My guess: You can remove the tires for flight, paint adds weight and I don’t see the Russian army scraping off the current paint without fucking up the primer/anti corrosion layer.
In the case of strategic bombers, anti-flash white is a key feature to reflect as much of the thermal pulse of a nuclear detonation as possible; theoretically you want these planes to survive the apocalypse that they’re unleashing to return to base and do it again.
My guess: You can remove the tires for flight, paint adds weight and I don’t see the Russian army scraping off the current paint without fucking up the primer/anti corrosion layer.
Are the planes not already painted? Why not just paint them grey to begin with?
In the case of strategic bombers, anti-flash white is a key feature to reflect as much of the thermal pulse of a nuclear detonation as possible; theoretically you want these planes to survive the apocalypse that they’re unleashing to return to base and do it again.
Me, gesturing broadly at the massive weight of all these tires
Which is why i said they could easily be removed for flight…