AIR TAXI

 

At the end of the 1940s the Czechoslovak government accepted the decision to increase the capacity of the national aviation industry and Kunovice in January 1950, he resumed the construction of a large aircraft factory No. 01 and not at all of its branches of Power plant No. 01 calculated under the licensed production of the MiG-15, obtained in Czechoslovakia marking S-102. However, since April 1953, full-scale manufacture of “MiG” were deployed on the factory “Aero” in Vodochody.

 

The plant was producing at this time, metal wings for a training and sport aircraft Z-126 “Trener” and details for the license of Il-1 OM (in Czechoslovakia, he received the designation Avia b-33). The experience gained has allowed the company team in the fall of 1952 to begin to implement its first large production programme — mass production of training aircraft Yak-11, which in Czechoslovakia was awarded the designation C-11. Only until 1956 in Kunowice produced 710 s-11, including 3 aircraft with the nose strut of chassis.

 

Simultaneously with the production of C-11 to factory # 01 at the end of 1953 began the production of another well-known Czechoslovak aircraft Ae-45S. Production and further development — AE-145, continued in Kunovice to 1960

 

In 1955 the factory was engaged in the Bureau, which oslevel talented engineer Ladislav Smrcek. – The creative team was made up of young designers and computing engineers, who had experience in the development of aircraft structures: engineers Joseph Globeleq, Vaclav Kahanek, Juraj Skokan, Frank Pig, Slawomir Chernecki. To strengthen the new OKB it has sent graduates of the Military technical Academy, Brno (at that time, VTA, and since 1958 VAAZ Military Academy of Antonin Zapotocky). Young designers set themselves the task of creating a light passenger aircraft, which would be all the indicators exceeded the serial Ae-45S.

 

Initially, the new air taxi has received factory designation L-145, the number of which was later appropriated by modern — Ae-45S, and aerotaxi L-200 “Morava”. The plane was designed with a spacious five-seat comfortable cab with good heat and sound insulation. The hot air for deicing the leading edges of the wing and heating the cabin is supplied with a special heat exchanger. The layout of the dashboard provided for placing on customer demand, additional radio communication and navigation equipment for flying at night and in adverse weather conditions. Unlike its predecessor the Ae-45S, L-200 undercarriage and flaps had no electric, and hydraulic drive. The new car was supposed to install more powerful engines M-337 with turbocharger and direct fuel injection. This engine was developed in the “Motorite” under the leadership of engineer Bohumil Simonka. famous designer of a number of motors of low and medium power for sports and tourist aircraft. The engines were equipped with ejector exhaust manifolds. Construction of the first prototype of the plane went quickly and ahead of the testing of the motor M-337, therefore, the first prototype machine was installed two serial 6-cilindrov engine “Walter Minor 6-III”. In terms of total capacity they are 78 kW conceded the power plant with the engines M-337.

 

Since state tests M-337 was completed only in January of 1959, and the first two prototypes manufactured with engine “Walter Minor 6-III” and two-blade metal variable-pitch propellers V-405 with an Electromechanical actuator.

 

The first prototype XL-200 first took to the skies on 9 April 1957, the factory test pilot Ladislav Schwab. At the end of the same month the airframe of the second prototype was transferred to VZLU (Vyzkymny a zkysebni letecky ustav — Aeronautical research and test Institute) in Letnany for strength tests, which finished on 3 August 1957 Factory flight tests of the first prototype took place in Kunovice until 6 December 1957. From 24 to 31 January of the following year the first prototype was tested in letňany. Subsequently, this machine was operated at a plant in Kunovice registration code OK-LNA. The third aircraft built, the second flying prototype (registration code OK-LNB) after production at the end of 1957 was handed over for flight test VZLU, where it was used for various tests and measurements in 1964, it was modified into an experimental aircraft E-33, which will be discussed below.

 

Even before the completion of flight tests of prototypes in Kunovice in 1957 produced a pilot series of 10 aircraft L-200 engine “Walter Minor 6-III” and two-bladed VISH V-406. The plane of the mounting series with serial number 00-004 and side code OK-04 was transferred to the state trials at VZLU, held from 21 January to 6 may of 1958. During flight tests revealed a lack of directional stability of the aircraft when flying with one working engine. To eliminate this defect on top of the fuselage behind the cockpit the aerodynamic set long comb. Change the position of the antennas, radio-communication equipment, on the window of the left door of the cab appeared window.

 

 

 

 

 

In contrast, experienced machines installation of series hit to customers. Five of them flew home in the “Agrolita” as a taxi, two more gained, air force Czechoslovakia: one for training crews of bomber aircraft, the second was converted into aerovodochody.

 

Two “dvuhsotki” from the installation of a series of factory pilots Vladimir VLK and Frantisek Mumps overtaken in mid-December of 1958 in the USSR: health option (registration code of the USSR-14342) and passenger (registration code of the USSR-14243). These machines flying in the USSR route 26 Sep 1958 first air taxi Ae-45S set in the Soviet Union. The aircraft flew from the factory airfield and landed in the “Ukrainian Venice” — in Lviv. This route for many years, it has become traditional for the Czechoslovak airmen. In Lviv, over time, opened the Czechoslovak service center for maintenance of aircraft built in Czechoslovakia. From Lviv two plane installation series were flown to Moscow for further tests.

 

The latest machine from the installation series, subsequently registered as OK-NIA, became the prototype of the L-200A, equipped with an engine “Walter Minor 6-III” with a new two-bladed variable-pitch propellers V-410 with an Electromechanical actuator. Improvements, already partially performed in the installation series, and subjected the airframe: extended nacelles, the cockpit was lower by 43 mm, washers tail became more rectilinear trapezoidal shape. The production of a prototype of the aircraft was planned to complete in July of 1958, but the motors for it came at the end of August, because of this factory testing was able to finish only in the end of the year.

 

After the improvements in the factory prototype 1.-200A in may of 1959 he entered the state tests in VZLU. State tests of the aircraft in the basic configuration could not be carried out in full due to the lack of at the aircraft factory engines M-337. Therefore, after the execution of the test program for verifying the operation of the cooling system of the engines, the plane returned to Kunovice for the preparation of his flight to Paris, scheduled for July 14, to participate in international air show. After completion of the tests for the plane 1–200A in the summer of 1960 received the State aviation administration certificate of airworthiness.

 

In the second half laid the 1 series.-200A of the six machines, the first of them, the registration code OK-OEA, soared 27 Feb 1960.

 

Delivery of the aircraft 1.-200A customers started in the spring of 1960 For the first series was followed by seven more, mostly twenty cars each. One of the first to master the new aircraft Czechoslovak pilots “agro-summer”, which already flew Kunovice AE-45B and aircraft installation of the series. In the early 1960s in “Agrolita” still had a few AE-45B. Aircraft 1.The first -200 series had not been eliminated until the end of the “childhood diseases”: often poorly start carbureted engines, sometimes in flight off the door. The L-200A these drawbacks are partially eliminated, the machine has a higher speed and moderate noise level in the cabin. Two years of testing and operation of the aircraft in Czechoslovakia and in the Soviet Union in 1.-200A fulfilled 1075 modifications of the design. Prior to 1965 due to the lack of on Board equipment required proteininteractions pilots “Agrolita” flying mostly in good weather. In 1969 on the basis of “Agrolita” was formed the new airline “Words in air”, which was inherited by air taxis to non-scheduled services

 

Delivery of the aircraft the main customer — “Aeroflot” executed Czechoslovak foreign trade Association “Omni-gender”. Except the Soviet Union, the aircraft L-210A is supplied in 15 countries, including: Australia, Argentina, Hungary, UK, Egypt, India, Italy, Poland, Germany, Switzerland, South Africa, Yugoslavia, and Cuba. All customers set 144 L-200A, of which — 68 “Aeroflot”.

 

The next step in the improvement of the L-200A after the completion of the state tests began equipping its engines M-337, supplemented by a enhancements made on the Soviet requirements of the customer: install hydraulic pump to left motor and dust filter on the suction side of the blower, winter nosing motors, the acquisition of aircraft radio and radio compass. The main requirement of “Aeroflot” was to increase the gap between the ends of the blades of the propellers and the ground. According to Soviet experts, the two-bladed screws with a small clearance to the surface of the earth, installed on the first “moravac” failed to ensure a safe takeoff from unprepared airfields. A simple offset of the motors in the vertical plane was unprofitable due to the deterioration of aerodynamics and cockpit view, and also hard to implement on a finished plane. Therefore, the designer screws Milos Adamec has developed a new automatic three-blade variable-pitch propellers of smaller diameter V-506 for engines M-337, which satisfied the requirements of “Aeroflot”. An additional advantage of the new screws was the reduction of the noise level in the cabin.

 

As a “Guinea pig” once again used the factory plane Kunovice L-200 with the registration code OK-PIA — in 1960, it was modified to the level of L-200D and in December of the same year held a factory test car. It has fulfilled the first part of testing in VZLU in March-April of 1961 and further tests in the summer of that year. And these tests coincided with the testing of the first production L-200D with the registration code OK-RNV. It was the fourteenth of the eighth plane of the unfinished series L-200A, seven later machines in this series are produced also as L-200D. After completion of these tests L-200D in the spring of 1963 received in the State aviation administration certificate of airworthiness.

 

Aircraft L-210D operated in 13 countries, including: Bulgaria, Hungary, great Britain, Germany, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Italy, Poland, USSR, Czechoslovakia, Switzerland, Sweden, Yugoslavia, France and Cuba were produced 205 L-210D (including modified to the level of L-200D seven L-200A and the prototype on the basis of 1-200 set series) Of them “Aeroflot” has acquired the 113 cars the Latest aircraft L-2000, delivered to the Soviet Union in the first half of 1966, assigned registration code of the USSR-02129

 

Many local passengers lines of “Aeroflot” remained pleasant memories of the flight in this small, comfortable air-taxi In particular, for many years it operated in the Rostov region L-200 has linked the regional centre with the village Tatsinskaya, Vyoshenskaya and towns of Shakhty and Millerovo From Moscow airport Bykovo in the early 1960s, “Morava” flew in Simferopol.

 

Production aircraft “Morava” was completed in 1964, just in Kunowice produced 361 aircraft, including three prototype Second after “Aeroflot” major foreign buyer L-200 — Poland Here flew about fifty “moral” basically, the air ambulance, some of these machines were purchased from Aeroflot at home, in Czechoslovakia, was used more than 100 such aircraft, repeatedly passing from one owner to another in the number of operated L-200 all modifications were the first flying clubs “Svazarm” over 50 “Morav”, 46 of the L-200A service For the transportation of their employees used the these comfortable people’s car company “Skoda-Pilsen”, “Moravan-Otrokovice”, “Skoda-Mlada Boleslav” and others.

 

To the “Morava” has proved of interest not only airlines, but also aircraft manufacturers – Yugoslav firm “Libis” gathered from the Czechoslovak components 14 series five cars, under the designation L-200 Libis Brazilian entrepreneurs negotiated the acquisition of a license for the manufacture of L-200D. There was an interest to license the production of L-200 in USA — 100 machines for 5 — 7 years, but declared “Omnipolar” price of 47,5 thousand dollars for the car American businessmen were considered as unacceptable.

 

Performance characteristics light passenger aircraft produced by the factory “Years:”

 

 

The end of serial production of L-200D still does not mean cessation of development work on further improvement of the aircraft First of all, it affected the increase in passengers and up to five related improvements: to increase the capacity of the motor, its service life before overhaul and other partial improvements.

 

Development of six “Morava” L-210 (sometimes called L-201) were performed serial section of the plant “-Kunovice” from the beginning of 1965 under the leadership of engineer Jan Freedom. One of the prerequisites for performing this modification was the operation of an Australian company Costall Airways sextuple modify the “Morava” made by Australians on their own. For improvements chose the plane L-200D (registration code OK-RNV), which improved to the level of the prototype in February 1966 – patched the left door, and increased the width of the passenger couch, removed the metal jumper in the upper glazing of the cabin and the glazing fulfilled convex — for easy placement of passengers On the modified aircraft was fitted with more powerful engines M-338 — 245 l (180 kW) with a new three-blade propellers V-506 laminar profile of the blades, increasing the diameter of the wheels on the main landing gear, what on the leaves at the bottom of the nacelles appeared typical of wydawcy After successful completion of factory tests, the aircraft offered a “Czechoslovak airlines”, but those it has not interested. L-210 it never saw mass production.

 

During the operation of the “Morava” was held overhaul of the first on the old kurowicka the factory, and later in workshops in Trencin. In this part of the L-200A modified to the level of L-200D: the aircraft was established three-bladed VISH V-506, dust filters on the suction pipe of the compressor and the fuel gauge on the end tanks of the wing.

 

In the “Morava” Czechoslovak pilots performed a number of outstanding for this class of flights to a considerable degree contributed to the news of the flight of the predecessor of the “Morava” — AE-45S Italian traveler p. P. Brielle in the night from 10 to 11 August 1958 took off from Dakar and landed on the island of Fernando de Noronha to South America In 14 hours he traveled 3,000 km British pilots in October 1960 on two AE-145 flew on the route Prague — Sydney At the end of April 1961 Czechoslovak crew of Vladimir VLK, mechanic Vladimir Koutny and employee “OMNIPOL” jindřich Synets started from Prague on :.-200A, registration code OK-ONS, on the route Belgrade — Greece — Syria — Iran — Pakistan — India — Burma — Indonesia — Australia and landed in Tasmania, the Total length of the route was 25 000 km, which they managed to do it in 92 flight hours. A year Frank the Pig with the mechanic Janek 30 flight hours in 6 days surpassed the Indian customer L-200A, registration code OK-RNO route Prague — Belgrade — Athens — Rhodes — Beirut — Baghdad — Bahrain — Hwang Ho — Karachi — Bombay with a total length of 8,200 km In February on the same track flying M Pskovskii the aircraft with an Indian registration code VT-DRG. The aircraft L-200D, registration code OK-SHD, made several flights on the route Bratislava — Belgrade — Thessaloniki — Athens — Rhodes — Nicosia — Beirut — Port said as a leading aircraft s-11, sold to the Egyptian army In the early 1960s, many countries carried out design and experimental work on aircraft vertical and short takeoff and landing Work to improve load-bearing properties of the wing in unconventional ways were performed and Czechoslovak aviation experts IN VZLU design group under the direction of engineer Juraj of Matachica in 1959, was designed by two twin-engined single pilot aircraft E-31 and E-32 the Most interesting of them — single vysokoplan normal aerodynamic configuration E-32 He was equipped with all-moving wing with a turboprop engine “Astasia” with a capacity of 400 liters with the French company “Turbomeca” For single-fin tail was a small control screw with a vertical axis of rotation is However limited production capacity of the Institute to obtain the necessary experimental data is forced to look for a compromise. This quest is embodied in a prototype aircraft, E-33, developed in April 1962 on the basis of the second flight of the prototype L-200 (serial number XL-003), VZLU operated since 1959 prototyping machine finished in July 1964

 

For its weight and size characteristics of the E-33 are close to the “Morava”. Double cabin of the aircraft provided for the accommodation of the pilot and technique of the experimenter. Empty weight was 1600 kg, and the takeoff and 2100 kg On the prototype machine in addition to the two motors “Water-Minor 6-III” set motor M 1080НК with a capacity of 325 HP to drive the supercharger is taken from the motor M-42 design capacity of 1.5 kg of air per second in the experimental E-33 indigenous completions were subjected to the tail part of the fuselage, which was associated with the placement over the section behind the driver of the M-108DНК For air supply to the supercharger used air intake is rectangular in shape with a wedge-draining boundary layer, protruding above the fuselage.

 

The wing of the aircraft, while retaining the same space equipped with a removable in sock with slit shaped blower, to which special channels were summed from the air blower to control pornsleep above the upper surface of the wing Similar profilirovannaja a gap appeared in front of the flaps and ailerons For laying of channels for supplying compressed air from the wing was dismantled fuel tanks Device of blowing boundary layer above the steering wheel height and equipped with stabilizer empennage became with plus size single-fin keel and rudder Adjustable stabilizer is moved closer to the middle of the keel In the forward fuselage and tail fin before the stabiliser, there are additional receivers of air pressure for measuring parameters of the incoming flow, Oversized vertical tail is allowed to carry out a long flight on one working engine This gave the opportunity to measure and compare the airflow on the wing, as a working propeller and a clean flow without blowing screw

 

In September 1964 test pilot VZLU Antonin Oswald performed on its first flight during the flight experiments, which lasted until 1966, received an interesting scientific and practical materials used later when creating new aircraft.

 

The success of the young design Bureau at Kunovice inspired and his rivals on new developments in 1958 Ladislav Smrcek colleagues began work on the project of high-speed passenger aircraft 1.-300 turboprop developed in Brno VAAZ together with the aircraft factory. Later, when the TVD M-601, was developed in Prague, project L-300 offered in two alternatives-low L-3000, and ten-seat high wing L-Project L 300H-300H formed the basis of another known machine kunovatskogo OKB-L-410, but this is a story about the next stage of development of the Czechoslovak aviation industry.

 

N. JAY