Yak-33 Medium Bomber

At the beginning of the 1960s DB-115 carried out design of a family supersonic VTOL aircraft for various purposes, under the general designation Yak-33. With a virtually completely unified airframe, the family included bomber, interceptor, reconnaissance. Several aerodynamic layout schemes of the bomber project implementation were proposed: a plane with a delta wing and classical empennage; a VTOL aircraft scheme with a tailless delta wing and two boosters, arranged in the tail of the fuselage, with six lifting jet placed between the air intake channels; a VTOL aircraft in a "canard" with a delta wing with two lifting engines in nacelles, fixed to the tip of the wing consoles and six lift engines: four pairs in the external motor gondolas, two in the fuselage behind the cockpit. The aircraft was optimized for low-level flights, fabricated of steel, and titanium. The type of main engines was presumably RD36-41 and its modifications under the version of the device changes the thrust vector, the type of lift engines, was apparently RD36-35 or RD36-38. Armament was one rocket - X-22 or X-30. The crew was 2 people: the pilot and navigator.

Three companies responded to the call for tender launched in spring 1962 with the Tupolev Tu-135 Yakovlev Yak-33 with the Sukhoi and the T-4. The primary role of the unit was to be the destruction of aircraft carriers and other major units of US Navy and strategic missile silos based on land. It should also be suitable for reconnaisance missions. The specifications were made by the GosNIIAS. The bomber was able carried two air-ground missiles with a range of 500 km. Its maximum speed was expected to reach Mach 3.0 cruising speed Mach 2.8, and was to be able to travel 6000 km without refueling.

The Yak-33 was too small and did not meet the specifications, was quickly dismissed. The Tu-135, made of aluminum, was designed for a maximum speed of Mach 2.35. That left only the T-4, with its steel structure and titanium alloy, was built for trisonic speed.