I hope you are not requiring me to know all the details of the intentionally confusing Soviet naming system. As long as you know which aircraft is meant I regard my name memory as successful.
Whatever the role of the aircraft originally was, it was obviously not necessary any more or at least was considered uneconomical compared to other solutions (Tu-22M with cruise missiles).
FBW for large and small aircraft is a different kettle of fish. And Sukhoi is Sukhoi, while Tupolev is Tupolev.
It’s just show that all your knowledge on T-4 is internet based. Soviet naming system may be confusing(sometimes), but that is for sure not intentionally. SOC pretty much give you the reasons behind cancellation of the program. I just gave you examples of previous testbeds for FBW system, and as you can see what was experimented on Su-7U was used to develop the FBW system of T-4.
Let’s look the other way around: If it was able to make M2.8 (or M3, doesn’t really make the difference) from the beginning, why wasn’t it demonstrated at least to get some measurements and validate the design? You cannot tell me that they purposely only tested to M1.3.
Again SOC explained that before my response.
Sukhoi was basically ordered to quit the T-4 for two reasons: 1) the far cheaper and less complicated (comparatively) Tu-22M was being pursued for the naval strike role instead, and 2) the MoD wanted Sukhoi to focus on the T-10, which was regarded as a very high priority.
If i remember correctly we had similar dispute before. I back up the opinion that Tupolev was behind the ending of the programme. His lie about modified Tu-22 was clever move to save his position as “master” of bombers. And i agree that if T-4 survived that surely was end of Tupolev supremacy. And i just wished that they continued with either M-18 or T-4MS. Here is the order to cancel all development and that all efforts must be concentrated on Tu-160 project.
And here on of the early design proposals, when Soviets didn’t know that Blackbird don’t have bomber role.
Fact is that the Russians realized – as the Americans – that a Mach 3 bomber is not worth the cost. They apparently realized that later, but I guess they continued the T-100 because it used technology that needed to be validated. The T-100 was apparently the first FBW aircraft of the Russians.
Likewise the Americans: they used the XB-70 to validate technology.
Note that Tupolev continued with work on the Tu-160, an aircraft that surely uses FBW-technology and I guess a Tupolev engineer would assure us the important role the T-1000 experience played for this program.
Real killer of T-4 is Tupolev with his child Tu-22M. And it’s apparent that you don’t know that T-4 role was aircraft carrier “killer”, not conventional bomber. Also there is no T-100, “Izdelie 100” was public name for T-4, and Sukhoi engineers chose it based on the planed aircraft weigh of 102 tons. That led to confusion and gave birth to T-100.
FBW was tested first on M-50 bomber, then on the test bed based Su-7U, related to T-4 programme.
Correct, but it didn’t. The T-4 that lifted off surely was unable to achieve Mach 3. Likewise the engines were probably not those designated for the high Mach testbed. therefore, there were still a few Rubel to spent. On paper many things work. But if it wasn’t tested, it doesn’t count.
So you can say that “surely” was unable, but you don’t know with what engines the testbed flew? In fact the goal was 2.8M. In the second part of the flight tests, when that speed was the target, in the first flight(10th with the previous) T-4 reached 1.36M. And here all stop, with the order to cancel the project.
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