Klimov VK-1
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Klimov VK-1 was the first Soviet jet engine to see significant production. It was developed by Vladimir Yakovlevich Klimov and first produced by the GAZ 116 works. It was derived from the British Rolls-Royce Nene plans for which were sold to the USSR by the British as a goodwill gesture in what has been widely regarded as a bad move by Western military powers.
Immediately after World War II, the Soviet Union had been working with obsolete designs based on captured German technology and the resulting engines were of poor quality. However in 1946, before the Cold War had really begun, the new British Labour government under the Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, keen to improve diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union, authorised Rolls-Royce to export 40 Rolls-Royce Nene centrifugal flow turbojet engines. In 1958 it was discovered during a visit to Beijing by Whitney Straight, then deputy chairman of Rolls-Royce, that this engine had been copied without license to power the MiG-15, first as the Klimov RD-45, and after initial problems of metallurgy forced the Soviet engineers to develop a better copy, the engine had then entered production as the Klimov VK-1 (Rolls-Royce later attempted to claim £207m in license fees, without success).
The initial RD-45 proved troublesome due to Soviet inexperience with engineering and materials, but was further improved to produce the VK-1 which differed from the Nene in having larger combustion chambers, larger turbine, and revised airflow through the engine. The VK-1F added the afterburner.
The VK-1 was used to power MiG-15 and MiG-17 fighters, as well as the Il-28 bomber.
The engine featured a centrifugal compressor unlike more progressive axial flow compressor engines, which required aircraft housing it to be thicker than aircraft featuring axial flow compressors. The wider bodies caused more drag and this somewhat limited the performance of the MiG-15 and MiG-17 fighters when compared to other contemporary aircraft such as the F-86 Sabre and F-100 Super Sabre.
[edit] Specifications (VK-1)
General characteristics
- Type: Turbojet
- Length: 2,600 mm (102 in)
- Diameter: 1,300 mm (51 in)
- Dry weight: 872 kg (1,395 lb)
Components
- Compressor: Centrifugal compressor
Performance
- Thrust: 26.5 kN (5,955 lbf)
- Specific fuel consumption: 109.1 kg/(kN·h) (1.07 lb/(lbf·h))
- Thrust-to-weight ratio: 41.4 N/kg (4.27:1)
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