Villish VM-6

Today's airplane is a curious Russian project that didn't see the light.
In mid-1917, the concept of a high-speed flying-boat came to an end and it was then when the 2nd Cpt. Scherbachev had the idea of designing a "counter-fighter". It was going to be a land-based single-engined aircraft with dropable wheeled gear to make it able to land on water surfaces. The idea also featured a blocking mechanism to stop the propeller and block it at the horizontal position when the airplane touched the water, turning the engine off.
In summer 1917 the UMA (Uprelevnie Morskoj Aviatsii - Naval Aviation Management) gave green light to this project and named it "Counter-Fighter". It's study and completion was ordered to D.P. Grigorovich, AIS Design Bureau and A.Yu Villish being this last one the only one who could present complete project winning the contest as the other two contestants retired from it.
On 13th September 1917 the project was ready. It was going to be powered by a 200hp Hispano engine and armed with a single Vickers 0.303in placed on the nose. The designs made by Villish included also a catapult for launching, rails, undercarriage and a compressed air system. The construction of the prototype started in the end of 1917 and by spring 1918 the prototype was almost finished as the waterproof boat-shaped fuselage, covered in plymouth which was going to be the fuselage was completed with the tail section (which was very thin and it's believed that it wouldn't have cope very well with the design) also completed but not ensambled.
The only incomplete prototype was destroyed during the Russian Civil War. The war in 1918 didn't allow A. Yu. Villish to finish the project and, as he was a landlord, he fleed Russia and settled in the Baltic Coast (surviving the Russian Civil War). He never returned to aircraft design and construction.

Sources:
1. http://ram-home.com/ram-old/vm-6.html
2. https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=10533.0
3. http://www.airwar.ru/enc/fww1/vm6.html (translated)

Moskalev SAM-13

The Moskalev SAM-13 was a Soviet two-engined pusher-puller low-wing fighter. It was made by OKB-31 and designed by Aleksandr S. Moskalev. It was developed in the USSR in the very late 1930s and remained only in prototype stage.
Its characteristic two engine configuration, being each of them a Renault-Bengasi MV-6 yielding each of them 220hp of power. Each of them was placed aft and forward of the engine and were set in a puller-pusher configuration. It had a double vertical stabilizer and a single horizontal stabilizer connecting both vertical ones. It was flown only twice at the commands of Nikolay Filson at the end of 1940 where many flaws were encountered and its development was halted due to the beginning of the war in the east.
Aleksandr S. Moskalev started this project back in 1938 after having seen the mock-up of the Dutch Fokker D.XXIII which was presented to the public in the International Aeronautical Salon of Paris-Le Bourget in 1938.
The Moskalev was built entirely out of wood and its design was initially interesting considering how it could get the best from such low powered engines. It was one of the first Russian aircraft to have a retractable tricycle landing gear. Thanks to the position of the cockpit, the pilot enjoyed a nice field of view thanks also to its plexiglas canopy.
Thanks to the good aerodynamics and its lightweight of just 1183kg, the aircraft had an excellent ratio of weight/power of 5.9lb/hp (2.7kg/hp) which proved to yield a nice speed when tested at sea level of 292mph (470km/h) and 422mph (680km/h) at an altittude of 19000ft (5800m) in the year 1940.
However, the problems found at the tests, were because the vertical/horizontal stabilizers were too close to the back engine which caused serious drag problems. Furthermore, the cooling of the back engine wasn't optimal and during take-off and landing the debris caused by the landing gear could seriously damage the cooling system of the back engine. The pilot was also unprotected in the case of a harsh landing as the impact could launch the back engine towards the cockpit.
In spite of the better performance achieved when compared to the other single-engined fighters of the time, the project was abandoned due to the German invasion in June 1941 mainly because it was hard to find an adequate armament fitting configuration which was expect to be of two forward firing 7.62mm ShKAS machine guns.
As we like sometimes to imagine new colours for the airplanes, we decided to draw two what-if versions. One serving with the Soviet Air Force and another serving with the hypothetical Russian Air Force because what-ifs are always interesting. We decided to arm them with two 7,62mm ShKAS machine-gun pods placed under the wings.

Sources:
1. https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moskalev_SAM-13 (translated)
2. Salamander Books - The Complete book of Fighters

Kocherigin BSh-1

At the end of 1935, the USSR received information about the American light bomber and attack aircraft Vultee V-11. Under orders of the People's Commissar of Defence Kliment E. Voroshilov showed interest on the project in order to replace the outdated Soviet attack biplanes like the Polikarpov R-5Sh.
Therefore, the Vultee V-11 was included in the list of purchase licenses and, on 11th April 1935 negotiations with Vultee began.
Both Soviets and Vultee reached an agreement and four Vultee V-11GB were sold to the USSR together with production blueprints adapted to the metric system. These weren't the standard type as they had a crew of three, one pilot, a rear-gunner and one navigator-bombardier.
It was powered by a single Shvetsov ASh-62 rated at 1000hp (746Kw) radial engine and was armed with four forward firing 7.92mm ShKas machine guns mounted in the wings with 3600 rounds in total. It could also carry up to 400Kg (881lb) of ordnance under the fuselage. As defensive armament, it had one 7.92mm Shkas at the end of the canopy and another one that was deployed on a hatch ventrally placed just behind the one at the of the canopy.
The first Kocherigin BSh-1 rolled out of the factory on 11th December 1936 and it was tested so it wasn't until mid 1937 that it entered into production. It was found however that the armour fitted for the ground attack role, reduced performance greatly and it was decided to stop production after only 31 aircraft were manufactured. As they proved to be not suitable for service in the VVS (Soviet Air Force) they were transferred to Aeroflot, which redesignated them as Kocherigin PS-43 and used them as high-speed transports until June 1941 when Germany invaded. Then they were transferred both to the VVS and PVO (Soviet Air Defence).
They served all-through World War 2 and, albeit serving in small numbers, they were present at the Battle of Stalingrad as they were the ones, together with outdated Polikarpov R-5, that delivered air mail to the sieged troops. However, casualties were heavy and by 1st June 1944 there were only 9 of them active and by the end of that year, 8 serving with the 1st Baltic Front and 2nd and 3rd Byelorussian fronts as par of the 3rd Communications Division air unit. By the beginning of 1945 as the lend-leased Douglas A-20 and B-25 were somewhat outdated, they were sent to the 3rd Communications Division to serve in the liaison role so the extremely worn-out and old PS-43 were written-off. By September there weren't any Kocherigin BSh-1 or PS-43 active inside the USSR.
Finally we decided that this aircraft would fit perfectly in an alternate history universe where the Whites won the Russian civil war, so we decided to paint one of them in Russian Aeronaval colours.

Sources:
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vultee_V-11
2. http://www.airwar.ru/enc/aww2/bsh1.html (translated)