Experimental aircraft: canards of war, aviation oddities, and engineering marvels, from Germany’s Focke-Wulf F 19 to the Curtiss XP-55 Ascender.First flown in 1927, the experimental Focke-Wulf F 19 “Ente” (duck) was more successful. Two examples were built, and one of them continued flying until 1931.Immediately before and during World War II, several experimental canard fighters were flown, including the Ambrosini SS.4, Curtiss-Wright XP-55 Ascender, and Kyūshū J7W1 Shinden. These were attempts at using the canard configuration to give advantages in areas such as performance, armament disposition, or pilot view. Ultimately, no production aircraft were completed. The Shinden was ordered into production “off the drawing board”[clarification needed], but only prototypes had flown when the war ended.In 1945, in Europe, what may have been the first canard designed and flown in the Soviet Union appeared as a test aircraft, the experimental Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-8 Utka (Russian for “duck”), a lightweight propeller aircraft. It was noted for its docile, slow-speed handling characteristics[citation needed]. It flew for years and was used as a testbed while developing the swept wing of the (conventional layout) MiG-15 jet fighter.
