IAR-93

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Ј-22 Orao in the Aviation Museum in Belgrade

IAR 93 Vultur (Orao) is a light ground-attack aircraft developed as a joint Yugoslav-Romanian project in the 1970s for the air forces of both nations. The Romanian aircraft was built by IRAv Craiova (today Aerostar SA), and its Yugoslav counterpart by Soko as the Soko J-22 Orao. For Romania, the IAR 93 was intended to replace MiG-15s and MiG-17s in the fighter-bomber role. The last IAR-93s were withdrawn and mothballed from the Romanian Air Force in 1998.

[edit] Development

On May 20, 1971, Romania and Yugoslavia signed the governmental agreements for the YuRom programme. The program managers were Dipl. Dr. Engineer Teodor Zanfirescu for the Romanian party and Colonel Vidoje Knezevic for the Yugoslav party.

The aircraft was of conventional high-wing monoplane configuration with all flying surfaces swept. The Rolls-Royce Viper was chosen as the powerplant, as Soko had experience with licence-building this engine. The Romanian prototype White 001 made its first flight which lasted 21 minutes on October 31, 1974. The aircraft was flown by Colonel Gheorghe Stănică. On July 18, 1975 the aircraft was presented to Nicolae Ceauşescu on the Bacău airfield.

The first batches of pre-production machines were delivered in 1978. It was originally intended that an afterburner would be developed for the Viper engines, but there were prolonged difficulties with this project, meaning that none of the pre-production aircraft featured it, and neither did early production examples. During the 1980s, both countries developed slightly different versions to take advantage of the afterburning engines that had since become available. Some IAR-93s are configured for the low level air defense role with a twinrail on each underwing hardpoint making possible the loading of up to eight AA-8 Aphid / R60 AAM.

[edit] Variants

IAR-93A - initial production version without afterburners. 36 built, including 10 two-seat trainers
IAR-93B - refined version with afterburners and revised wing, including adding leading-edge extensions and removing fences

[edit] Operators

Romania.
- Romanian Air Force.

[edit] Specifications (IAR 93B)

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[edit] General characteristics

Crew: one, pilot
Length: 14.90 m (48 ft 10 in)
Wingspan: 9.30 m (30 ft 6 in)
Height: 4.59 m (15 ft 1 in)
Wing area: 26.0 m² (280 ft²)
Empty: 5,750 kg (12,650 lb)
Loaded: kg ( lb)
Maximum takeoff: 10,900 kg (23,980 lb)
Powerplant: 2x Turbomecanica/Orao-built Rolls-Royce Viper Mk 632-47, 44 kN (10,000 lbf) afterburning thrust each.

[edit] Performance

Maximum speed: 1,089 km/h (680 mph)
Range: 1,320 km (825 miles)
Service ceiling: 13,600 m (44,608 ft)
Rate of climb: 3,900 m/min (12,792 ft/min)
Wing loading: kg/m² ( lb/ft²)
Thrust-to-weight:

[edit] Armament

2 x 23 mm GSh-23L cannon
up to 2,800 kg (6,173 lb) of stores, including
- BM 500 bomb
- BEM 250 bomb
- BE 100 bomb
- LPR 122 rocket launcher
- LPR 57 rocket launcher
- PRN 80
- BL755 cluster bombs
- AA-8 Aphid / R60 AAM
- RAV RS AAM