Crashed Il-2 Sturmovik radio

[Marcel Banziger]

Hereby I wanna show my radio supposedly taken from a crashed Il-2 Sturmovik, crashed near Gdanks in march 1945, also shown in the aviation section of this forum. I usually don't collect relics but this one I couldn't pass on. I've been doing some research but couldn't confirm it is indeed a radio used in the Il-2 Sturmovik. I know however for a fact it is used in Soviet military airplanes from 1937 'till 1959 and because of the specifications I know it is an early wartime radio. Unfortunately though the date tag is missing since this is usually on the left side of the radio, which here is completely missing due to the impact of the crash.

First pic is how the radio is supposed to look like in good condition (taken from the Russian website (click on the pic there for more pics): Армейский радиоприемник УС)



One can clearly see the impact the crash had on this radio and the metal container is completely deformed. Still there are plenty of parts that clearly identify this radio as the above shown army radio receiver:









My questions now are, since I am not familiar with research to downed aircraft, does anyone know of a dug up Il-2 near Gdansk fom the last few years and second, did the Il-2 indeed also carry this specific radio? I am aware of the typical Il-2 Sturmovik square РСИ-4 and later on РСИ-6 transmitter/receiver. I however can't find if mine was also used on board.

Thanks a lot for looking and any help in the right direction!
All the best,
Marcel

[Marinecollector42]

In 2013 near Gdańsk were recovered leftovers of a downed Il- shot down in March 1945. However deffinitely a lot more Il’s were shot down or crushed due to engine failures during combat in this area. There’s just a small percentage of official and legal recoveries, a lot is illegal. Especially if these diggers had a plan to sell relics abroad there would be no info on local metaldetecting forums. I think that in case of shot down planes the only way to research is to have a serial number of some important part and find documents tracing it to right plane.

[Marcel Banziger]

Thanks a lot for the info, much appreciated!
I got my relic radio from the website Relics from the front: Relics from the Front
So an Il-2 indeed recovered near Gdanks and indeed shot down in March 1945 makes it a quite reliable source. Do you perhaps have pics or any other info from the dig? Maybe newspaper report or something like that? Would be great if I can manage to tie all loose ends to a knot and get the story complete behind this radio (if possible at all due to more planes being shot down in the same area - it is at least worth a shot to try and get the info complete ).

[Marinecollector42]

I’ll try. There were some pics from that dig, however this was carried by a recovery association under archeological control so I doubt that something could “vanish” from that dig. Eventually someone could recover it after the recover was over. It definitely laid in a wet ground on deep where clay preserves metal things. That would be a trace after we’ll see the photographs from that dig.

[Marcel Banziger]

It happens more often yes that after an 'official' archeological dig private diggers come to see if there's stuff left behind or overlooked. The radio I have is very well preserved. No rust at all. Just traces of a heavy impact from the crash.
And thanks for trying to find info. I appreciate that a lot!

[Egorka]

From what I gather, this what you have is remains of УС-1 (US-1 with Latin letters).
This was a RECEIVER module of a radio station RSB radio station. I.e. it is not the whole radio station, which also had a transmitter module and power supply module. RSBs were quite bulky and were used on heavy bombers and ground.
As I know RSBs were not used on IL-2, which rather utilised РСИ (RSI) radio station.
RSI complex had its own receiver and transmitter modules, which looked differently from the one depicted here.
So, in my opinion, this device can not be assosiated to an IL-2.

[Marinecollector42]

So maybe Petlakov PE-2? Deffinitely some of these bombers were also shot down during Pomeranian offensive, and for this plane we should search for.

[Egorka]

RSB was also used on other bombers than Pe-2: on SB, Pe-2, Pe-8, Li-2, Il-4, Er-2.
RSB weight was app. 47kg. RSI had less than half of that.

[Marcel Banziger]

Thank you guys for helping me out in the right direction. Because of my own research I figured out it couldn't be an Il-2 because of the other used radio receiver/transmitter system. But it is good to see that confirmed. The question that remains is: which plane could it be?

So this is the complete module, including transmitter and power supply as seen below? If yes, than it is definitely belonging to a heavy bomber because it is just too bulky to be put in any other plane I guess. A Pe-2 was still too small I would assume?

[Marinecollector42]

For sure, in the area of Gdańsk were used Pe-2s and Il-4s. Not only in 1945 but also during earlier bombardments by Soviet airforce, including largest Soviet bombardment in 1943. For sure Il-4s participied in this air raid. Li-2s hadn’t much to do here during German presence. I wasn’t able to trace any official recovery of Pe-2s or Il-4s near Gdańsk but I’ll try on forums.
The only known officialy recovered wreckcage of Pe-2 in last years was between Bzura and Vistula rivers in central Poland.