Sovietwarplanes

Hi,
here is colorized photo of the belly landed Il-2 single seater:

(http://i1063.photobucket.com/albums/t518/66misos/Il-2%20zostreleny/141121_Il-2bellylanded_A5_01web_zpsf2af048c.jpg)

Whole discussion with source photo is at http://sovietwarplanes.com/board/index.php?topic=1910.0 (http://sovietwarplanes.com/board/index.php?topic=1910.0)

Regards,
   66misos

Beautiful work, 66misos!

Regards,

Jason

That looks great, keep up the good work

Cheers

Dennis

Hi Misos,
This looks really good!  Except that the colour of the uniforms is too bluish - IMHO, what you have is exactly the color of WWI Austro-Hungarian uniforms.  ;)
WWII German Army uniforms were "Feldgrau" gray-green.  From what I remember (in movies, museums etc) it's more green than gray.

You may mention in the text that the plane was probably camouflaged in factory (probably Zavod 381, Jason could confirm this???), ShVak canons next to necelles are also interesting/unusual.

This 1941 Il-2 was an easy job, we have a real challenge for you now:  Stepanyan's "sverhrazrisovani" Il-2...  Could you help there???

Regards,
KL

Konstantin, this could be from Zavod 381, although it has the wooden rear fuselage and some sources state that Zavod 381 only made Il-2's with the metal rear fuselages. I personally doubt this, but if so, it wouldn't be from Z.381. Z.18 is the best bet, since it produced the most Il-2's in 1941 (1,510). Z.381 only produced a handful in 1941 (25 or so). Regarding the ShVAK cannons inboard of the ShKAS, this was the initial installation for the Il-2's offensive armament. I've never seen the VYa-23's mounted like this, although I've seen quite a few photographs of ShVAK's in the VYa-23-type fairings.

Regards,

Jason

Hi Jason,
I agree. Should it be of Z.381, it should be likely of 1942 when the most part of them was produced. This doesn't fit with the light armour of the canopy, though. It is a possibility, but not the most likely one.
Where did you find that Z.381 made some metal rear fuselages?
This type of wing (defined type 1941 in my page) was utilized by Z.18 till, I think, to October 1941.
Regards
Massimo

Hi,
I've received a mail from Vitaliy with a collection of photos from ebay of this plane and the note:
Regards
Massimo

Massimo, regarding Z.381 building Il-2's with metal fuselages, that showed up in a couple of sources for my book when I was researching it. To be honest, I don't remember which sources now, but as I said, I'm doubtful of this as I've seen photographs of aircraft stating they're from Z.381 but which clearly have the wooden rear fuselage. I believe the metal-fuselaged Il-2's were all early single-seaters which were built by Z.18 in 1941.

Regards,

Jason

Hi Misos,
look at this one!
(http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/images/1downed.jpg)
Regards
Massimo

That's a very early single-seater - notice that it still has the glass armour directly behind the pilot, instead of the steel armour with the small glass cutouts. The rear fuselage definitely looks wooden.

Regards,

Jason

Hi Jason,
yes, it's the same plane of other photos. Now we know its bort number.
I don't know which color, could be yellow or blue.
Thanks to Vitaliy for the image.
Regards
Massimo

Hi,
thanks all for comments and inputs.  ;D

KL, those uniforms are de-saturated dark green, there is no blue added. I made them according to tons of pictures found at internet. Yellowish-brownish -greenish background makes them opticaly faded to blue. Plus, original image in my comp is 16-bit RGB displayed on HP Trucolor monitor. However, final jpg is only 8-bit resulting to the loss of some halfones. So yes, you can see on the final image something different from what I see on my monitor.

Massimo, IMHO last picture is not the same plane as colorized one. Different level/ type of damage could be a matter of time. But in front of right wing of colorized plane is a slope, but there are horses on the last bw photo above. Plus upper propeller blade on the colorized photo directs to "12" while on the bw photo above to "1" o'clock.

In the meantime I started to colorize white/silver P-400 in winter Vaenga. But seems that Stepanyan's Il-2 generates a lot of interest, so (probably) I will change my subject.  ;)

Regards,
     66misos