Lisichkin/Rentel LK-1 / NIAI-1 « Fanera-2 »

[Stargazer]

Lisichkin/Rentel (not Bedunkovich) LK-1 (NIAI-1) was a small passenger/transport plane carrying 5 persons or 500 kg payload. [...] The LK-1 (NIAI-1) was even produced in 20-piece series. The production aircrafts were used by Aeroflot and by Polar aviation, and became more known under another name, a little bit amusing: Fanera-2 (Plywood 2, due to wide usage of this material in their construction).

The LK-1 was built by a group of engineers in the Leningrad Institute for Transport Engineers. Main designer was V. F. Rentel, assisted by A. I. Lisichkin. "LK" stood for Leningradskii Kombinat, or Leningrad Combination). "NIAI" stood for Institute for Scientific Research in Aviation.

The float version of the LK-1 was called the NIAI-1P. I'm attaching a slightly different picture from the one in the first link, clipped from an old issue of FLIGHT International, in which I also found the above information.

 

[Stargazer]

Topic split. Here are two more photos of the LK-1 from Frontovaya Illyustratsiya Aviaarchiv No.1:

 

[borovik]

drawing I.Sultanov
of the old "Kryl'ya rodiny"

 

[Stargazer]

Just realized that this topic was misplaced in the Designations section. It belongs here, in the Early Projects section! Sorry for the confusion.

 

[cluttonfred]

Wonderful design, it suggests to me a miniature Beardmore Inflexible in a special tourist version for scenic flights. Thanks for sharing!

 

[malcolm]

More akin to the Westland dreadnought, also based on the ideas of a russian.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westland_Dreadnought

 

[Avimimus]

Hello everyone,

1)
Interestingly, according to this link the design was planned to be a testbed with visual stealth technology at one point: https://www.ecured.cu/Lisichkin/Rentel_NIAI-1 (it isn't clear which of the original sources this information comes from. The idea appears to have been for a blended wing bomber with non-wooden wings polished to be reflective (and thus match surrounding light levels better).

This source describes instruments being mounted on the front wing spar, and the passenger seat rests attached to the rear wing spar.

3)
I'm trying to figure out if there are any surviving photos or diagrams that can give a better idea of the interior/instruments/pilot's view.

Do such photos or drawings exist? If so, where can they be found?

 

[5696836]

This plane also appeared in a soviet movie called "the brave seven" (translated). The tail seemed to be modified compared with earlier variants.