Hi
Were the Pe2 and Tupolev twin engined medium both used for ground attack and medium alt bombing? I suspect the Tupolev wasn't but if anyone can confirm that it'd be great.
Also, what altitudes did they operate at for level bombing - about 3000m sound right to you? I guess it depended on the situation but if anyone knows more I'd like to hear it.
Some Pe-2s sported rocket rails under wings outside engines. Besides level and dive bombers they were used as a sturmoviks too.
Tu-2 however wasn't (to my knowledge), and was used only as a daylight level bomber. There were tests done with the Tu-2 (=Sh for Shturmovik), with whole lot PPSh submachineguns in a bombbay for strafing infantry, but only a few were built.
The Pe-2 and Tu-2 were primarily used as medium-alt level bombers even though the Pe-2 was designed to act as a dive bomber as well.
But dive bombing tactics were not well understood and was deemed too dangerous to do in the Pe-2. One pilot, a commander of a bomber division, I think, in 1943(?) decided to dive bomb (against orders!) and found it was far more accurate. After a few months more pilots used dive bombing, but most of the time it was just level bombing that went on.
The Tu-2 was considered to be better than the Pe-2 as it had a greater range and much greater maximum payload, but it came into production after the factories were already tooled for the Pe-2, and the Tu-2 was much more complicated to build, so priority was given to the Pe-2 production.
I think you're confusing the TB-3 for the Tu-2 here. The TB-3 is the one that has the parasite I-16s. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>Originally posted by Tooz_69GIAP:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by M_Gunz:
Of course the Tu is the one that can carry its own long-range pin-point attack smart munitions system, aka I-16s with bombs....
I should know this. I've shot both kinds down before.