Civil airliner Yak-40, late version 1/144 Eastern Express 14493

Civil airliner Yak-40, late version 
1/144 scale plastic model kit
Eastern Express 14493

Manufacturer: Eastern Express (Russia)
Scale: 1/144
Material: Plastic
Paint: Unpainted, Unassembled, Kit do not contain paints and glue.
Condition: New in Box

The Yakovlev Yak-40 (NATO reporting name: Codling) is a small, three-engined airliner, the world's first regional jet transport aircraft. It was introduced in September 1968 with Aeroflot.By the early 1960s, the Soviet state airline Aeroflot's international and internal trunk routes were flown by jet or turboprop powered airliners but their local services, many of which operated from grass airfields, were operated by obsolete piston engined aircraft such as the Ilyushin Il-12, Il-14 and Lisunov Li-2. Aeroflot wanted to replace these elderly airliners with a turbine-powered aircraft, with the Yakovlevdesign bureau being assigned to design the new airliner. High speed was not required, but it would have to operate safely and reliably out of poorly equipped airports with short (less than 700 m, (2,300 ft)) unpaved runways in poor weather.

Yakovlev studied both turboprop and jet-powered designs to meet the requirement, including Vertical Take-Off and Landing (VTOL) designs with lift jets in the fuselage or in wing-mounted pods, but eventually they settled on a straight-winged tri-jet carrying 20 to 25 passengers. Engines were to be the new AI-25 turbofan being developed by Ivchenko at Zaporozhye in Ukraine.The Yak-40 is a low-winged cantilever monoplane with unswept wings, a large T-tail and a retractable tricycle landing gear. The passenger cabin is ahead of the wing, with the short rear fuselage carrying the three turbofan engines, with two engines mounted on short pylons on the side of the fuselage and a third engine buried in the rear fuselage, with air fed from a dorsal air-intake ahead of the fin by an "S-duct", as was an auxiliary power unit which was fitted to allow engine start-up without ground support on primitive airfields. The three AI-25 engines were two-shaft engines rated at 14.7 kN (3,300 lbf). The engines had no jetpipes, and initially no thrust reversers.The first of five prototypes made its maiden flight on 21 October 1966, with production being launched at the Saratov Aviation Plant in 1967 and Soviet type certification granted in 1968. The type carried out its first passenger service for Aeroflot on 30 September 1968.In the 1972 version, a tailspin was removed. In 1974, new version was introduced, with non-stop flight distance increased. Also, the forward door on the right side of the fuselage changed its place – it was located together with the sixth window.

In 1975, the last upgrade of Yak-40 took place – the number of cabin windows on the right side changed from nine to eight.