In 4.12, a skilled pilot can do wingtip scrapes without exploding, and that is just the wingtip. I think that the current model is good enough for high speed crashes, but for low speed crashes we need something different. I think that if we could have a similar explosion to the one seen in a fuel tank explosion for low speed gentle crashes, that would be nice.
For example, you are flying the brilliantly designed (but explody) Su-25, but all of a sudden, you suffer a flameout. Being your first day playing Il-2, you settle it down pretty hard and BOOM! However, your camera follows the maximum damaged, small flaming chunk of fuselage that contains your post-medium-rare pilot. Eventually, the fire goes out and all you can see is your *charred, blackened* plane.
Right now, the story ends at "you settle it down pretty hard and BOOM!"
*having fire damage in il-2 would also be nice