Hi,
there is a new article of Him on the colors of polar aviation.
http://www.redbanner.co.uk/History/Aviaarktika/Arctic_Colouration.htmlHe writes that their usual color before and briefly after the war was yellow... who knows?
This is a recent example.
Interestingly, we have a surviving ANT-4, allegedly from Aviaarktika service, allegedly SSSR N-317. There is no doubt that the livery it wears now is not original; by no means. This scheme looks like it dates from the 1980s, or thereabouts; it does not demonstrate any kind of surface that would be 80+ years old and exposed to the elements. The grey-blue trim is not overly convincing, and when new it was likely this kind of ubiquitous blue shade seen everywhere on every kind of vehicle in USSR days. The yellow paint, however, does at least seem to harken back to an authentic memory of its original appearance. Certainly, had the restorers seen a bright red-orange species of faded paint when they undertook this work, they would have replicated that in some form? One would at least think so; and recall that at the time, actual in-use paint of this type would have been available to them.
I think to remember a walkaround of that plane with photos of the old chipping paint under the wings, and I remember it as orange.
Here is one that I found on Google:
https://abpic.co.uk/pictures/model/Tupolev%20ANT-4I think that orange paints fades up to yellow; the medium blue visible on some photos seems a light brey-blue in the one that he has taken.
Yes it was not the original paint but a restoration, but what it proves is that orange paint can turn to yellow with the age.
Massimo
