ИЛЬЮШИН ИЛ-76 (ILYUSHIN IL-76) - MASS PRODUCTION TRANSPORT AIRCRAFT
The A-50 Airborne Early Warning & Control (AEW&C) aircraft and its derivatives are built on the basis of the Soviet/Russian Ilyushin Il-76 medium transport aircraft, to which we will devote some attention.
Il-76TD (serial number 89-02, factory number 1033416525, 1993) from Tashkyent factory.
Soviet basic Il-76TD, about 1988.
Russian basic Il-76MD.
Heat flares launchers were introduced during the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan in eighties.
They were built into the main landing gear nacelle at the rear (as above), and were later mounted in external boxes on the fuselage (including on late series A-50 aircraft), called Чемодан {'suitcase'}.
After dissolving of USSR in December 1991, many Il-76s were left in Ukraine. Here's an example of Il-76MD in 2021.
Ukrainian Il-76s and Il-78s are overhauled, maintained and modernized in Миколаївський авіаремонтний завод «НАРП» {State Enterprise Mykolayiv Aircraft Repair Plant “NARP”} in Mykolayiv.
ЗВРОЙНI СИЛИ УКPАЇНИ Ukrainian Air Force, 25-та брига́да тра́нспортної авіа́ції {25th Transport Aviation Brigade}.
|
|
The first Il-76 (serial number 01-01, registration CCCP-86712) made its first flight on 25 March 1971 piloted by Эдуард Иванович Кузнецов {Eduard Ivanovich Kuznyetsov}. Since 1973 the Il-76 (and military versions M, MD, MF, civil transport T, TD and others) have been produced in city of Tashkent in USSR Republic of Uzbekistan (M Militarniy 'Military', MD Militarniy Dalnyj 'Military Long range', T 'Transport', TD Transport Dalniy 'Transport Long Range'). In total, almost a thousand Il-76 aircraft have been built there for USSR/Russia and foreign customers (aircraft is spreaded on whole world), including the Il-78 and Il-78M tankers, early warning aircraft A-50 and A-50U, various special and experimental versions, testbeds, flying laboratories and even passenger variants. There was also a fire-fighting version and prototype/experimental versions for radio-electronic warfare (Il-76PP), a flying command post in wartime (Il-76SK/VKP, aka Il-82) and even a airborne laser to fight spy balloons (Be-60). In December 2006, the Russian government decided to start production of the Il-76 at the Aviastar-SP (SP from Samolotnoye Proizvodstvo) plant in Ulyanovsk, where An-124 super-heavy transport aircraft were produced in the past. The new version was designated Il-76MD-90A (izdieliye {'product'} 476, called Il-476; the number 90 comes from the PS-90A engine). On 22 September 2012, the first 001-02 flying aircraft (second prototype RA-78650) made its first flight in Ulyanovsk piloted by Николай Дмитриевич Куимов (1957-2021) {Nikolai Dmitryevich Kuimov}, Ilyushin's chief test pilot, tragically died in Il-112V crash. Now, in twenties, Il-76MD-90A has become a basic aircraft in transport and military versions, including tanker variant. The basic engine of Il-76 was the Solovyov D-30KP, and later the D-30KP-2, produced in the Пермские моторы plant in city of Perm. The Il-67MD-90A is powered by larger PS-90A engines, named after Павел Александрович Соловьёв (1917-1996) {Pavel Alexandrovich Solovyov}, a well-known engine builder who once headed the 19th Experimental Design Bureau (OKB-19) in Perm (now part of «ОДК-Авиадвигатель» {Aviadvigatyel 'aeroengine'}), where PS-90A engines are produced for Russia and abroad. The regular crew of Il-76:
Glazed nose of fuselage was needed especially during takeoffs and landings on ground airfields and mainly for optic viewfinder, with the help of which the navigator determined the point of the beginning of the drop of paratroopers or cargo, which was the main task of the Il-76. Regardless of the production of Il-76MD-90A aircraft at Ulyanovsk, since about 2020 the fleet of older MDs is also slowly being upgraded to a standard similar to the Il-76MD-90A, called Il-76MD-M. They receive new digital equipment (incl. optical-electronic station Шарик {Sharik 'little sphere'}), but retain the old D-30KP-2 engines. First flight of prototype 76746: 28 February 2016 with N. D. Kuimov at the controls.
Known producer's designation of the variants of the Il-76 family {Изделие means 'product'}:
|
