The Soviet Fighter That Couldn’t Shoot Its Guns | The MiG-9 Story

[@Jim-dr2ec]

"This is fine." Said the air force leadership. Every time I smiled. Fantastic work and writing!

[@rogerwilco2]

Russian culture seems to have created a very long history of such events, even now in 2023 it is on full display in their war in Ukraine.

[@jedimindtrix2142]

I about died when he said that!

[@parkerlong2658]

While this video can seem amusing it does seem to ignore that the mig 9 was basically a test bed for the jet technology used in the mig 15 and was never intended for use in combat by the Soviet military at any point.

[@ovencore2549]

"this is fine" the leadership said calmly

[@dphalanx7465]

@@parkerlong2658 Lucky they had the Yak-15 available if any sort of conflict had broken out. 🙄 And that was fine. 😶‍🌫

[@JackManiaky]

I'm baffled that "sticking a gun in the middle of an engine intake" was seen as a "good idea".

[@090giver090]

I think it looked good on paper as mounting huge gun in a centre of fuselage would allow to use it without rocking and tearing the plane apart with recoil.

[@martijn9568]

@@090giver090 Jup, I feel like it's a logical mistake to make when you are designing your first jet aircraft.

[@matthiuskoenig3378]

To be fair such gun mounting positions was really good for piston driven aircraft, so if you are unfamiliar with jets, like these engineers were, it would make sense.

[@werwolfnate]

@@matthiuskoenig3378 yeah, they failed to gauge how delicate the air intake was to debris and the stress the higher speed had on the materials used. It feels they reached a point where they were committed to the design and either pride or government pressure kept them from a full redesign.

[@joshuahadams]

Even the A-10, which was designed twenty-odd years after the MiG-9, struggled with choking the engines and covering the canopy in soot. They solved the choking by wiring the ignition to the trigger, so if the engines do flame out, they’ll start right up immediately after fresh air flows into the engine.

[@alucardvigilatedismas2868]

The Soviet Uniom wouldn't be the Soviet Union if the leadership did not find this fine

[@Thelingerer]

The US would never build a plane that is so ineffective that it cant fly in rain or near thunderstorms. Or build a flying abortion that has killed more US troops than enemy engagements like the osprey 😅

[@AugustKling]

It is like Rheinwiesen and Guantanamo.

[@lkrnpk]

well it was either that or somebody goes to Gulag, and nobody wanted to go to Gulag

[@marckyle5895]

And yet this WASN'T the Sovietiest Soviet aircraft that ever Sovieted. That was the Tu-22 Backfire. That bird had all of the cons of the B-58 Hustler and none of the pros.

[@gingernutpreacher]

​@@marckyle5895speed?

[@anzaca1]

12:53 The gun propellant gas ungestion problem is why the MiG-15 and the fighters that succeeded it all had their guns mounted below and behind the intake.

[@razorback20]

For that same reason, I've always wondered how the german Gotha 229 Flying Wing could have fired her MK-108 cannons without flaming out her engines at the first round...

[@anzaca1]

@@razorback20 The guns were outboard and behind the engine intakes.

[@Apyr404]

​@@anzaca1 but the muzzle brakes were in front of the air Intakes and yes although to the sides still were close to the intakes

[@anzaca1]

@@Apyr404 The Horton 229 was NEVER actually fitted with any guns. If fitted, they would've been without muzzle devices, like on the Me 262.

[@anzaca1]

​@@Apyr404 German 30mm aircraft cannons didn't use muzzle breaks. Look at the Me 262. It used the same cannons, and they don't protrude from the fuselage.

[@CrazyFikus]

20:00 "For example, when in January 1948 one of the MiG s factory engineers, Alexander Abramzon, visited the 3rd Guards Aviation Regiment, he found to his surprise that among all the MiG-9s received by the unit 2 months prior, only one aircraft had flown, and that only once. Meanwhile the rest of the fighters were sitting untouched in the open field under rain and snow, so their engines had even started to rust. The reason for this, as he later learned, was that the regiment had only 30% of the required technician staff and even those available were sitting in barracks doing nothing due to the lack of boots." This isn't incompetence, this is _advanced_ incompetence.

[@ussindianapolis487]

this isnt advanced incompetence, this is soviet/russian incompetence

[@tadasdovii8262]

This is just another day in russia

[@adamg7984]

Yeah, it's sadly how Russia works. They sincerely only ever seem to make genuine, sometimes even edge leading, progress during an active war. Other wise, they always think they know what's best, they get into a war, get utterly curbstomped and then pick up on NATO or enemy tactics and use those. Their equipment, kit, leadership, structure, it all sees this type of fart smelling behavior. They just can't accept, at least not openly, that they need help with designs, modern tech, etc. They just plug their ears screaming "LA LA LA LA" until they have no choice but to adapt or be shot/go to gulag.

[@Ma_nerd]

Modern version of "for lack of a nail"

[@michalanckoronski2673]

That's centrally planned economy in a nutshell

[@thatonedaniel98]

While some may get off on a fact, that this jet couldn't really shoot its main thing, I find it super weird, that this jet didn't have fuel indicator. With jet engines, the fuel indicator is one of the most important instruments in the cockpit, as these engines burn through fuel like crazy

[@restitvtororbis5330]

I might be completely wrong about this, but i think i remember a presentation about restoring and flying a mig 21 and i swear they mentioned something about the mig 21 (and earlier designs) not having fuel indicators either. I think it was partially because of the relative complexity of actually making and adding the sensors, but more because of how little fuel some of the smaller jets could carry and how short the flight time was on a full tank (i think under 30 minutes) it was far cheaper and almost as effective to rely on a timer to figure out how much burn time you had left instead of a fuel gauge.

[@sdpg_spad]

@@restitvtororbis5330 MiG-21, obviously, did have an in-cockpit fuel gauge, it just was designed differently from a typical fuel gauge in a WWII fighter or a pre-2000s car. The latter would be usually connected to a float that raises and lowers with the level of liquid in the fuel tank(s); whereas in a MiG1 -21, the ground crew had to accurately input the amount of fuel filled in. Then, when the engine is running, flow meters in the fuel lines are used to measure fuel consumption. The fuel gauge here is essentialy an electro-mechanical downcounter which deducts the amount of fuel consumed from the initial set up value and gives you an estimation of fuel remaining.

[@ГеоргийМурзич]

That is total bullshit, the fuel indicator was on the lower right part of the panel

[@ГеоргийМурзич]

There was one in MiG-15, there was one in 19. Same goes to 23 and 25. So, those people said there was no fuel indicator in the 21?

[@SkylineFTW97]

@@sdpg_spad Cars still use the same float system for the most part.

[@InspectorGadget923]

Sending your best engineers to the gulag for the failure of government planning is the most Soviet thing I can think of.

[@magnemoe1]

I say grounding planes because the lack of boots for the maintenance crew rivals it.

[@Project_1143M]

Bring engineers to court say "you is accused of anti soviet behavior" shot them

[@red_d849]

@@magnemoe1 wait what

[@innacrisis6991]

It truly amazes me that these problems in leadership are still so prevalent

[@martijn9568]

@@innacrisis6991 Makes you wonder what kind of, almost idiotic stories, are behind things like Su 57 Felon or the T-14 Armata.

[@Windows98R]

What’s interesting is that the Soviet aim for parading these aircraft even faking it was to impress and scare the west. But that also caused the development in the west to become accelerated and standards to be pushed even higher, which then surpassed the Soviet equivalent… famously like the F-15’s development cycle

[@Cherno35]

Classic communist L

[@legoeasycompany]

@@TonyBustaroni Depends on the variants compared

[@jeskler]

Ok the F-15 wasn't the Soviets fault, they made an interceptor to do interceptor shit and advertised it as such, it was the Americans that saw it, thought it was this super fighter, then went ballistic and made the F-15

[@MrAndyBearJr]

One of the events that spurred the West into action, was when a reconnaissance version of the Mig-25 flew over Israeli airspace at approximately Mach 3.2. What western intelligence services didn't know at the time was that this particular plane landed at its base with the engines trashed, and the pilot lucky to make it back alive.

[@asteroidrules]

It also reminds me of the Su-57, the modern day parade fighter. It looked intimidating, it barely functions, they built only enough to show off at parades, and it encouraged western governments to approve upgrades to the F/A-18, F-35, Typhoon, and Rafale, all of which were already superior to the Su-27.

[@randomdeadpool]

I discovered this channel a few weeks ago, already one of my favorites, I watched most of the older videos as well and I'm aware of "...the soviet union wouldn't be the soviet union..." quote/joke, I love it!

[@legoeasycompany]

I enjoyed seeing it once but I always enjoy seeing your videos again. I also love the fact you the Mig-9 got the glory of the first jet fighter in flight for the USSR because of connections. Helps who you know right?

[@Furzkampfbomber]

Well, the Sputnik and then the second rocket with the satellite containing Laika, the dog, were only launched because Nikita Chrustschow was a massive fanboy of the head of the russian space and carrier rocket program, Sergej Koroljow. When the first russian H-bomb meant to be carried in a rocket was ready to be integrated into the rest of the weapon system, the russian carrier rocket developed for this bomb failed time and again. One time it exploded, another time it failed to separate the freight from the engines. In the end, the developers of the H-bomb simply declared that they would not trust this rocket system and that they would not hand over the bomb. In the end, the design of the carrier rocket got a complete overhaul and redesign, but Koroljow now had two spare rockets, so... In the end, he palavered Chrustschow into allowing something that was little more than a pet project for Koroljow. Fun fact, Koroljow started his career as rocket engineer in a russian gulag at the polar circle. His work with self-made rockets made him suspicious as a supposed saboteur.

[@oleksiysokolov3510]

@@Furzkampfbomber And because Soviet nukes were so heavy that they required a heavy-lifting rocket, which later turned out to be easy to convert to carry other payloads incl. an astronaut.

[@Furzkampfbomber]

@@oleksiysokolov3510 Oh, I was not aware of that, but it makes a lot of sense. It's quite stunning and sad how often war is indeed the 'father of all things'.

[@nerd1000ify]

Early American nukes were similarly heavy, the rocket that put John Glenn in orbit was an Atlas missile, and the later Gemini program used the Titan II missile as its booster. Funny how all these early ICBMs made better orbital rockets than weapons.

[@ThePilot4ever]

Cool. I knew about the Mig-9 as whenever I flew it in IL-2 1946 the starboard engine would always explode. Thought it was a glitch all this time lol

[@CakePrincessCelestia]

There's been two rookie mistakes... this (throttle back a lot before shooting) and tailstriking on takeoff by pulling too hard :D

[@PaperSkiesAviation]

This “MiG-9 Story” video was initially made exclusively for Nebula. However, given the current situation, I’ve decided to make one exception and post it on KZbin so this video can serve a good purpose: *100% of the ad revenue from the video will be donated to "Revived Soldiers Ukraine"* , which helps with wounded Ukrainian soldiers’ rehabilitation. As you know, I already direct Ad money from my Yak-9T video to this organization; now with this new video, I hope we can increase the support. Just a reminder that you can also *follow “Paper Skies” on Nebula* , where you get early access to all my new videos as well as to some exclusive content like this MiG-9 video, and also a new and different type of episodes about Soviet Aircraft History. Watch *"When The Soviets Tested The Captured F-5 vs MiG-21"* nebula.tv/videos/paperskies-when-the-soviets-tested-the-captured-f5-vs-mig21

[@dimasakbar7668]

if i may ask, currently, what content are Nebula exclusive?

[@itsmerker]

Any chance you'll be able to do a video about the history of the Ukrainian Air force and the other post-soviet air forces? Would be interesting to see how they all evolved in the years since 1992

[@arkplayer179]

Hey man great video as always do you think there is enough material on the mig 19 for a standalone video? It's my favorite looking jet of the era.

[@wape1]

What a noble goal! One question: Where is the footage of the development of the MiG-9 from? Looks like an early documentary film on the subject and I'd love to see the whole thing.

[@JamesPhieffer]

I'm presuming the footage is from "They Conquer the Air"? If so, do you know where it can be found and streamed, ideally with English subs?

[@ZGryphon]

"Wait, won't that just ingest all the muzzle gases from the cannon and flame out its own engines if it fires? ... Yes, yes it will. All righty then! This is fine."

[@dudududu1926]

Automatic disengagement system. Shoot a burst, then glides back to base. Prevent pilots from defecting.

[@ZGryphon]

@@dudududu1926 Ah, modeled on the operational doctrine the Germans developed for their rocket-powered interceptors during the war.

[@LoftBits]

I think the key decision parameter was always: "If we don't pull this off, Stalin will be furious!"

[@onebronx]

Hindsight is always 20/20

[@leovang3425]

​@@onebronx It's almost likely putting an exhaust next to an intake.

[@Bkjgghyheuling]

Two videos in two weeks? Oh paper skies you’re really spoiling us!

[@flickingbollocks5542]

He knows the end of the World is nigh.

[@rafale1981]

Ukrainians are good at rapidly delivering surprises under adverse circumstances

[@donaldwrissler9059]

Well done video. The aerodynamic issues with the Mig9 were matched with powerplant issues. They used a copy of the BMW003 built in a Bmw factory moved to Russia, but they did'nt have the technical documentation . Their inexperience with jet technology and metallurgy was a stumbling block for quite some time. They did get a leg up when Rolls-Royce sold them Nene engines that helped make the Mig-15 a success. So many planes have been at the mercy of good/bad powerplants.

[@ironhead2008]

Also they got those engines because of KGB ties within the British Gov't

[@PercyPruneMHDOIFandBars]

Yes. But they were sold to the Soviets with the condition they were NOT for military use! 😂 That went well. 🙃

[@papadopp3870]

If there only were a way to go back in time and supply the Mig 9, P-59 and other first gen jets with third gen engines. We may find the engineering was equal to the thrust. I wonder if it would have taken more time to get swept wings in operations. The F-80 was hampered greatly by the early engines, but went on to have a long career in it’s two-seat T-33 variant. The F-84, like the F-80, required tremendously long takeoff rolls.

[@lostalone9320]

Even very modern fighters have been shafted this way, particularly home grown non-NATO designs. Not that they are bad, they just can't deliver the same power to weight or power to volume.

[@patrickgriffitt6551]

​@@papadopp3870you ought to see a loaded "thud" take off run.

[@RS_Mogli]

Didn't know about the original 57mm gun, that is absolutly crazy. Very informative video, thanks!

[@ericyang3332]

I personally thought it was a 37mm, maybe it was a different model or something.

[@RS_Mogli]

@@ericyang3332 in the video he sais that the 57mm was changed to a 37 because of its difficulties that arous from it

[@ronhall9039]

@@RS_Mogli yup - started off with a 57mm and downgraded to a 37mm. The Mossie had a 6lber (57mm) strapped to it at one point and I'm sure the US stuck some artillery calibre onto a few of their WW2 planes, so it's not that unusual.

[@janwacawik7432]

@@ronhall9039 Some B-25 Mitchell variants were fitted with a 75mm cannon. The Germans slapped a 75mm gun on the Hs-129. The Italians beat them all with a 102mm howitzer mounted to a naval bomber.

[@ronhall9039]

@@janwacawik7432 👍👍

[@oliversmith9200]

The clips from the vintage Soviet MiG-9 movie scenes and many still photos brings wonderful visual live to this excellent lecture.

[@AnalogCaliga]

Ever since this and your previous video on Soviet TopGun program you've quickly become one of my favorite aviation KZbinrs. The footage you use, your narration, and subtle music is truly a pleasure to watch, keep it up man!

[@amogusenjoyer]

The movie footage is amazing! Very cool to see in the context of the story, almost perfectly fits the narration too

[@jeffbrinkerhoff5121]

Re: Ukranian accent, the narrator speaks with better diction and clarity than many of my US-born neighbors.

[@garliconionshallot]

Lol you cornball

[@djl5634]

USA speaks closer to proper English than any other English nation.

[@Skyprince27]

#MoreUkrainianAccentPlease

[@apinakapina]

I just love the accent. Greetings from Finland! :)

[@RayyMusik]

It took me about half a minute to get familiar with it, like with most other accents. No problem at all. Greetings from Germany.

[@cudamaniac]

The "this is fine" seems to be a still standing order in russian military leadership...give em hell!

[@090giver090]

And those people dare to speak anything about "pentagon wars" )))

[@mykhaylobyelostotskiy9255]

Wow, I didn't even expect another great video that soon!!! Thank you!!!

[@NickJaime]

Wow, the amount of its fine in the Soviet Air Force and the military is crazy. They didn't care they were adding more ways of friendly fire killing their men than before the enemy could.

[@CakePrincessCelestia]

Quiet firing be like:

[@kdrapertrucker]

In socialist systems it isn't about actual doing well, it's about looking good.

[@Trashpanda115]

Well, You cant have less kills and more casualties if all your kills were your casualties

[@pauloaz496]

​@@kdrapertrucker it's about stealing all the money

[@brianm.595]

Who would think guys staying awake 72 hours at a time would have poor quality output?

[@CakePrincessCelestia]

Without having watched the video yet, I do remember this issue very well from Il-2 '46, especially with the I-300 prototype sporting the massive 57mm cannon. I was one of the three virtual pilots on the entire planet who managed to be successful with that thing without constantly losing the engines simply because I fricken knew to throttle back before firing that thing. Much more modern planes had similar issues BTW. Just recently got the Mirage F1 for DCS and learnt that it has a throttle back automatic going when firing the DEFAs for the same reason. And the F-14A does the same by the way. Fun fact: The RD-20 basically is a BMW 003.

[@PaperSkiesAviation]

You could drop the word "basically" :) . It was the exact copy. The same thing with the RD-10 (Jumo 004) installed on the Yak-15.

[@CakePrincessCelestia]

@@PaperSkiesAviation Yes, I mean they even took the production facilities to produce those engines themselves. I wonder how far their own reseach was during that time. At least they had a rocket powered interceptor before Germany did, and its fuels was way less dangerous during the refueling process... you could make an episode about it, it's the Bereznyak-Isayev BI-x series, sometimes also called Bolkhovitinov after the design bureau's head. Would perfectly fit into your channel covering the less well-known things :)

[@crazydave911]

An early version of this was the F11, the fastest plane to nowhere lol 😂

[@JohnWilliamNowak]

A Soviet interceptor of that time was probably intended to engage the American B-36, a prewar design able to cruise at 13,000m, about three kilometers higher than the Japanese Zero. The MiG-9 was able to match the B-36's ceiling, so closely it was almost certainly designed with that in mind.

[@martijn9568]

I personally do really like the looks of the MiG-9. By the way, that the MiG-9 only beat the Tu-2 during the performance trials makes me wonder which aspects they all graded and if they overvalued manoeuvrability instead of speed.

[@CakePrincessCelestia]

Probably just constant turn rate. It would bleed off more speed when turning than the 262 due to the wing design. And it literally had the same engines. We all have heard the stories of the 262 being most vulnerable right after takeoff with basically no speed. Same applies here. Took ages to get it up to speed.

[@Laotzu.Goldbug]

@@CakePrincessCelestia yes, I think this was a fairly common problem, although to varying degrees in different countries, with all of the early turbojets, with many different solutions attempted to try get the short take-off / early flight regime already achieved by the most mature prop fighters (F-84 for being the most extreme example)

[@ethanmckinney203]

I believe that they were mock dogfights. Otherwise, the Soviets had detailed performance data for all of their prop aircraft, so there was no need to do anything except run solo performance trials for the MiG-9.

[@deltavee2]

And the Tu-2 probably had to fly with one prop feathered....

[@kaixcheng]

In that case you gotta love the Yak-36...

[@andrelieli]

Two Paper Skies Videos in just two weeks? Christmas seems to be early this year. Excellent content as always!

[@pandoranbias1622]

You *always* stick to the test plan. It doesn’t matter what you are building, you need to ensure your design can handle basic functions before you move to more advanced tasks.

[@dyingearth]

Unless you're Buckaroo Banzai, and there are additional classified (to folks outsideo of Team Banzai) test plan, and you ARE the chief engineer as well as the test pilot. The jet car's actual purpose is to fully test out Oscillator Overthruster and breaching into the 8th dimensions.

[@martijn9568]

Believe it or not, but there was a time where jet fighters would go supersonic on their first flight. Probably because they could🤷‍♂️

[@HereticalKitsune]

"This is fine" sums this plane up perfectly.

[@GeorgeSemel]

I like the Yak-15 being towed by a Lend-Least Jeep.! As for your accent, I understand everything you say. Your English is very good. I wish my Russian and Ukrainian were half as good. I am teaching myself both languages. The fuel system on the MiG-9 is very very strange, how many airplanes were wrecked due to running out of fuel? But I have to say they did get it right with the MiG-15

[@_b_x_b_1063]

These languages are very close, considering that many Ukrainian words are old extinct in the Russian language

[@GeorgeSemel]

@@_b_x_b_1063 I know. My mom spoke polish, she and my grandmother did not pass that language on to me. I am 67 now and retired but had a job and in the hangar across from where I worked as a Pilot was a MiG-15 and I really wanted to fly that airplane. Mom could understand a lot of Russian, they are very similar.

[@thepinkplushie]

Ironically the MiG-15, while no longer having the fueling issue, allegedly had its own fuel tank issue, where the high pressure pumps could cause the tank to implode, if there was venting issues. Unfortunately there's very little information about this in any english source I could find, but given the myriad of issues the MiG-21 had with its fuel tanks, I think its plausible.

[@MrDgwphotos]

The reason the MiG-15 was such a success was thanks largely to the Rolls Royce Nene, which Britain unwisely "sold" the Soviet Union (sold being in quotes because the Soviet Union never actually paid Britain for it), on the caveat that it was not to be used for military purposes, which, of course, the Soviet Union promptly violated that term of the agreement as well.

[@mechadrake]

As far as we know, nobody would have known those are lend lease sometimes. There were rumors about sercret factories making those and people believed them, despite truck having writings and logos of us manufacturing (later deleted). at least my parents tell me this (we were occupied by soviets. Thanks by the way for doing lend lease to them, not to the people really needing it)

[@cloud4565]

Nice video, the mig 9 is like one of the forgotten soviet fighters, everyone remember the mig 19, 21 , 23,25,27 and 29 and the su 27+ but no one remembers the early migs or the sukhoi fitter series

[@PaperSkiesAviation]

"When thinking about Soviet MiGs most of you would normally imagine some slick-looking swept wing fighter aircraft. Indeed, today it’s hard to imagine anything else for the MiG - an aircraft that for decades became the synonym for a any Soviet fighter. However, such a perception could hardly apply to the first jet MiG. Unlike its famous successors, like the MiG-15, 21 or 29, the very first mass-produced jet fighter by Mikoyan and Gurevich, the MiG-9, did not possess any elegant exterior or outstanding flight characteristics. ...". This is the opening part from the very 1st version of my script :). However, as with some other parts, I cut it off while "optimizing" the length of the video.

[@_b_x_b_1063]

@@PaperSkiesAviation будет ил еще видео по МиГам, от 15го до 29/35. Все таки КБ "МиГ" фактически умерло и "Сухой" подмаля остатки под себя.

[@jerryle379]

I think you mean the more famous mig 15/17 right 19 ain't that famous

[@cloud4565]

@@jerryle379 yeah I meant the 15/17 since they were all developed from each other I misremembered, my bad lol

[@mrjockt]

I believe that Sukhoi’s early jet fighters were shoved into the background and effectively ignored because Lavochkin, I believe it was, convinced Stalin that Sukhoi’s fighters were nothing more than copies of the German Me-262 and thus shouldn’t be fielded by the Soviet Air Force.

[@gertjanmoens4188]

Top video as usual! I have fond memories of the MiG-9, flying around in it in IL-2 1946.

[@CakePrincessCelestia]

Good old times! /)

[@str8ballinSA]

Do you remember "Black Death" FPS testing procedure with FRAPS? I came up with that.

[@gertjanmoens4188]

@@str8ballinSA Hi Hank, I remember using FRAPS (and still do) but I'm afraid I haven't heard of "Black death".

[@str8ballinSA]

@@gertjanmoens4188 It was one of the game replays that shipped with IL-2... We (few other guys and I) collaborated on forums to standardize performance testing using Fraps. Decided on Black Death replay - and to run Fraps with FPS logging from 0:05 to 1:05 length. Results would then be posted (together with CPU/RAM specs and NVIDIA settings)...

[@CakePrincessCelestia]

@@str8ballinSA Black Death literally was the benchmark "level" back in the day. Counted way more than any 3DMark or other thing. But I never used FRAPS with it... instead I opened up the console and entered >fps start show :)

[@ThePsychoAnon]

There’s something magical about those early jet aircraft, a lot of the designers were trying wild stuff, some innovative, some a bit to crazy for its own good. The ho229 and the meteor are some of my favourites.

[@Ganiscol]

MiG-9 - Doing it the Soviet way! Thanks for this visualized history lesson and especially for presenting it with your subtle and dry humor 😏

[@YukariAkiyamaTanks]

When you were talking about the mig 9 demonstration and the pilot showing off, it reminded me of the Tupolev TU-144 display at the Paris airshow that ended in tragedy.

[@himanshuanand9048]

The narration is pure gold my dude.

[@jnb894]

2 Paper Skies videos within 2 weeks! Is it Christmas already?! I'd watch your videos 24/7 if there was enough to do so! In the meantime then, well, I revisit them on a regular basis! Salutations du Québec!

[@Ghostrider-gn8ml]

Great video about this old bird. A nice video like this about the Yak-15 wold be highly appriciated.

[@Nyeoom]

15:55 those eyebrows are absolute UNITS lol

[@aliancemd]

Just want to repeat that hearing about the Soviet Union with your accent is just a match made in heaven :)

[@TimberwolfCY]

Fantastic telling of this fascinating story. Everyone knows of the MiG-15 and 17 here in the States, but few have ever heard of the MiG-9, and you told it's story well. Thank you!

[@Flightcoach]

You are so modest with that "having trouble understanding my Ukrainian accent". DUDE! your English is better than most Americans and way less obnoxious than most Britts! Love your videos.

[@Aditya-wg3lp]

I don’t think the pilot didn’t listen, I think he did exactly what he was told.

[@PaperSkiesAviation]

It is quite possible. Putting all the blame on the pilot who couldn't say anything (because he's dead now), is an easy way to cover design mistakes and failures.

[@Т1000-м1и]

Paper Skies fits this one so perfectly

[@messedupfmj]

Can we all agree that at 15:55 we witnessed the most glorious eyebrows seen in the 20th century?

[@X8X8X8X8X8X8X8X8X8X]

One of my favourite aircraft in IL-2 1946 back in the day! I was intrigued by its looks.

[@danmcintyre9733]

"This is fine." "There is no panic." The more things change, the more they stay the same. LOL

[@MM22966]

BTW, wherever you are digging up these old Soviet docu-dramas, complete with their own "crash CGI", keep doing it!

[@tomonabudget]

You're on 🔥 So happy to see paper skies back on air

[@ДенисЧ-р3у]

Nice job as always. It's funny how your accent actually makes it easier for me to understand what's said, as my mother tongue is russian and as I speak Ukranian.

[@TheArklyte]

The thing that blew my mind the most about post war soviet jet fighters isn't even the fact that our only good engine was british engine literary gifted to us by UK, which became the heart of MiG-15. No, instead it was our inability to copy airportable radars for nightfighters until MiG-17P. Great. Cool.

[@The_Real_Maxajax]

They should have made "Fake it till you make it" the national motto.

[@proteusnz99]

To be fair the Hawker Hunter F1 had the same problem, the early Avon engines were very sensitive to airflow disturbances when the guns fired. The Sapphire engine used on the F2/F5 versions were untroubled, unfortunately all the early gunnery trials were conducted with Sapphire engined prototypes. Interim solution was to modify the fuel control to dip fuel amounts when guns fired. Longer term, RR modified the Avon to use the Sapphire compressor.

[@StrikeNoir105E]

Really amazing how a lot of the issues that plagued the Mig-9 are a microcosm of the Soviet/Russian military as a whole, and even more said problems still persist to this day in the exact same manner as evidenced by the ongoing conflict: a military more concerned about flashy looks and appearances to show off at parades, which only looks mighty and intimidating on the outside, but in reality heavily flawed and unable to perform to its fullest due to economic issues, incompetence, arrogance, and the inability of the brass to accept any wrongdoing.

[@kaixcheng]

A story I heard... The same engine stalling problem happened again when VVS entered the missile age. This time they put a small tank of gasoline and a bottle of oxygen in the plane, then link the ignition switch to the trigger. When guns or missiles were fired, the engine would try to re-ignite constantly. So the engine flames out all the time, but it always re-ignites!

Great channel. Nice of the Soviet Union to provide you with this much tailor made video material for the video. As a small video creator I can appreciate how useful that is 🙂 And great that you give the money to Ukraine 👍

[@nick4506]

it actuly took a while for jets to outperform props. they had lower thrust but they could carry that thrust to high speed and altitudes. but the time to climb record was healed by the f8f bearcat a naval prop for 10 years during the time of these early jets.

[@welshpete12]

I always liked the MIG 9 . Many years ago , would you believe before we had plastic kits . We used to make our own models out of balsa wood. I must have made over a hundred , all to a scale of 1/100 . Which was the common scale then, not 1/72 as used today.

[@rorybaker5799]

They could have fixed the fume problem by taking a tube with exhaust gasses near the front of the barrel, and then routing it backwards along the barrel, and down under the plane.

[@Pablo-ms3qx]

23:04 "...one MIGht say that for the Soviets..." I see you there, caption maker:)

[@David.Harris]

I was trying to figure out if this was a re-upload. Nope. Watched it on nebula like 2 weeks ago. This is one of my favorite channels.

[@erictaylor5462]

5:10 Ironic. The US Mercury program had the same problem. The Mercury-Redstone and the crew were ready to fly way ahead of the Soviet's first manned flight, but the engineers got cold feet and insisted on one more unmanned test flight.

[@sball1990rack]

Well, Dead astronauts don’t make for a good budget next year.

[@tovrobi5097]

This must be the most Soviet plane from its design, production, and to the end of its service. And the whole project looks like a big deadline rush.

[@cyberista]

Great doc, and a historical eye-opener to the (then) Soviet political treatment of aviation and engineering developments. I'd just like to have seen a comment about the reverse engineering of the Rolls Royce Derwent and Nene engines that helped the Soviets make the jump to the Mig 15.

[@ricardobufo]

a much later fighter, the Hawker Hunter prototype had the same problem. "Britain's latest fighter, the Hawker Hunter, is a great success .. except for its inability to fire its guns."

[@EnclaveGeneral]

This is the one time I willingly disabled ad-block on a KZbin video. Keep up the great content, mate!

[@CakePrincessCelestia]

I didn't (it often would not play ads anyway in my FF even if I disabled it), but decided to let it run in the background in Microsofts browser downloader (Edge) that doesn't have a blocker installed, turned it down to 144p and also 2x speed (according to Linus Sebastian, this counts fully as if you watched at 1x in regards of revenue) for saving traffic and energy :)

[@andrewruss5824]

23:01 i see the little MIG pun in the captions

[@ciprian7243]

Never knew you are Ukrainain, but now i like your videos even more. Regardless, they were top notch content anyway. Kudos, keep up the good job & greetings from your Romanian neighbours.

[@johnbennett951]

I didn’t know he was Ukrainian, now I wanna go down on him too ❤

[@SandyRiverBlue]

Decreased drag but drastically reduced lateral stability. I've heard from several ex-flyers that at low and peak speeds it was like trying to steer a kite in a wind storm.

[@scavenger6268]

The Soviet Union wouldn't be the Soviet Union if it didn't try to copy someone else's design while missing important details.

[@horusfalcon]

A very well done video. Thank you for posting this here.

[@pizzagogo6151]

Great production thanks! Don’t see enough quality stuff on early non-US/UK fighters. FWIW to be fair, a lot of countries were still figuring things out with cannon armed early jets - mig 9 certainly wasn’t alone with engine problems from gun blast ingestion ( hawker hunter & Australian Sabre being obvious ones that spring to mind).

[@colinboone9920]

Wildly underrated channel, fantastic content m8. Cheers!

[@iainmalcolm9583]

Great video. Your accent is fine. I'd even say your English is better than some native speakers on YT. Keep up the good work.

[@slippymitc]

4:06 look how perfectly he was able to draw those circles.

[@samschellhase8831]

so just like the MiG-25, it was a jet that was hyped up way more than operationally possible, and succeeded in scaring and holding back western powers

[@depressedTrent]

This video brings me a bit of nostalgia, i had kit of this aircraft as teenager (and never managed to finish it since it was typical shortrun and i was too inexperienced for it back then). Those early jets had their charm from design point of view...

[@charlessaint7926]

Soviet leadership, "Some of you may die, but it is a sacrifice that I'm willing to make."

[@rizypeacy4877]

We wish you all the best in this difficult time❤

[@BCJAZZZ]

Do you think, that problems with fumes from firing the guns were the reason, why Mig-15 has it's guns positioned below the intake? :)

[@miquelescribanoivars5049]

That's exactly the reason, in fact the unaccepted MiG-9M used the exact same gun arrangement.

[@BCJAZZZ]

@@miquelescribanoivars5049 That was my thought, the same armament, different configuration. :)

[@CakePrincessCelestia]

Guess they completely went with the solution shown at 12:55 which just was problematic for the center mounted gun.

[@ChorltonBrook]

Gotta say, the splicing of the video with the narration is top class. Eg when you spoke about the tail being damaged splice against the pilot looking at the tail or the fuel filling when the ground crew looks at the cockpit fearfully. Engaging and informative, I’m enjoying these thanks & oh… Slava Ukraine!

[@theisolatedone]

Question: is it really common during Soviet times that movies (i.e., dramatic reenactments) about engineering were being made? I remember in your NS-23 cannon video, you also scenes from another movie about it being made.

[@kostis2849]

Oh yeah. I remember watching a movie about an experimental nuclear reactor. I can't remember the title.

[@connorc6293]

Does any one know the title

[@joydrathasarkar2841]

Your style of storytelling and narrative is very good. I appreciate your content

[@danielvandersall6756]

Seems to me that "This is Fine" is the eternal motto of Russia from the very beginning. Under the Communists, it became a Mantra. It's very interesting looking at the careful design of the A-10, that addresses this problem by carefully controlling the airflow so all the crud stays under the aircraft, not going up into the top-mounted turbofans. As far as they could get it from that cannon.

[@alexpayne2662]

The spongebob like music fits this narrative perfectly.

[@The_Modeling_Underdog]

Outstanding, as usual. Would there be a chance for you to do a video on the Tsybin LL-1/3 research rocket gliders? Cheers.

[@folgore1]

Hilarious video! (Except for the part about the test pilot getting killed, of course.) I also loved the moniker "the parade fighter"!

[@wilsonli5642]

The footage looks amazing - was there a Soviet documentary or movie dramatization made about the MiG-9? Or was some of this from actual Mikoyan-Gurevich archives?

[@ghomerhust]

huge props to the donation. i hope it brings in a lot of funding!!

[@oler777]

I look forward to you videos they are a great watch

[@depilot2035]

The paper skies bureau has gifted us this nebula made for video

[@rciscon]

An excellent mini-documentary on the tragic MiG-9. Is the film footage you used for this available to see in it's original form? I'd be quite interested in watching that original film.

[@CativaCookie]

I'd like to say that the pun near the end did not go unnoticed, as for the video, very good work!

[@duncandehulst2016]

i always like it when you post video's, not too often but that is okay! i love aviation history as i am to become an avionics tech. I'd love to see if you could make like a video of the design process and development of the helicopter! if in the future that could be arranged, that would be amazing (:

[@DominusRexDK]

SO i really really liked your Mig-27 and Soviet Top Gun videos. I would love to learn more about the Su-24 Fencer

[@spladam3845]

Your content is always fantastic dude, one of the best aviation channels on youtube, but what you are doing for Ukraine is the kind of altruistic goodness there is just not enough of, and sets a profound example of how social participation is suppose to work, so thank you very much.

[@Russão000]

When me and my brother was playing WT together, my first Jet Fighter was MiG-9 and his was the Su-9, we called the MiG-9 as "the Lil Bird" due to it small size and the Su-9 "the Rock" due to slow and Heavy flight performance, it was like 10 days ago

[@Lizardmium]

Its sad that your channel doesnt get as much attention from youtube as it deserves

[@asteroidrules]

In a lot of ways it's impressive that the MiG-9 and Yak-15 performed as well as they did when you consider the circumstances of their development. The US, UK, Italy, and Germany had world class aviation engineers working on the problem of jet propulsion for military aircraft for five years or more before they produced operable fighters, and the US and UK did so without the endemic corruption and questionable leadership that the Soviets had constantly screwing things up. That the MiG-9 could fly at all barely a year after it was first ordered is borderline miraculous.