Dev blog #238

Hello everybody,

This week we continue telling you about the new Collector Planes, now is the turn of Yak-9 and Yak-9T. Yak-9 was the most mass-produced Soviet WWII fighter, more than 14,000 were made on three factories in Moscow, Omsk and Novosibirsk in total. The production started during Autumn 1942 and peaked in 1944, but continued well after the war ended - it stopped only in 1948. They were used in combat en masse for the first time during Kursk battle in Summer 1943, but several documents reflect smaller scale combat deployments of the new fighters on other fronts of 1943, including the Battle of Kuban.

Yak-9, while being an evolution of Yak-7 design, had significant changes: metallic spars instead of the wooden ones, bubble canopy with an improved field of view, forward-and backward-facing armored glass pieces. The fighter armament was standard - 12.7 mm UBS MG and 20 mm ShVAK gun. It was powered by M-105PF inline engine.

We also recreate a special model of this fighter, Yak-9T, that was developed to counter enemy bombers and was also used against lightly armored targets. A powerful 37 mm NS-37 gun with 30 rounds ammo reserve required more space, so the pilot's cockpit has been moved back to make more room for it and to maintain the pitch balance. It's interesting to note that while this gun was much more powerful, the total weight increase was just 40 kg and the plane aerodynamics did not change for the worse noticeably.

We'll start the work on Yak-9T immediately after finishing Yak-9 (the exterior 3D model of Yak-9 is nearly complete while its cockpit 3D model and physical model are in the works and show good progress).