Re: IN WHICH METHOD IT IS EASY MANUFACTURE

> I watched an interesting program on Discovery about the Soviet program to
> reproduce the USAAF B-29 bomber from two intact aircraft which had landed
> in eastern Siberia. Stalin directed that exact copies be made from the
> originals. That meant that all the tubing, sheet metal, fasteners, cotter
> pins, gears, shafting, bearings, fittings and the rest had to be made
> from scratch to US customary sizes. You didn't argue with Stalin. It was
> an enormous job, but they actually did it. I think it was designated the
> Tu-2. They had no tooling of course so they drew everything including
> what would otherwise be standard off-the-shelf parts, and developed the
> tooling after they'd literally taken the planes down to nuts and bolts,
> drawn everything. The Russian team was under incredible pressure from
> Stalin and a number of the project people suffered complete breakdowns
> before the first Tu-2 flew. That must've been what Churchill meant when
> he mention the Russian capacity for suffering...

On the other hand, the T-34 (tank) was a brilliant design, in most ways superior to the best German designs of the day. I don't know how much the designers had to suffer for that one.

Also of note are/were the Su fighters (late 20th century) which always seemed to look like existing American designs with bigger engines and cruder controls.

I think I'm getting of topic.

Paul Received on Thu Jan 08 00:13:00 2004