Sturmovik in Peacetime- Antarctic Survey Spotter

[DeeBob]

I went to see my folks today, and as one so often does I found myself rooting around in the loft looking for some old books which I had no chance of finding, but I did find this:
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A charming little kit I have no recollection whatsoever of purchasing! Opening the box we see the following selection:
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With no sign of the PE sprue, which I can't say I'm distraught about as I probably would have omitted it anyway.

An evening of fettling later, we see most of an aeroplane:
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It went together pretty well, the only real issue was getting the fuselage halves to mate around the scoop(?) at the front. It was nothing some gentle shaving and sanding couldn't fix, though.

I went for a colour sort of like post-war soviet cockpit blue with a red fuel tank to add some colour, and because I envision this being some sort of post-war civil (or at least, not military) aircraft. Probably going to end up in Antarctic survey orange when all is said and done, unless I think of a more compelling backstory for a sturmovik on skis in peacetime.

[NARSES2]

I like the idea of seeing that in post War civil service 

[DeeBob]

The IL-2 has been progressing, bit by bit. The fit has been tricky and required a lot of sanding to get parts to fit, but most of the plane is together and looking like a plane!

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Bearing in mind that I wanted this to be some sort of Antarctic survey aircraft, I drilled a great big hole for a camera in the fuselage. I'd imagine that the expedition crew would establish a base of operations with a rudimentary airstrip serviced by An-2s and Li-2s (lotta twos going on round here) bringing people and supplies in and out, from which the il-2 would conduct photoreconnaissance flights deeper into the ice to gather images of potential expeditionary routes. I also scribed some rudimentary panel lines around the hole- they're not square, but I'll say that due to the logistical difficulty of doing anything in the Antarctic, the camera equipment and the airframe arrived at the base at different times and the modification was done in the field. And maybe they had to rework some stringers in this area to fit the camera and the panel lines follow them. Or maybe it was done by an abstract expressionist.

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In one of those rare happy accidents, with no forward planning, the hole I drilled neatly fits the round bits of clear sprue! So I have a camera lens, even with a nice convex appearance. (Naturally I'll trim it down a bit!)

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[jcf]

Pre-WWII Polar Aviation aircraft were mostly in an orange and blue scheme, occasionally overall orange. Early post-war were generally overall orange i.e. Pe-8 and FW 200, later overall red was used along with, once again, orange and blue, but it was a different shade of blue. All of the aircraft used at both poles bore civil registration, CCCP-, the individual aircraft numbering scheme varying over time.

Here's a relatively complete list of the aircraft used at both poles, it's
alphabetical by type:
Soviet Polar Aviation aircraft list PDF

In the "real world" the 1st SAE didn't occur until 1956. 

[DeeBob]

Pre-WWII Polar Aviation aircraft were mostly in an orange and blue scheme, occasionally overall orange. Early post-war were generally overall orange i.e. Pe-8 and FW 200, later overall red was used along with, once again, orange and blue, but it was a different shade of blue. All of the aircraft used at both poles bore civil registration, CCCP-, the individual aircraft numbering scheme varying over time.

Here's a relatively complete list of the aircraft used at both poles, it's
alphabetical by type:
Soviet Polar Aviation aircraft list PDF

In the "real world" the 1st SAE didn't occur until 1956.

Jcf you consistently have information and insight so vast that "encyclopedic" doesn't do it justice! Thank you for a wonderful resource.

[jcf]

You're welcome.
The subject of Polar Aviation paint schemes has come up a few times over the years on Wings of Peace (Interwar civil aviation from the Armistice up to Pearl Harbor) an old-school email based discussion group, it's been around for a long time. In relation to the period, of course, but as usual with an esoteric subject that covers a longer period of time, overlap isn't a problem.

The depth and breadth of knowledge of the group membership is amazing. Aussie aviation illustrator Juanita Franzi is a member and regularly posts her work for feedback, before publication, she also makes requests for aid in research to ensure she gets it as right as she can, requests that the group answers as well as they probably ever could be.

[su27rules]