Drawing by Tapani Tuomanen

Two R-5 aircraft of 669 AP, on transmission flight to Tampere, made a forced landing at Ontajärvi, East Carelia on Jan.19, 1942.

The following morning, the planes were surprised by some Finnish Fokker D-XXI; another R-5 aircraft was destroyed during an attempt to take off .

Red 2 was captured by Finns with marginal damages. The crew of Red 2 consisted of the regiment C.O Maj. P.Pudan and Capt. Kuzmenko.

Finns obliterated the red stars and painted yellow Eastern front markings on the place, but not their national insignia.

The plane was coded VR-1 by Finnsh, but this code was never painted, as Finnish mational markings; none of 18 captured R-5s became operative in FAF, because they were considered as obsolete.

Some comments on the images: they depict Red 2, an R-5 adapted to the role of ground attack plane. It is equipped with:

• two PV-1 machine guns contained into a metallic fairing on the upper surface of each lower wing;
• four bomb racks under each wing as usual R-5s;
• a turret armed with a ShKAS; it was not the same installation of R-Z, but characterized by a protruding curved ammo box just behind the right side of the back of the gunner, and connected to the gun by an half-moon nearly horizontal flexible ammo guide;
• ski gear;
• it seems that, before the Finns obliterated the Soviet marks and painted their yellow bands, it was painted according to a prewar standard, with dark green upper and side surfaces, light blue (or blue-grey?) undersurfaces and wing struts, bare metal engine cowling, red stars on the fuselage sides and wing upper and undersurfaces; nothing suggests that the Soviet prewar markings were updated to wartime ones.

Here are some details of the turret: it was a ring with two fixed supports for the ShKAS machine gun; the nearly vertical supports end with wide rings that allowed to hinge the gun ; the ammo rail and waste shells duct seem passing inside these rings. A curved ammo box protrudes behind the gunner, and is connected to the wide gun hinge by a flexible guide with a slot on its upper face that let see the ammo nail.

The last image of the four below shows a vaguely similar turret, but wthout the protruding ammo box, that was probably put inside the fuselage.

Some images of the guns fairings above the lower wings, installed on Red 02 and other similar planes.

The second image is of red 02, but the shape of the fairing was put in evidence on the image.

The first and third images below show a VAP phosporus device installed under the wings; these incendiary devices were utilized against Finns in the Winter War.

The PV-1 was the air cooled version of the Maxim, and had a manifold around the barrel that gives the 'thick' look evident on photos.

On the photo below, the weapon is shown from above.

References:

Red Stars of Geust, Keskinen, Stenman;
ALBATROSISTA PILATUKSEEN of Timo Heinonen & Hannu Valtonen;
Armada R-5 of Maslov .