Hey guys, I just got a 1/72 Waco glider today and want to do it right. In the July 2004 issue of FineScale, there’s an article on painting invasion stripes, and it says that stripes on multi engine aircraft was approx 24" wide. It says nothing about the size of stripes on gliders . Does anyone know what size they might have been, and what size is that in 1/72? Any help will be appreciated .
Not sure on the width for gliders, but i would assume that all WW2 a/c used the standard 24" pattern. Which by the way converts to 8.5mm or 0.8 cm in 1/72 scale.
The specs specified that the stripes on multi-engine types were 24" with single engine types being 18’'. In practice, however, the stripes were often times were almost literally slapped on.
If you look at the images at the bottom of this webpage, they’ll give you a bit of info, although they’re kinda hard to read.
Invasion Stripes - A D-Day Story in Black and White
I’ll see what I can find as to specifics for the Wacos although gliders were among the types which were exempt from the mandatory application of the stripes. Nevertheless, I don’t think the glider boys wanted to get their a**es shot off, so they were applied.
Fade to Black…
From what I have read, as most of the WACO gliders were built for the invasion specifically, they stripes were factory painted, thus would be neat and crisp and not slapped on by the mechs the night before.
Don
As is always pointed out when this subject inevitably comes up, the stripes (and I believe what was said about glider stripes being applied with more notice, and thus more carefully) varied WIDELY, because of haste, and a lack of understanding of the order. Some were slapped on, some were carefully masked. I saw some D-Day footage the other day in which one C-47 had three black and three white stripes on wings and fuselage. That one extra stripe changed the look of the bird enormously, so it immediately jumped out of me in a photo of a dozen Goons waiting to take off with gliders. Personally, I always mask my stripes carefully, because I haven’t figured out a way to deliberately make them look sloppy, while at the saem time letting the viewer know that it wasn’t the modeler who was careless, but the original painters. I have, however, seen decals of the stripes where they did a good job of making the edges look brushed on in haste. Wish I could remember where.