In 1923 the Academy of the Air Fleet and the Military Academy of the RKKA leadership allowed students to build gliders and light aircraft using the academy workshops.
Between 1 and 18 of November of 1923 took place in Uzun-Sirt mountains in Crimea First National Competitions Gliding. In these competitions 10 gliders were presented. Among them were three Air Fleet Academy student gliders named AVF-1 Arap , AVF-2 Strizh and AVF-3 Mastyazhart and built by students MK Tijonrarov, VS Pyshnov and SV Ilyushin respectively. The technical commission, chaired by Professor VP Vetchinkin, after reviewing them, allowed the flight of 9 of them.
Pyshnovs’ AVF-2 Striz (Russian: Пышнов АВФ-2 «Стриж») glider had a biplane structure with long wings. The fuselage was constructed entirely of wood, with cable ties and featured a rectangular cross-section with a curved top. The fuselage structure ended in a horizontal rib towards the tail. The covering was fabric.
The wing trunk was located above the fuselage. The upper flange had an offset of 0.3 meters and the distance between both planes was 0.9 meters, being joined by means of parallel uprights and braced by cables. The wing construction was also made of wood, with textile covering and corresponded to the Prandtl-387 profile. Roll control was carried out by ailerons located in both planes.
The monoplane tail unit featured a large elevator attached to the rear frame of the fuselage and a large area empennage to which the rudder attached.
The landing gear was of the conventional type with two large spoke bicycle wheels whose axle ran from side to side through the fuselage and was attached to rubber shock absorbers. In the tail it had a fixed skate to the structure.
The pilot was located in a cockpit in front of the wing leading edge.
The Pyshnov glider was the second model designed and produced at the Air Fleet Academy (AVF), for which it received the official designation AVF-2 and the nickname “Strizh.” The Strizh was built in the AVF workshops and assembled at the “Aviarabotnik” factory. Unfortunately by the time the competitions started in November 1923 the AVF-2 had not been finished and was sent to the competitions in that state. All the metallic fixings were already installed in the camp of the participants in the competition.
This situation played a negative role in the fate of the glider. The Strizh was not only incomplete, it had not been tested, so construction defects had not been corrected. During the first tests on November 15 the Strizh on several occasions rotated on its axis before reaching takeoff. To correct this difficulty the builders increased the rudder area considerably but after this the glider refused to rise.
As a consolation, in this competition they also failed to launch their gliders SN Lyushin with their “Maori” and VI Cheranovski with their BICh-1 “Parabola”. Despite the difficulties the 17 of February of 1924, during the conclusions of the first competitions of gliding, the builder VS Pyshnov to the present like other builders, received a special award for its creation.
AVF-2 “Strizh”
Wingspan: 10.2 m
Wing area: 12.5 m²
Length: 4.7 m
Height: 1.8 m
Elevator area: 1.6 m²
Keel rudder area: 0.6 m²
Rudder surface area: 0.5 m²
Ailerons surface: 2.2 m²
Empty weight: 60 kg
Wing loading: 10 kg / m²
All Aero 