[Milsurplus] [ARC5] Addenndum: TU-4 vs. B-29 Radio Sets

[Glen Zook]

There is a cable television program on the Soviet copying the B-29 as the TU-4.  First of all, they were able to get 3-basically complete B-29 units, all of which landed at Soviet bases.  There were other B-29s that crashed.

Stalin was so demanding that the B-29 be copied exactly, that on the first several TU-4 units produced actually had Boeing on the control pedals for the rudder controls.  Andre Tupolev had been imprisoned by Stalin and he was very aware of Stalin's punishments for deviating at all from any of his (Stalin's) directives, that every detail of the B-29 was copied in the early TU-4 aircraft.  As production increased, then those things like the Boeing name were eliminated.
 
Glen, K9STH


Website:  http://k9sth.com


________________________________
 From: Mike Morrow <kk5f at earthlink.net>
To: arc5 at mailman.qth.net; milsurplus at mailman.qth.net 
Sent: Wednesday, November 28, 2012 11:04 AM
Subject: Re: [Milsurplus] [ARC5] Addenndum:  TU-4 vs. B-29 Radio Sets
 
> There are stories of how even repair patches to cover battle damage on the
> impounded B-29s were copied... as well as the interior paint job.  Seems the
> factory had run out of green chromate primer, and painted part of the inside
> of one B-29 with white lead.  Supposedly the insides of Tu-4s were 
> green-and-white, as a result.
>
> My source is a book titled "Soviet Superfortress" which can be found on amazon.

Yes, those stories have been around forever.  I don't believe a bit of it.  The
Soviets were not stupid, regardless of the desire of many in the USA to believe
that mythology.