Overview

The first Lavochkin fighter was designated I-22 and was also the first of the triad of new Soviet interceptors (Lavochkin, Yakovlev and Ilyushin) to take flight, on March 30, 1939. Lavochkin, together with Gorbunov and Gudkov, had created a simple and robust fighter, relatively good-looking, but which had the problem of choosing strategic materials, or rather, the choice not to use them. It was, in fact, the only one of the three that was built entirely of wood, except, of course, for the fundamental elements such as the landing gear, weapons, engine, ailerons (metal and covered in fabric). The retractable landing gear and the M-105P engine were signs of relative modernity, and certainly worthy of note was its maximum speed of 605 km/h. The weapons were high rate of fire, two ShKAS cannons and a ShVAK cannon. Despite its heavy structure, the real problem was the tendency to enter a spin in tight turns, which certainly did not encourage to make the most of its flight characteristics, already not very exciting. However, it was successful as a tactical support fighter, especially used on the Finnish front, and within the limits of its autonomy, also valid for escorting bombers. It was capable of flying in cold climates and often had skis, which, however, worsened its performance in flight. The first LaGG-1 model was followed by subsequent models, the LaGG-3, the La-5, the La-7 and, finally, the La-9, but by then at the end of the war.

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