Relax, it’s an aircraft paint question. On the early war Navy aeroplanes, the paint scheme is Intermediate Blue over Light Grey. Later, this changes to dark Sea Blue top, Intermediate Blue sides, and a White bottom surface. Why is this? Why did they not stick with the Light Grey?
Does anyone out there have an idea on this?
Regards, PWB.
The “brains” in the “Five Sided Puzzle Palace On The Potomac” had changing ideas on what camouflage was effective.
Darwin, O.F. [aln]
That’s not the real puzzler… The real question is why the change from Blue over white to overall Blue? Apparently, Naval Aviators spent 50% of their flight-time inverted…
Camouflage, no matter what you do, is relative… The eyes are attracted to a moving object, so camouflage is moot in most cases… In an air-to-air environment, the only visual trickery that I thought was really effective was that done by the Canadians on the F-18 where they had a false canopy (complete with white “helmet” painted on the bottom… That, I could see, would really screw up your day if you were engaged and thought you were looking at the top of the aircraft…
Seriously, it makes a difference when one is down low and visual contact can be lost against the background, but at any higher altitudes they airplanes all look black until you’re right in the bad guy’s knickers, at least in my experience… I was up against another guy in a T-34 vs T-34 fight once upon a time (in fact, that’s what’s going on in my avatar), and even though we were both painted bright yellow, it was mostly just a black silhouette I was engaged with…
did these aviation schemes change along/in correspondence with the naval ship measures, or was the air paint schemes developed separately?
One of the influences in the color schemes was visibility on carrier decks rather than just in an air-to-air scenario; a carrier was a much more valuable asset than individual aircraft. That’s why the outer wing panels of SB2C’s were painted blue - so they wouldn’t be so visible when folded on the deck. If anything it made them more visible in the air with the high contrast between the blue outer wings and the white inner wings & fuselage.
Another factor later in the war was that multi-color schemes require a lot of manhours hours to maintain. Once air superiority was established later in the war, any marginal benefit of multi-color schemes didn’t justify the work involved.
Mark
Oh well. With a total of 145 views and only 4 replies, it would seem that this question can be filed under the heading: The world will never know.
Thanks any way for giving the subject a thought.
I have only 2 WWII Navy aeroplanes in th stash right now, both SB2C Hell Divers. One, an old Monogram and the other a Pro Modeller. I think when the time comes for the Monogram to hit the build table, I will do it in the tri-color scheme with a Light Grey bottom just to see what it looks like.
Regards, PWB.
I would respectfully point out that Intermediate Blue was never used over Light Grey in USN color schemes. It was Navy Blue Grey over Light Grey, followed by the Tri-Color scheme (uppers non-specular Sea Blue, flat Intermediate Blue on the sides and flat white bottoms - the specs actually called for the top of the flight surfaces (wings and horizontal tail) were to be painted in semi-gloss Sea Blue - which turns flat very quickly in use). The switch to overall Gloss Sea Blue apparently came about to simplify application and maintenance of the paint scheme (flat and semigloss coverings wear very rapidly in service).
Uglygoat
I never gave it a thought to compare the dates for the Aircraft Tri-color and the Ships Dazzle measures,it sure would make sense if they were close in the dates,would explain the white undersides on the planes,the ships used white in the shadows as a countershading in some of the Measures,would explain the Intermediate Blue also (“partly shaded”)
and Gloss Sea Blue is very close to the Flightdeck Blue also
Rex
that was my thought Rex, someone will have to go through the naval measures for the carriers and compare dates and aviation schemes. i cannot remember the website that has all the naval schemes…
http://www.shipcamouflage.com/warship_camouflage.htm
the aircraft measures aren’t online, though,so one of the “books with the specs and dates” would be needed too
Squadron’s Navy Air Colors Vol 1,or Monogram’s Color Guide to the USN Aircraft
I don’t have Vol 1 of the Squadron pair, or Vol 2 of the Monogram (I think that would be the one), so I can’t drill through Mil Specs for that period,I foolishly skipped the early books in both series, thinking I only needed the “Gull Gray” years
Rex
that book is no longer in print, and amazon is waaay out of line, ninty bucks or so. the local library didn’t have it either. however, the book is in digitial form, and can be found. i’m ‘leafing’ through it now, maybe there is a chart or table in the apendixes, but right now it looks like i’ll have to really dig through to glean the schemes and dates.
Looking at Ship Camouflage .com the Dazzle schemes came in to use around in March 1943. According to my Squadron US Navy Aircraft Colors and Camouflage, the tri color schemes came in to use in April 1943, so they were close in conception date, although coming from two different sources, Bureau of Aeronautics and Bureau of Ships.
just plowing through the text in the monogram book, here are some dates.
feb 1942: two tone scheme, blue gray over light gray
jan 1943: three tone shceme, sea blue, intermediate blue, white, excepting special shades for those in the north atlantic and caribbean.
june 1944: over all carrier based planes glossy sea blue.
there are numerous revisions clarifiying which paint is which as the army and navy attempted to standardize paints, and revisions dealing with gloss or flat, and what color to paint surfaces that fold and can be viewed from the air.
it seems like their primary concern was with airborne evasion, but it carries over into not being able to descern the planes on the flight deck… despite the huge wake.
“seen from the air while on deck”,yeah, I remember a long time ago a discussion on SMML about one of the intents of the Aircraft camo being to mask whether the planes were on deck, or out on a strike,and how many were on deck and the locations
for a Navair fan, the period with Dazzled ships and tricolor aircraft is sure fun to model,two ships of the same class next to each other on the shelf look a lot different with different Measure #
Rex
Goat, I think some of those dates are off. USN aircraft started getting th Blue Gray uppers before Pearl Harbor in Dec of 41. And from what I have read, there was concern about aircraft on deck being visible. That was why the lower surfaces of folding wings that could be seen from above, as on the TBD and SB2U were painted blue gray so as to better blend in with the deck blue of the flight decks. Otherwise there was no reason not to leave them in light gray.
you are correct stickpusher! i typo’d the 1942. it should be jan/feb 1941 they started issuing orders about the two tone scheme. well they started in dec 1940 stating all a/c should be light gray. patrol a/c should have upper surfaces painted blue gray. in 1941 around february, the command issued a standard blue/gray scheme.
from the reading of the monogram book, there are a lot of pictures so i got side tracked a lot, the command would issue orders, then follow up with changes, such as how you should blurr the lines, what sort of finish to use etc, then issue an over all directive that summed up. apparently it caused a bit of confusion, and there are several photos of planes on board the same ship with different patterns, especially regarding insignia.
admittedly, this is all new information for me, i’m trying to pass on what i am finding out, sorry for any errors, and thanks for pointing it out.
No worries Goat! Along those same lines I have a good book on Pearl Harbor with tons of photos. Some aircraft involved there were still in the overall gray scheme. Even thought they had been ordered to be repainted months before.