Fourth MiG-9 Discovered in Beijing, China

[Aahz]

As previously announced in this thread, it seems that a FOURTH surviving example of a MiG-9 aircraft has been discovered in Beijing, China. All of the literature I've referenced, and all of the people I've come across who know of these things, all concurred that there were only three known surviving examples, so this may be an important find.

While I was in Beijing in May of 2011, I happened to notice what at first appeared to be an airplane graveyard in a parking lot outside the window of my room at the Vision Hotel:

I was surprised to see the U.S. and other non-Chinese aircraft, but apart from the P-47, the T-6, and the Harrier, I did not try to specifically identify the aircraft until recently. With some assistance from a member on DeviantArt, I identified one MiG-9 on the lot [inside red rectangle] (no. 86104, one of the three known) as well as what appeared to be a partial fuselage of a second MiG-9 [inside red ellipse].

The literature and recent photographs identify the surviving MiG-9 aircraft and their locations as:

1) MiG-9 "01" (a.k.a. "Red") is at the Central Air Force Museum in Monino, Russia, near Moscow (photo from Wikipedia)


2) MiG-9 "30" (a.k.a. "White") is at the Chinese Aviation Museum at Datangshan in Beijing, China (photo from Paul Hannah, posted by Vagabond in the earlier thread)


3) MiG-9 "86104" is at the Beijing Air and Space Museum at Beihang University in Beijing, China (photo from Aircraft in Focus, reference posted by k5083 in another thread)


Prior to being restored and put on display, 86104 was one of the two MiG-9 aircraft on the parking lot. Even though the paint is badly eroded, the number "86104" is still faintly visible over the three color swatches:


But if the other two MiG-9 aircraft were known to be elsewhere at the time this photo was taken, then what is the other one?


Photos from other enthusiasts help confirm its identity as a MiG-9:
(posted by Lightjug, September 2012)


(also posted by Lightjug, September 2012 - the MiG-9 is partially obscured by another fuselage)


(Paul Hannah, taken in 2007, posted by Vagabond July 2015)


So a FOURTH surviving example of a MiG-9 does seem to exist, probably owned by the Beijing Air and Space Museum or by Beihang University. While the fuselage, tail, intake, and other details match, it is the intake-mounted 37mm cannon that is the giveaway, as no other aircraft had that configuration.

The task now is to attribute it. According to various sources, there were a number of prototypes, both original and variants built from production models. Some of these variant prototypes were never completed. There may be a real possibility that this fourth MiG-9 is one of these prototypes. It would make sense that either the University or the Museum would want a second model that is different from their primary exhibit model in some historically or technically significant way. Given its present condition, it may take a real expert in MiG-9 aircraft to identify it, though.

[k5083]

When I visited the Beijing Air & Space Museum in 2014 there was a cutaway MiG-9 wing on display as well as MiG-9 86104.



Perhaps this wing is related to the aircraft in your photo.

August

[Aahz]

When I visited the Beijing Air & Space Museum in 2014 there was a cutaway MiG-9 wing on display as well as MiG-9 86104.



Perhaps this wing is related to the aircraft in your photo.

Wouldn't surprise me. After thinking about it, the airplane is owned by an aeronautical university and/or a museum. This aircraft may have been a study piece, which might explain why the skin is off one side of the fuselage but not the other; off one side of the wing but not the other. Perhaps they have all the pieces, including the engine, sitting around somewhere. The fuselage was in the parking lot and the starboard wing is on display, but the port wing and engine may be collecting dust in storage, or may even be at a branch location or a different university entirely. But there is a chance that enough pieces remain to reassemble most of it and restore the rest.

Anyone have a contact at Beihang University?

[hang the expense]

I noticed the thunderbolt fuselage next to the mig.I thought they only had the one t bolt that looks pretty intact.

[Aahz]

I noticed the thunderbolt fuselage next to the mig.I thought they only had the one t bolt that looks pretty intact.

That's the only one I know of. The engine and cowling are under the tarp in front of the Q-5 (you can see two of the prop blades sticking out). It was reassembled, repainted, and put on display in the Museum.

[k5083]

When I visited the Beijing Air & Space Museum in 2014 there was a cutaway MiG-9 wing on display as well as MiG-9 86104.



Perhaps this wing is related to the aircraft in your photo.

Wouldn't surprise me. After thinking about it, the airplane is owned by an aeronautical university and/or a museum. This aircraft may have been a study piece, which might explain why the skin is off one side of the fuselage but not the other; off one side of the wing but not the other. Perhaps they have all the pieces, including the engine, sitting around somewhere. The fuselage was in the parking lot and the starboard wing is on display, but the port wing and engine may be collecting dust in storage, or may even be at a branch location or a different university entirely. But there is a chance that enough pieces remain to reassemble most of it and restore the rest.

Anyone have a contact at Beihang University?

You are correct that the collection is the property of Beihang University, a major and prestigious Chinese engineering school; sort of the Chinese M.I.T. The school actually designed one airplane, the twin engined light transport with the faded red trim parked between the MiG-19 and the Harrier in your hotel shot. The new museum facility is in a teaching building on the sprawling campus and yes, it is partly a lab full of instructional airframes. Go through the wrong door and you find yourself in a hallway full of classrooms. There were cutaway displays there of Chinese and foreign types including bits of an F-84 and purportedly part of a B-25 nacelle. Even on campus, however, the museum is not that well known; it took me a while to find someone who could point me to it. To find someone who could answer your questions I guess I would start by being in the museum and being fluent in Mandarin, which I'm not.

I'm surprised by the distressed condition of the planes in your 2011 shot considering that they were all spiffed up and on display by 2012 when the new museum opened a couple of blocks away. Even if the restorations are just cosmetic, some fast work was done there. Most of the Chinese types in the museum looked so good that I wouldn't have thought they ever deteriorated to the point shown in your photos. Have you tried to ID all the partial airplanes along the top of your photo? I don't recognize some of them, and I think Hang the Expense may be talking about the fuselage just to the right of the MiG-9 fuselage when he mentions the second P-47.

August

[Aahz]

After thinking about it, the airplane is owned by an aeronautical university and/or a museum. This aircraft may have been a study piece, which might explain why the skin is off one side of the fuselage but not the other; off one side of the wing but not the other. Perhaps they have all the pieces, including the engine, sitting around somewhere. The fuselage was in the parking lot and the starboard wing is on display, but the port wing and engine may be collecting dust in storage, or may even be at a branch location or a different university entirely. But there is a chance that enough pieces remain to reassemble most of it and restore the rest.

Anyone have a contact at Beihang University?

You are correct that the collection is the property of Beihang University, a major and prestigious Chinese engineering school; sort of the Chinese M.I.T. The school actually designed one airplane, the twin engined light transport with the faded red trim parked between the MiG-19 and the Harrier in your hotel shot. The new museum facility is in a teaching building on the sprawling campus and yes, it is partly a lab full of instructional airframes. Go through the wrong door and you find yourself in a hallway full of classrooms. There were cutaway displays there of Chinese and foreign types including bits of an F-84 and purportedly part of a B-25 nacelle. Even on campus, however, the museum is not that well known; it took me a while to find someone who could point me to it. To find someone who could answer your questions I guess I would start by being in the museum and being fluent in Mandarin, which I'm not.

I'm surprised by the distressed condition of the planes in your 2011 shot considering that they were all spiffed up and on display by 2012 when the new museum opened a couple of blocks away. Even if the restorations are just cosmetic, some fast work was done there. Most of the Chinese types in the museum looked so good that I wouldn't have thought they ever deteriorated to the point shown in your photos. Have you tried to ID all the partial airplanes along the top of your photo? I don't recognize some of them, and I think Hang the Expense may be talking about the fuselage just to the right of the MiG-9 fuselage when he mentions the second P-47.

I wondered if he meant the one right next to the MiG-9 or just *near* it. I took a quick look at the one right next to the MiG-9, but it just didn't seem to me to be a P-47 fuselage. I have a higher-resolution photo I'll look at later just to be sure, though.

Unless there is something very unique about the fuselage that makes for quick identification, I'm not really good enough to ID the fuselages along the fence in the conditions seen in my photo. Someone did point out that the far left one was the midsection of a B-25, so it is possible that the wing segment with the engine and nacelle is from a B-25, and may be the one you're referring to.

I would like to try and identify the remaining bits and pieces if possible. Don't know how easy that will be, though.

[marine air]

Is the fueslage in front ot the Harrier a DC-2? Or the japanese copy. Isn't that some version of the T-6 in the left upper corner missing wings and side panels. Also the aircraft with yellow wings may be an Aero Ae-145. There's also a Yak-11 at the bottom of the picture, a Yak-18A in that row of fuselages and lots of other unknown stuff, maybe an IL-10 fuselage as well. Is that B-25 hulk the remains of the Doolittle B-25B that landed in China?

[bdk]

I noticed the thunderbolt fuselage next to the mig.I thought they only had the one t bolt that looks pretty intact.

They have the complete D-model and then they have at least a fuselage ond wings of an N-model. The N-model fuselage has had the skin on one side removed as they have done on some of the other aircraft at the school.

[Dan K]

Saw the firewall on the left and thought P-47, no?

[k5083]

Is the fueslage in front ot the Harrier a DC-2? Or the japanese copy. Isn't that some version of the T-6 in the left upper corner missing wings and side panels. Also the aircraft with yellow wings may be an Aero Ae-145. There's also a Yak-11 at the bottom of the picture, a Yak-18A in that row of fuselages and lots of other unknown stuff, maybe an IL-10 fuselage as well. Is that B-25 hulk the remains of the Doolittle B-25B that landed in China?

Your IDs are correct. Here is my page of the current museum showing most of the planes in the parking lot as they look today.

http://aircraft-in-focus.com/beijing-ai ... ce-museum/

The DC is a Soviet DC-3 clone, a Lisunov Li-2.

I do not think the B-25 is one of the Doolittle raiders; that would be rather sensational. I'm not sure how much B-25 is in the pic, certainly one nacelle and the adjacent wing areas but I don't know if any of those fuselages to the left are B-25. The bit at extreme left looks kind of right.

I'm not sure that is a P-47 fuselage next to the MiG-9 but I agree with HTE, it looks like one.

August

[ignomini]

Could that black twin lurking under the tree on the right be a P-61? Maybe those are it's wings sitting behind the P-47.

[Aahz]

Is the fueslage in front ot the Harrier a DC-2? Or the japanese copy.

It is either a C-47 or the Russian clone, a Lisunov LI-2

Isn't that some version of the T-6 in the left upper corner missing wings and side panels.

AT-6D Texan - it does have wings which have been reattached, but the side panels are still off.

Also the aircraft with yellow wings may be an Aero Ae-145.

Either that or an Aero AE-45 - they're very similar. The AE-45S was built under license in China, so that's what it probably is.

There's also a Yak-11 at the bottom of the picture,

Yes

a Yak-18A in that row of fuselages and lots of other unknown stuff,

Possible... that's one of the ones I'm not good enough to identify based on what's there...

maybe an IL-10 fuselage as well.

The Museum does have an IL-10 on display, so that's possible, especially since the display model is missing its wings. In fact, I do believe the IL-10 is the one just to the right of what may be a B-25 wing segment and nacelle.

Is that B-25 hulk the remains of the Doolittle B-25B that landed in China?

That is a matter of conjecture. There is a B-25 midsection and possibly a wing segment with engine nacelle in the photo, and the museum has the landing gear from a B-25 on display, but whether or not they're from a Doolittle B-25 is unknown at this time.

[Aahz]

Could that black twin lurking under the tree on the right be a P-61? Maybe those are it's wings sitting behind the P-47.

Definitely. It was my search to identify that plane that led me to the WIX forum in the first place. My first posts were under a P-61 thread here.

[Mike]

Any sign of the partial Ryan ST-M that used to be out in the weeds at the old site?