Evolution of the Mikoyan MiG-29

Mike Pryce said:
The first picture seems to be the variant shown by the models in this earlier post https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/evolution-of-the-mikoyan-mig-29.1398/post-174935 and is similar in planform to the Sukhoi T-10.

Two TsAGI alternatives? MiG chose wisely?

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According to Sukhoi, the layout for the "integral" design was entirely Sukhoi's with no "help" from TsAGI (who were more aligned to MiG). Sukhoi also tested a more conventional F-15ish design as a baseline. MiGs design at that time was a MiG-25/F-15 blend with awful rear view.

p1010739_mig-jpg.69500


Sukhoi's integral design easily beat Mikoyan's design in the first meeting in key parameters.

Mysteriously, by the second meeting, Mikoyan had an "integral" layout of their own and it was smaller, F-16 sized.
1715023092454-png.728125
They obviously refined it from the initial starting point, and the later MiG-29 layout is more "MiG-ified" in general.

1715023127872-png.728126
 
overscan (PaulMM) said:
According to Sukhoi, the layout for the "integral" design was entirely Sukhoi's with no "help" from TsAGI (who were more aligned to MiG). Sukhoi also tested a more conventional F-15ish design as a baseline. MiGs design at that time was a MiG-25/F-15 blend with awful rear view.

Sukhoi's integral design easily beat Mikoyan's design in the first meeting in key parameters.

Mysteriously, by the second meeting, Mikoyan had an "integral" layout of their own and it was smaller, F-16 sized.
They obviously refined it from the initial starting point, and the later MiG-29 layout is more "MiG-ified" in general.
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Just to clarify what do you mean when you say "integral"?
 
Blended wing/body with voluminous LERX and centroplane (engines and intakes spaced widely apart).
 
overscan (PaulMM) said:
According to Sukhoi, the layout for the "integral" design was entirely Sukhoi's with no "help" from TsAGI (who were more aligned to MiG). Sukhoi also tested a more conventional F-15ish design as a baseline. MiGs design at that time was a MiG-25/F-15 blend with awful rear view.

p1010739_mig-jpg.69500


Sukhoi's integral design easily beat Mikoyan's design in the first meeting in key parameters.

Mysteriously, by the second meeting, Mikoyan had an "integral" layout of their own and it was smaller, F-16 sized.
1715023092454-png.728125
They obviously refined it from the initial starting point, and the later MiG-29 layout is more "MiG-ified" in general.

1715023127872-png.728126
Click to expand...
And eventually Sukhoi had to 'MiG-ify' their T-10 when their integral design did not work out?
 
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There were less drastic aerodynamic fixes available for the original layout, but the (newly arrived from TsAGI) Mikhail Simonov wanted to make his mark by casting the T-10 as a failure and taking personal credit for the redesign. This is the story of the Su-27 origins we were originally sold while Simonov was still in charge, which has been nuanced a bit later.

Both designs went from continuous curved leading edges to separate conventional wing and LERX, which the F-16 also did, so it doesn't necessarily follow that Sukhoi cribbed that idea back from Mikoyan.
 
overscan (PaulMM) said:
There were less drastic aerodynamic fixes available for the original layout, but the (newly arrived from TsAGI) Mikhail Simonov wanted to make his mark by casting the T-10 as a failure and taking personal credit for the redesign. This is the story of the Su-27 origins we were originally sold while Simonov was still in charge, which has been nuanced a bit later.

Both designs went from continuous curved leading edges to separate conventional wing and LERX, which the F-16 also did, so it doesn't necessarily follow that Sukhoi cribbed that idea back from Mikoyan.
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I totally understand why they had to do that redesign, but aesthetically I wish they'd stuck with the original T-10 layout!
 
overscan (PaulMM) said:
There were less drastic aerodynamic fixes available for the original layout, but the (newly arrived from TsAGI) Mikhail Simonov wanted to make his mark by casting the T-10 as a failure and taking personal credit for the redesign. This is the story of the Su-27 origins we were originally sold while Simonov was still in charge, which has been nuanced a bit later.

Both designs went from continuous curved leading edges to separate conventional wing and LERX, which the F-16 also did, so it doesn't necessarily follow that Sukhoi cribbed that idea back from Mikoyan.
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I have Fomin's Su-27 book but that is a bit old. Is there one that looks at all of this for both MiG and Sukhoi?
 
There's no objective account about the entire PFI program, which I think is what you need. I'd like to read that. Might make a good article.

The best account of the PFI program I've seen is in Su-27: Beginning of Story by Ildar Bedretdinov et al. It's written by some of the original Sukhoi engineers and hence presents a Sukhoi insider view of things (and not necessarily Simonov's version).

A guy at SIBNIA has written an account of how important they were in the Su-27 development.

Everyone agrees that Yakovlev came a distant last.
 
TsAGI recommended three generic shapes for fighters in the MIG-31 to MiG-29 era: conventional MiG-25/F-15 with small LERX, VG, and tailless delta. You will note that Mikoyan made designs for all of them for the MiG-31 requirement. There was no requirement to follow TsAGI recommendations, but Mikoyan tended to follow them quite closely.

TsAGI were supposed to do generic research, and general layout recommendations, but Sukhoi (at least) preferred to rely on Western basic research papers more often than not, rather than waiting for TsAGI to replicate it eventually. However, neither Sukhoi nor Mikoyan had their own wind tunnels, so if you wanted to test out your chosen configuration in a wind tunnel, you had no choice but to get TsAGI to test it. Sukhoi had some internal model building capability, but needed to get the larger and more models fabricated, which took a lot of time. You then had to wait for TsAGI to test it - and Mikoyan's brother was a big shot in the Communist Party, so there's the suspicion at least that maybe they got priority.

The T-10 design was constantly being iterated even as the prototypes were under construction, and the wind tunnel and model test results were almost always too late to be useful. Sukhoi had achieved amazing lift/drag values with the T-10 shape,, and didn't want to ditch it or change it too much, though some engineers had preferred a less complex (LERX + slightly swept conventional wing) shape from the start.

TsAGI eventually tested Sukhoi's models, and made some reports which Mikoyan had access to. The first MiG-29 "integral" layout is near identical in wing shape to T-10.Yes, Mikoyan stole the generic configuration from Sukhoi, via TsAGI ("it was an official recommendation!"). TsAGI then recommended a separate LERX and conventional wing instead of the curved leading edge. Mikoyan adopted this, and the MiG-29 design emerged quite trouble free.

T-10 hit issues in test flights. Sukhoi had started working with the new SIBNIA institute, which had excellent modelmaking facilities and a lack of work compared to TsAGI, which allowed them to rapidly iterate through different LERX shapes, wing sweep angles, tail positions. The end result was a superb design.
 
overscan (PaulMM) said:
You then had to wait for TsAGI to test it - and Mikoyan's brother was a big shot in the Communist Party, so there's the suspicion at least that maybe they got priority.
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Anastase Mikoyan had been put into retirement by Brejnev Dec. 9,1965. Then wrote his memoirs (published 1970). Could not have been of any influence during the time-frame of T-10 / izdeliye 9 development.
 
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BROF said:
Anastase Mikoyan had been put into retirement by Brejnev Dec. 9,1965. Then wrote his memoirs (published 1970). Could not have been of any influence during the time-frame of T-10 / izdeliye 9 development.
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Fair point, I hadn't realised that.. TsAGI and GosNIAAS both favoured Mikoyan still though.
 
Does SIBNIA have windtunnels in addition to their modelling? Or was/is TSAGI still the place where the main testing is carried out?
It's a fascinating post, which I learnt a lot from.
 
kaiserbill said:
Does SIBNIA have windtunnels in addition to their modelling? Or was/is TSAGI still the place where the main testing is carried out?
It's a fascinating post, which I learnt a lot from.
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Yes, they had their own windtunnels. They were at the ass end of nowhere, though. 3245 km by road from Moscow. Novosibirsk Aircraft Production Association built Sukhoi aircraft.
 

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