R-3 LD ( TUPOLEW ANT-3)

The Tupolew ANT-3 / R-3 was a Soviet reconnaissance biplane plane from the interwar period. The prototype flight took place in August 1925. Serial production was carried out in the years 1926-1929. About 100 aircraft of this type were built in its course. In the R-3LD version, the drive was provided by a single Lorraine-Dietrich 12Eb engine with 450 HP. The machine did not have a permanent on-board armament. The ANT-3 aircraft was the third consecutive project of the well-known air designer Andrei Tupolev. At the same time, it was a very important structure in the history of Soviet aviation, because it was the first plane, almost entirely made of metal, which was not the rule in mass-produced machines at the end of the 1920s. Although the plane turned out to be successful, it was not manufactured - by USSR standards - on a large scale due to the high cost of production. Despite this, several versions were created, including: Tupolev R-3 (version with Mikulin engine), R-3LD (version with Lorraine-Dietrich engine) or PS-3 (version adapted for civil use and used by Aeroflot) .