Russian Tu-95 bomber "The bear"

Other Wars Cold War
#1

Defiantly one of the best bombers of the cold war. This bomber was massive.

Here is some good info on the bomber

http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/bomber/tu-95.htm

Although a good bomber ( Looks alot like the B-52 in my opinion) had a major drawback. Its loudness. I heard first noticed by the Russians and soon after by Nato submarines.

From wikipedia: The Tupolev 95 is one of the noisiest aircraft in the world. It is so loud that submarine crews could detect it during dives, picking up the clear signature of the plane’s eight contra-propellers. This hampered the plane’s utility in maritime patrol. During the Cold War, U.S. fighter pilots photographing Tu-95s in flight found them extraordinarily loud, even though these fighter pilots were in pressurised compartments and wearing head gear. The intercept pilots found the Bear to be uncomfortably loud and today, there are many hearing impaired former Tu-95 crewmembers in Russia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tupolev_Tu-95

#2

The fastest propellen driven multiengined aircraft of world. :rolleyes:

A tipical image of the cold war , NATO fighter escorting Tu-95.

Rear turret (NR-23 guns removed)

#3

And she was a beautiful aircraft…

#4

Well Gen actually it was damn loud.
the reason was the the superpower turbo-engines NK-12

This is the MOST power engine in the world ( untill the nowadays)
it was able to pick up over 15 000 horces in the forsage regime.
This engine had a useful effectiveness about 94% - the absolut recourd for that class of engines.
As the resault inspite of devils power this engine had a good economy of fuel in the basic regime of fly.
Also the resource of engine was a very good ( about 5000 hours)

The Tu-95 with 50 mega tonns(!!!) hydrogen bomb befor the testing in the island of “New land” in the 1961.

#5

Hay gyust the two of Bears recently visited the US naval base in Huam island;)
After ht emeeting with US fighters the crews greeted them and turned back.
They were roughtly on the distance 500 km from the base - enought to get fire with the tactical wings-rocket;)

#6

Nothing new Chevan, according to http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/russia/tu-95.htm

In late June 1999, two TU-95 Bear bombers flew within striking distance of the United States as part of Moscow’s largest military exercise since the end of the Cold War. The bombers were intercepted by four US F-15 fighters and a P-3 patrol plane near Iceland and escorted in a clockwise flight around the island. The Bears, and two Blackjacks, were from the Donbass Red Banner 22nd heavy bomber division based at Engels Air Base east of Moscow. They initially flew across the central Norwegian Sea. When they got about halfway across, the Blackjacks split off from the Bears and flew along the Norwegian coastline.

On 16 September 1999, a pair of Russian Tu-95 Bear bombers were detected by the US Air Force headed toward the Alaska coast. U.S. fighter jets were sent to intercept the aircraft which had been caught on radar. Air Force officials said both bombers turned before crossing into US airspace and about 90 miles from the approaching fighters. The Soviet Union regularly tested U.S. air defenses by flying toward Alaska during the Cold War, but this was the first time the Air Force had documented such a test as happening since March 1993.

#7

Our boys will stop those nasty Bears…

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/09/07/nraf107.xml

#8

Just tell the boys to be carefull out there
or they may end up like on the picture:

#9

I seem to recall hearing that the turboprops for the Tu-95 were based on the Jumo 022 turboprop engines the Germans were developing.

#10

Well actually the first soviet turbojet engine was based on the Germans Jumo 22.
The first post war soviet strategic bomber Ty-4 had a TV-2F engin ( the more power design of the Jumo 22). In the 1950 the first Ty-4 with Tv-2f was ready to fly.
However when the Ty 95 was projected it was clear that Tv-2 is too weak for this aircraft.
Thus was developed the TV-12 : the couple of Tv-2 was connected via the special reducer ( the most complex part of engine).
The new ebgin has got the Dual-propeller and power over 12 000 h.It was a absolute world record for the such kind of the engines
Later in the 1951 the TV-12 was renamed into the NK-12 engine.