MiG15/MiG21

Most of the Indian Air Force MiG-21s were license built by Hindustan Aeronautics, the major aerospace company in India.

Production of both MiG-15s and MiG-21s was eventually farmed out by the Soviet Union to satelite states in the Warsaw Pact to make room for the more modern MiG variants on Soviet assembly lines.

A good number of 15s and 21s came off of Polish,Czech and Indian assembly lines on proper licenses, far more came off of Chinese lines with sometimes no license at all.

I'm not certain to what standard Hindustan Aeronautics built the Indian 21s, from what I understand, they started building them from Soviet supplied kits, but then eventually were able to get permission to machine their own components from scratch to build more.

The rule with the 21 is to remember that it was the most produced and widely used jet fighter in history. it was produced in many nations in many variants and to this day its final production numbers are a point of intense argument. There's a lot of grey area to cut through to get to the truths about where the aircraft you saw has been in its career:

Did India get it new or second hand?

If they got it second hand, who had it before them?

Did it serve in any war zones?

Lots of questions.

On the other hand, India doesn't have the best economy in the world and perhaps the aircraft you were looking at suffered the unfortunate effects of the baling wire and duct tape field repair kit a few too many times.

Hi Dai,
did you get a look at the mileage on the speedo

just a thought or two really but is it possible that the Fishbed in question had been 'decomissioned' with various equipment removed from the airframe in a less than careful manner, or had it possibly been a doner for parts for some (years ?) time before your meeting ?- without the picture on its past it may be a little easy to judge the book by the cover...it is a fifties design and some Air Forces were retiring them in the late sixties......
India had 35 years service with the MiG 21, nearly 13,500 were built, 3/4 ish by MiG themselves and it was always a respected and well turned out plane..........
I wish my metal work class had had one ......!!

Upnorth and migs raised some valid points. When I was stationed in Germany in 1985 several F-4E's from a middle eastern country came through our base for transfer back to the states. That country had just received newer ones. They had the aircraft for only five years but all were in very bad shape. Parts were actually missing and even panels were missing. The cockpits looked like a salvage crew went through them. Parts and boxes in the cockpit were from some other aircraft and was taped to the side walls or onto the consoles. Wireing was strung every where. Most of the aircraft electronic systems did not work. Some were not even hooked or or was missing. One aircraft had the complete radar package missing. In place of it was sand bags full of sand and rocks to act as ballast.

My job was to inspect them to make sure they would be safe to fly and to sign off the exceptional release, so they could fly. I, as well as other maintenance supervisors, was told to do the inspection with our eyes closed. All of them made it back to the states where they were to go through depot maintenance. More than half were shipped, not flown, to the storage facility at DM. They were in such a bad state they were beyond repair. It was also near the end of the Phantoms time in the service and wasn't cost effective to repair them.

It looks like I have opened a real can of worms! The MiG in question was flying in Australia until a few years ago. I saw it at the Newcastle Regatta when it did two passes down the coast. Not permitted to overfly the city.
The a/c has a full cockpit with no missing isntruments. If the photos turn out OK I will post them in the forum.
As far as the history of the plane is concerned all that I could find out was that it served in the IAF display team was declared redundent and sold to an Australian who flew it until the CAA pulled the pin and said no more.
Dai

Well, having been in private ownership is a big hint in itself of how the aircraft may have gotten into such sorry shape. Did the owner have any real expertise in high performance jet maintenance or did he just want a fancy rich boy's toy?

If the aircraft had served in a military flight display team, then I suppose it was probably well maintained in service if, for no other reason, than to maintain the sharp, spit and polish image that might fill up a recruiting office with eager young potential pilots.

Lots of ex military birds have ended up in private hands and turned into scrap metal, this is particularly true of jets, they're a very different animal to maintain at the best of times and ones that are designed with front line combat duty in mind are even more high maintenance. If the owner doesn't have the resources to keep it going, it goes to scrap real quick.

Perhaps its private owner was a subscriber to the baling wire and duct tape repair kit, that might explain the raised rivets and shop class project appearance of it, its pretty easy for anyone to pick up some cheap sheet metal at a scrap yard, some metal shears and pop rivet gun at a hardware store and make something with them (perhaps a new panel or two for that 21 came about in such a way).

ANYTHING'S possible in private ownership.

Hi guys,
I'm enjoying the topic - i had a read and watched a video about MiG last night and a couple of points worth noting were
that the 21 ' was not an 'asthetic design' - built before composite material construction, and yet pushing hard on the search for speed.
Early Eastern block engineering can be mis-understood in that it was practical and strong - reliable and tough, rather than elaborate and elegant.
Seems a similar design was also used for early Soviet Cruise missiles ! not hard to see in fact.....
No suprise they can look a bit rough at the end of the road

More on the MiG21
It was built in the USSR in 1969 and transfered to the IAF shortly after. I have e-mailed Fighter World and hope to get the A/C history and will post it soonest.
Fighter World has a web site on www.fighterworld.com.au
Dai

I'll be real interested in seeing that bird's history considering what you've said about it so far.

Being a Soviet built example, I suspect it looked pretty good off the assembly line, if it went to India at the time you stated, it may very well have perticipated in the border war between India and Pakistan.

Back again.
First Always listen carefully to what you are told/Always take what you are told with a grain of salt.
The 21 in question was built in the USSR but was used by the Polish! Airforce and was purchased from them. While in Australia it was painted in IAF colours because the wife of one of the owners liked it.
The a/c lost a cockpit canopy on take off but landed/aborted safely and a new canopy was ordered. While waiting ita delivery some klutz left on or operated a fuel switch in the rear cockpit with the result that the plane caught fir on next startup. The structural integrety ofthe airframe was therefore compromised and the aircraft was removed from the civil list.
It was intended to import several high speed planes into Australia to try and get a contrach to do target towing for the MoD Navy. the current contractors use Lear Jets. Although this did not happen the MiG21 is still the only civil machine in the country capable of Mach 2.
Thats about all I can find out about this particular aeroplane.
Dai