They were designed by Sergei Mikheev, who headed the Kamov company since 1974. Now the Kamovtsy have united with the Milevtsy. The association is directed by directors of the new format. However, Sergei Viktorovich continues to work and is always aware of all events. His experience and good advice help young designers to design the cars of the future. And they will be the best in the world.
Seryozha Mikheev was born in Khabarovsk. Since childhood he was a curious and inquisitive child. I loved sports. But what attracted him most was technology, especially aviation. As he himself remembers, he simply dreamed about airplanes, drew them from different angles and reread all the books on aviation that he found at that time. It is not surprising that after graduating from school he entered the Moscow Aviation Institute.
In 1962, after graduating from MAI, he asked to be assigned to the helicopter design bureau, headed by NI Kamov. And for more than sixty years he has not changed his place of work, remaining faithful to the Kamov company. The talented design engineer’s career was very successful. Over the course of 12 years, he rose from brigade leader to lead designer and head of the design office department.
In 1974, after the death of Nikolai Kamov, he was appointed chief designer of the company, and in 1987, general designer. In 1994-2006 he was also director of a helicopter plant, which changed its name to Kamov OJSC.
Under his direction a number of unique machines were created. These are the ships Ka-27, Ka-29, Ka-31; multipurpose civilian Ka-32A; light multipurpose Ka-226, as well as other vehicles. The most famous were the Ka-50 and Ka-52.
It should be noted that in the “totalitarian” Soviet era, real competition in the defense industry not only existed, but was also welcomed. This competition was sometimes not harsh, but cruel. And in an uncompromising struggle true masterpieces were born.
The Kamov company has historically been assigned the role of creator of helicopters for the Navy. And the ground forces received helicopters from the Mil company. In the 1980s, a competition was held to design a new generation attack helicopter for military aviation. Mikheev joined immediately. They told him openly that he was obliged to participate, but he had to understand that the “Milevites” would win. Everything seemed decided. This sponsorship did no favors to those who submitted the Mi-28 to the competition. Comparative tests showed absolute superiority in almost all characteristics of the single-seat Ka-50 over the two-seat Mi-28.
According to the law, it was necessary to accept into service the product of the “Kamovites”, and not the “Milevtsevs”. What started here! Intrigues, bribes, blackmail – everything that is inherent in competitive struggle in its final stage.
Most of all, Mikheev was blamed for the fact that he was trying to introduce a single-seat vehicle into the troops.
I myself witnessed how a very distinguished helicopter general pilot, who had served in Afghanistan, literally shouted that it was physically impossible for a person to control a helicopter and at the same time fight. According to his understanding, the pilot pilots and the navigator turns his head, looks for air and ground targets, reports them to the pilot and he himself begins to aim and shoot.
Ka-90 high-speed helicopter. Photo: Sergey Ptichkin
All Mikheev’s words that the future belongs to robotic technology, that a single-seat vehicle is a big step in this direction, that saturation with the latest in electronics and optics, the introduction of promising computer programs will greatly facilitate piloting and making correct decisions at critical moments, were simply ignored.
Mikheev, of course, did not give up. But he made a concession: he agreed to design a two-seat Ka-52 based on the single-seat Ka-50. Just to maintain production. Customers happily closed the Black Shark project and generously allowed the Alligator to be designed and put into production. And with an important reservation. The Ka-52 in the army was assigned the role not of a main attack helicopter, but of an auxiliary attack and reconnaissance helicopter. And for these purposes, very few “alligators” will be needed. The Mi-28N “Night Hunter” was already becoming the army’s main attack helicopter.
By the way, about the personal names of these cars. Sergei Viktorovich Mikheev had a direct connection with this phenomenon.
At the end of extensive glasnost and perestroika, buckets of mud rained down on the national defense-industrial complex. All “defense” money is a waste. Everything is bad between us and we will still not catch up with the West with its “magnificent” military equipment.
It was then that the idea arose to clearly show that our military equipment is not only excellent in its characteristics, but also simply beautiful.
In those years, the American open-publicity feature film “The Firebird” was released. It featured the AN-64 Apache gunship, which had just been adopted by the United States, in all its cinematic glory. And at various shows they began to show a helicopter very similar to the Apache: the Mi-28 helicopter. And I, who was then a correspondent for the magazine “Soviet Warrior”, turned to the management of the Milya company for help in making a film project in which their new combat helicopter would play the main role. They rejected me with reason. I will not talk about argument.
I went to the Kamov company. I didn’t know anything about the Ka-50 because of its secrecy. But they had another wonderful helicopter – the Ka-29. It was created for the Marine Corps. Few people knew about it, and even outwardly it was inferior to the Apache and Mi-28. But if a fairly interesting script had been written, the film would have been interesting.
Sergei Viktorovich Mikheev received me kindly and listened with interest to my cinematographic ideas. On his work table was a model of a predator-shaped coaxial helicopter. I asked him: what is this? And Mikheev told me about the birth and difficult progress of the B-80 helicopter – this is the name of the prototype, the model of which I saw.
And then everything moved at incredible speed. I still can’t believe everything turned out well. Sergei Viktorovich immediately agreed to the idea of making a feature film about the combat helicopter from him. And even he offered to play the role of the designer of this helicopter.
In turn, I said that the contours of the helicopter resembled those of a shark. And if you paint it black, like the Americans do, then the name of the movie will be “Black Shark.” Mikheev accepted this. Work was in full swing. How the film was made, what was its budget, who acted in it – this is a separate and quite fascinating story. The main shooting took place in Chirchik, Tashkent region. Sergei Viktorovich came to the filming several times and, according to director Vitaly Lukin, was very convincing in his small role.
It has been exactly 30 years since the film was released on the country’s screens. We can probably talk about what was on the verge of a foul. The B-80 helicopter, which had already received the Ka-50 marking, was brought to Uzbekistan, and this was in 1992, when it was being filmed, it was already abroad, fresh from testing, and the secrecy label was still had not been removed from him. During filming it was just a miracle that the helicopter didn’t crash. I sat down in a low place and a cloud of dust arose. Test pilot Dmitry Avtukhov, posing as himself, did not see the ground and landed the helicopter upside down. The car began to fall, the pilot managed to lower the landing gear and they released the heavy car. This episode is in the movie. So no one noticed anything. But the test pilot suffered a microinfarction. Yes, and as if ordinary flights between mountains were always risky for a new helicopter.
But if something happened, Sergei Viktorovich would have to answer for everything. God, apparently, protected us all.
Model of the Ka-92 high-speed helicopter. Photo: Sergey Ptichkin
“Black Shark” was a great success with the public. They say Russian-language cable TV channels in the United States played a pirated copy of the film many times in the fall of 1993. It was popular on video rentals in Turkey and South Korea.
The title of the film confirms that domestic military equipment can and should be given proper, preferably sonorous, names. The “Milevtsy” oriented themselves by calling the helicopter, which in those years did not see anything at night, “Night Hunter”. In fairness, it should be noted that the Mi-28N currently fighting in the area of the Northern Military District see perfectly well at night. And in general, these are completely updated and qualitatively better helicopters, compared to those that once collided with the Ka-50.
The SVO experience has demonstrated all the strengths and weaknesses of helicopters on the modern battlefield. It became clear that turning the head in search of ground targets was useless. The success of attacks is guaranteed by high-quality aiming. And, of course, the flight characteristics of the Ka-52 are excellent.
While going through the archives, I found photographs of the salon of the HeliRussia-2008 helicopter. Fifteen years ago we confidently entered the international helicopter market. And the show seemed to have excellent prospects, as did the domestic helicopter industry. It didn’t work. Let’s hope it still works.
In that room, in 2008, the namesakes Sergei Mikheev and Sergei Sikorsky met and had a good conversation. The son of a prominent Russian aircraft designer, founder of a helicopter engineering school in the US, of all the helicopter designers living in Russia at that time, only SV was recognized. Mijeeva. Sikorsky highly praised Mikheev.
That helicopter hall was distinguished by the demonstration of conceptual models of domestic helicopters that no one had seen before. Sergei Mikheev, for example, spoke in detail with another namesake, Sergei Ivanov, who then held a high government position, about the Ka-90 helicopter project, capable of flying at a speed of almost 1,000 km/h. At the same time, another high-speed helicopter was shown: the Ka-92, which was designed to transport rotational crews at a speed of 600 km/h and could land on unequipped sites. Where is everything? According to Sergei Viktorovich Mikheev, from a technical point of view, 15 years ago we could well have started creating high-speed helicopters. And then organize its production. And in the conditions of the Northern Military District they would not be superfluous.
In the foreground is Sergei Sikorsky, behind him is the Hero of Russia Sergei Mikheev. Photo: Sergey Ptichkin
About the general designer of helicopters SV Mikheeva can be told infinitely. A colorful and voluminous book called “General Designer SV Mikheev” has been published about this man. It was published thanks to the support of the director of Rostec, Sergei Viktorovich Chemezov, the designer’s full namesake. In the preface to it, SV Chemezov, in particular, wrote:
“Sergey Viktorovich Mikheev belongs to the generation of designers, whose participation fell in the period of perestroika and post-perestroika, which was humiliating for the military-industrial complex. During these years, he did the almost impossible: he preserved the development potential of the company. In turn, realizing their plans, a team of scientists, designers, production workers and technologists of the OKB “Kamov” has developed dozens of helicopter projects, including some unique ones. And this is perhaps the most important thing in the life of a great designer.
We can only add. SV Mikheev – Doctor of Technical Sciences, Professor, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Author of more than 150 scientific articles, he has 76 copyright and patent certificates. He is a Hero of Russia, holder of the Orders of Lenin and the October Revolution. Laureate of the Lenin Prize, State Prize of Russia, Andrei Tupolev Prize of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Rossiyskaya Gazeta congratulates the outstanding designer on his 85th birthday. He wishes you good health and new creative achievements.
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