Hello,
until today, according to this piece of I-16 KL shows me,
I thought the underside blue between 1927 and 1937 could be a quite dark blue, andn so did I paint my I-15 and the I-16 type 5 I'm doing:
Today, a russian friend of mine , Alex Gorodnichev, who often take part in my french modeler forum "master194", gave ue today very important elements.
I wrote as I thought, that ther was no rest of plane of that period who shows how could the blue color been.
Well, I was wrong.
in 1933 USSR did try with stratosferic balloons to reach the world record of altitude...
the original baloon is in the museum of aviation in Monino Rusia, but it have been repaint without any care, is the star show it...
Fout were builted. Between them , one , the fourth never flew and was used for propaganda in expositions...
He was finally offered to the FAI (international aeronautic federation) and ended in the "mus?e de l'aviation et de l'espace" of Paris....
Why told you all that?
Because as it's rotten in the sphere, it was build in 1933 in the 28 factory, the same where were builted the policarpov planes (R-1, R-5 and first I-16 type 5)
So this pale blue was surely the same it was used on metallic plane pieces....
well, here are the pics:
the ballon was first in the reserve:
here are better pics:
The ballon stands now in the space hall in the Bourget museum:
the hall is quite dark , so the blue seems deeper, I think the pics above are better...
it seems to me an important discover Alex did, what do you think ?
Xan