The Moskalyev SAM-7 Sigma was a one-off, Soviet, experimental tailless fighter aircraft.

As early as 1933, Aleksandr Moskalyev was designing a rocket-powered, tailless aircraft with an ogival or gothic delta wing, wingtip fins and rudders, which would be able to fly faster than sound. Because no sufficiently powerful engines were available at the time, the Moskalyev SAM-4 Sigma never left the drawing board but it did lead to two interim types, the SAM-7 Sigma and SAM-9 Strela.

The all-metal Sigma was intended to investigate the manoeuvrability and field of fire of a two seat, tailless, wingtip finned fighter aircraft, using a less radical low aspect ratio, trapezoidal plan wing. This low wing had two spars and trailing edges carrying inboard elevators and outboard ailerons. The fins bore balanced rudders; six Soviet diagrams show different profiles and no photographs of the completed Sigma are known.

#plane #airplane #Military