, , and a tailpipe going all the way back to a swept tail. The German was the first fighter fitted with an 18. Further experience and research during World War II later established that swept wings would give better performance at speeds. At the end of World War II, the Soviets seized many of the assets of Germany's aircraft industry. The swept wing later proved to have a decisive performance advantage over straight-winged jet fighters when it was introduced into combat over Korea. The design that emerged had a mid-mounted 35-degree swept wing with a slight anhedral and a tailplane mounted up on the swept tail. Western analysts noted that it strongly resembled Kurt Tank's , a later design than the Me 262 that never progressed beyond the design stage. While the majority of Focke-Wulf engineers in particular, , who led the Ta-183 development team were captured by Western armies, the Soviets did capture plans and wind-tunnel models for the Ta-183. The MiG-15's design understandably shared features, and some appearance commonalities with the MiG design bureau's of the rocket fighter in the appearance of its fuselage. The new MiG retained the previous straight-winged MiG-9's wing and tailplane placement while the F-86 employed a more conventional low-winged design. To prevent confusion during the height of combat the US painted their planes with bright stripes to distinguish them. The resulting prototypes were designated I-310. The I-310 was a fighter with 35-degree sweep in wings and tail, with two fitted to each wing to improve airflow over the wing. The design used a single Rolls-Royce Nene fed by a split-forward air intake. A duct carried intake air around the cockpit area and back together ahead of the engine. Its first flight was 30 December 1947, some two months after the American F-86 Sabre had first flown. It demonstrated exceptional performance, reaching 1,042 kilometres per hour 647 mph at 3,000 metres 9,800 ft. The Soviet Union's first swept-wing jet fighter had been the underpowered , which was otherwise more similar to the MiG-9. The , which reached production as the , used the same engine as the MiG but used a shoulder mounted wing and t-tail; it was the main competitive design. Eventually, the MiG design was favoured for mass production. Designated MiG-15, the first production example flew on 31 December 1948. Visible differences were a headlight in the air intake separator and horizontal uppe
