MiG-29 early artistic impressions

[JP Vieira]

The Mig-29, as with other Soviet aircraft, started its “career” in the west as artist impressions.
Here are 3 of those, of the early 80’s a time when (obviously) not much was know about this aircraft.
http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k1/JPVieira_2006/MiG-29C.jpg
http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k1/JPVieira_2006/Mig-29B.jpg
http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k1/JPVieira_2006/MiG-29A.jpg

Aircraft illustrations: copyright of Pilot Press Ltd & Salamander Books ltd

[Ruy Horta]

I have that illustration in a "Great ..." book, at the time the type was mostly unknown. It also featured a fuzzy picture of the Su 27. The type looks like a mix between MiG 25, F-5 and even a little YP-17 thrown in the mix.

[Pilot]

In that time only spy images of bad quality was available and long time this types are marked RAM, by the base Ramenskoye where they were first time spotted.

[Griffon]

if you look at the first profile though, the plain-view looks remarkably close to the actual Mig-29;

oh and to add this thingie: Ramenskoye is not related to any airbase, in fact, Ramenskoye is a village close to the Gromov flight test centre at Zhukovsky.
therefore, while the real name was not known, it was thought that the base is called Ramenskoye and so the planes spotted there were given RAM-x designations.
the same was true in WW2, when German planes first spotted at test centres like Rechlin for example were also similarly labelled.

cheers
phil