By Pierre Charlebois
On the brink of World War II the Yugoslav aircraft industry produced two outstanding ighter designs with the high wing Ikarus IK-2 and the low wing and retractable undercarriage Rogozarski IK-3. Both had Hispano-Suiza or licensed made 12Y engines developing 860 and 920hp, bringing max speeds of 435km/h and 535km/h at 3,100 and 5,000 meters respectively. Armament consisted of an engine mounted 20mm canon and two 7.92mm machine guns, although some IK-2 had the canon removed. The pilots found the IK-3 to be more manoeuvrable than the Hurricane MK I and BF 109E also lying for the Royal Yugoslavia Air Force. About sixteen IK-2s and IK-3s were serviceable at the time the German armed forces invaded Yugoslavia in April 1941. During the brief war, their valiant resistance accounted for thirty ive kills, a dozen brought down by pilots lying Yugoslavia made ighters. A number of IK-2s went to ly for the newly created Croatian Air Force. Sadly, no aircraft survived the war.
Two or three IK-3s were believed to have been captured and tested by the Germans. However the picture of an aircraft coded 5+7 is obviously a fake forged from a horizontally reversed winter 1939-40 photograph. Also dubious is the image of an aircraft coded CL+Li, missing the top of the Balkenkreuz and bad code alignment, which raises doubts about a third coded GP+IK and supposedly tested at Rechlin. Doubtful at best until new evidence comes to light.
Lisez l'article complet et bien d'autres dans ce numéro de
Scale Aircraft Modelling
Options d'achat ci-dessous
Si le problème vous appartient,
Connexion pour lire l'article complet maintenant.
Numéro unique numérique
October 2017
 
Ce numéro et d'autres anciens numéros ne sont pas inclus dans une nouvelle version de l'article
abonnement. Les abonnements comprennent le dernier numéro régulier et les nouveaux numéros publiés pendant votre abonnement. Scale Aircraft Modelling
Abonnement numérique annuel
€46,99
facturé annuellement
Abonnement numérique mensuel
€4,99
facturé mensuellement