In 1928, under provisions of the Five Year Plan for experimental aircraft design, Polikarpov was assigned to develop the primarily wooden I-6 fighter for delivery by mid-1930.
Both aircraft were armed with two 7.62 mm (0.3 in) PV-1 machine guns, but the production model of the I-5 was expected to be armed with four, although this proved to impose too great a penalty to the I-5's performance.
Polikarpov I-16 | Polikarpov I-15 | Polikarpov Po-2 | Polikarpov I-6 | Polikarpov I-5 | Polikarpov I-153 |
Antonio Cordón also actively contacted with the Soviet Union over the provision of war materials, including T-26 light tanks and Polikarpov I-16s.
These aircraft were used against both the Imperial Japanese Army and Navy Air Forces and both ground and naval targets with considerable success through the end of 1937, before being superseded by the better-armed and faster Polikarpov I-15 and I-16 fighters.
Polikarpov I-16, a Soviet fighter aircraft introduced in the 1930s
On 18 July 1938, he was killed during an aerial battle when his aircraft collided with a Chinese Polikarpov I-15 fighter flown by Soviet volunteer Valentin Dudonov.
Polikarpov and the others were moved to Central Design Bureau 39 (TsKB-39) to complete the I-5 project.
In 1939 Polikarpov fighters were extensively used during the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought around the Khalkha River in Dornod Province.
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In August 1937, the Chinese Kuomintang Government signed a non-aggression pact with the USSR.
In December 1929 the OGPU gathered a number of aircraft engineers together at Butyrka prison, including Polikarpov, and formed the Internal Prison Design Bureau (Konstruktorskoye Byuro Vnutrenniya Tyurma—KB VT) under the leadership of Dmitry Pavlovich Grigorovich.
A one-second burst from four ShKAS in Polikarpov I-153 or Polikarpov I-16 placed 120 bullets within 15 angular mils at 400 meters (1,312 feet) giving a firing density of 5 bullets per square meter of the sky.
The UT-1 was used as a transitional type between the UT-2 and fighters like the I-16.