i dont think having published data from various contradictory sources is a problem, or that it justifies for oleg not to openly quote his BoB aircraft performance charts and the sources he used.
amongst the data sources available some will be more accurate, and based on direct performance testing in a controlled environment (like using captured aircraft, factory performance testing, contruction plans and blue prints etc), and some of these reference texts will stand out as being more comprehensive and reliable then others. in the 50 yrs since ww2 these historical aircraft performances have been analyzed, compared, and even new performance tests have been made with historical aircraft or reproductions built.
the same problem of, "what data can you trust", exists in every scientific discipline, and there is fairly simple ways to cut through the accumulated evidence in an objective way and source some "close to accurate" numbers, these SHOULD then be reproducible in a SIMULATOR on a computer if it claims an accurate flight model.
right now some of the aircraft behavior is down right silly, the numbers for the i-16 being a perfect example. the aim of having disclosure of flight performance characteristics in BoB, with a similar program like il2-compare, is to avoid those extreme "errors" (which in case of the i-16 were probably deliberate)
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