Airfix 1/48 Gnat Colour Scheme Possible Error resolved - they got it right

[dambuster]

A quick dive into some references and a search on t'internet suggests that the Colour Scheme details for the silver/dayglo orange scheme for the new Airfix Gnat might be incorrect. Now I know that by pointing this out someone will provide a photograph, but....

All photos that I can find of Silver/Dayglo orange Gnats have the fuselage serial painted directly on the orange, and not in an unpainted 'rectangle'. Conversely, the admittedly few photos I have found of Light Aircraft Grey/Dayglo orange Gnats do have the fuselage serial in a light grey (?) rectangle.

Airfix may have mixed these schemes up as they have a silver/orange aircraft with the serial on a silver rectangle. Can anyone confirm that this is correct for XM709/95 of CFS in 1964?

Peter

Edited November 8, 2014 by dambuster

[Spad]

Got a feeling you are right - and to add weight, their own 1/72 kit shows serial on dayglo.

Here's mine

Here's XM709, abeit at a slightly different date (1967) as "92" - no surround to the serial.

http://www.abpic.co.uk/popup.php?q=1256908

Edited November 7, 2014 by Spad

[Julien]

Not that aircraft but this pic looks to be silver/dayglo and the serial is not ina rectangle.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1c/Folland_Gnat_T1_XR_977_46.4_FTS_Valley_03.09.67_edited-3.jpg

http://www.abpic.co.uk/images/images/1048134M.jpg

http://www.abpic.co.uk/images/images/1051819M.jpg

also;

[Paul J]

Aah! The vageries of aircraft markings! Such a minefield and so many variations to the rules.

[John B (Sc)]

Yes, all the early Gnats at Valley had the serial, in black, painted directly onto the dayglo on the rear fuselage. I saw them there in 1964, along with the Yellowjacks aircraft.

There were none at that time with that rectangle. I think tat perhaps a later change. I saw no CFS machines at Valley - perhaps they were differently laid out. My shots of that time are all on 35mm slides. Shall transfer to digital soon I hope.

The dayglo on the early Gnats I saw appeared to be the Orange shade, not the later Fire Orange.

Humbrol used to do Orange and Fire Orange dayglo. Wish they'd bring that back.

John B

[Gary West]

They sure were Black serials on a rectangular silver background, at least on some - I have 4 or 5 images showing this, but at least one image shows the Gnat in the later Grey & Dayglo. Aircraft in Images that I have are...........XR541, XP504 & a hard to see........X??93

[dambuster]

Gary, thanks, do you have the tail codes for these, and dates for when the photos were taken please?

Peter

[XV107]

With rectangles within dayglo, there are

On this thread (post #26)

There's another (about 13th post down and appears in with a pic of a Dominie a little further down) here

One from Little Rissington here (post #23) from 1968 (date given a couple of posts earlier)

[dambuster]

With rectangles within dayglo, there are

On this thread (post #26)

There's another (about 13th post down and appears in with a pic of a Dominie a little further down) here

One from Little Rissington here (post #23) from 1968 (date given a couple of posts earlier)

Thanks. These are all in the Light Aircraft Grey/dayglo scheme. Still looking for photos of silver aircraft with serials in silver rectangles.

Peter

[Spad]

With rectangles within dayglo, there are

On this thread (post #26)

There's another (about 13th post down and appears in with a pic of a Dominie a little further down) here

One from Little Rissington here (post #23) from 1968 (date given a couple of posts earlier)

All LAG I think - seems to me that LAG replaced silver between '67 and '68 and rectangles were part of that change?

[AnonymousAA72]

Thanks. These are all in the Light Aircraft Grey/dayglo scheme. Still looking for photos of silver aircraft with serials in silver rectangles.

Peter

It's very difficult to differentiate between Silver an LAG in photo's , and whereas the last two examples are most certainly LAG, for my 2/- worth I'd say that the first photo is clearly silver.........

[dambuster]

It's very difficult to differentiate between Silver an LAG in photo's , and whereas the last two examples are most certainly LAG, for my 2/- worth I'd say that the first photo is clearly silver.........

Bill,

I think its grey as I can see a distinct difference between the nosewheel and the fuselage..

A bit more research and I came up with this:

There was a recent edition of jets monthly which had some detail on colour schemes. Essentially theprototype had the yellow trainer bands, first preproduction aircaft with cfs were natural aluminium/dayglo orange, production aircraft delivered in natural aluminium and a redder shade of orange dayglo(!) then grey/ dayglo, then red / white with grey wings and finally red/white with red/white wings. The change from the dayglo scheme was largely due to the fading problems with dayglo and was from 1968 on. The change from grey wings to red was on "safety grounds" (their quote marks, but no explanation what those grounds were)

Regarding the shades of dayglo, I took a colour slide of XP530 at Little Rissington in early April 1963 when it was about a week old; it was so new they hadn't got round to applying the CFS badge on the nose. Perhaps of more interest is a clear difference between the darker reddy shade of dayglo on this production T.1 aircraft and that on pre-production T.185D, XM704, the tailfin of which can be seen behind it. Also of note is that serial numbers were painted directly onto the dayglo paint on the rear fuselage of production Gnats whereas it was applied within a silver box on the pre-production machines, at least until their first repaint.

As XM709 was a preproduction aircraft then Airfix may have got it right, however the question is what is the difference between the two shades of dayglo used with the silver schemes?

Peter

[viscount806x]

XM709 is the subject of the Airfix dayglo option in 1/48. I have photos of this Gnat at Rissy during Feb 1962 (Ray Deacon's very good book). It was delivered 2nd Feb'62 and had an accident on the 28th, pictures of it on the latter occasion show NO silver rectangle. That is not to say that later on it had said rectangle but one would not be incorrect modelling Fleet 95/XM709 with the serial directly onto the dayglo since it is documented as such.

Certainly, LAG painted a/c had the serial on a grey rectangle, photos exist, but I have yet to turn up a silver one with this feature although they may also exist.

Looking at colour drawings, the Warpaint has a silver/dayglo scheme with the rectangle and also the Airfile RAF Trainers, Vol.2. This latter credits the information back to a previous work by the late R. Sturtivant, 'The History Of Britain's Training Aircraft' (1987). I know he was close to Alan Hall who produced the Warpaint book so Mr Hall may also have referred to the same work for his three view of the dayglo/silver aircraft. What reference, I wonder, did S&M use for their decal sheet which offers a dayglo/silver with fuselage serial on silver rectangle?

Perhaps the whole thing was a mistake and everyone over the years has perpetuated an error going back to a single piece of work. Or then again, maybe not.

It will be interesting to find out what the correct answer really is.

[Dave Fleming]

There is a pic in Ray Deacon's LIttle Rissington book showing XM709's rudder behind XP530 which shows the difference in dayglo (Scroll down from initial link)

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=eBrOAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA130&lpg=PA130&dq=XM709+gnat+little+rissington&source=bl&ots=X2HuKY9CQ6&sig=OfssdFY7UbUR7_ziylBd3ZMWgn0&hl=en&sa=X&ei=V0NeVI7JO-_Y7Aau8IHIDA&ved=0CCYQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=XM709%20XP530%20gnat%20little%20rissington&f=false

Perhaps Ray has better shots of it

Edited November 8, 2014 by Dave Fleming

[AnonymousAA72]

Bill,

I think its grey as I can see a distinct difference between the nosewheel and the fuselage..

Peter

Funny thing is that I can see a difference in the other two pic's, but in the first pic the fuselage and wheel looks to be a very similar shade......

[dambuster]

Airfix got it right. The first six pre-production aircraft, XM704 to XM709, coded 90 to 95, were delivered in the very light dayglo orange/silver scheme with the serial on silver panels. After this the orange dayglo became a different shade and the serials were applied directly to the dayglo. When the above aircraft were repainted it was in the later dayglo with serial directly applied to the dayglo, and they were re-numbered, XM704 to 95, XM705 to 98, XM706 to 94, XM707 to 91, XM708 to 99, and XM709 to 92.

There is a photo in the aviation mini-monograph of XM705 and XM706 which shows the silver painted areas behind the serial, and also a picture in SAM vol 8 number 2 that shows this.

Sorry for creating a bit of a wild goose chase....

Peter

[Black Knight]

not a wild gnu chase at all, its good to get these questions sorted.

[viscount806x]

Airfix got it right. The first six pre-production aircraft, XM704 to XM709, coded 90 to 95, were delivered in the very light dayglo orange/silver scheme with the serial on silver panels.

Peter,

The reference I made to XM709/95 at Rissy, is the same one that Dave Fleming refers to above, in Ray Deacon's Rissy book. The photos shown on his link (4 posts before yours) show XM709/95 on 28th Feb, clearly sporting the serial directly onto the dayglo, or are my eyes deceiving me? This was the very first Gnat delivery (2nd Feb '62) to the CFS and predate those sent to Valley.

This photo is very very useful since it can be pinned down to a specific date. The Airfix 1/48 Gnat can be built correctly with the in-box decals without silver behind the fuselage serial.QED.

But, the crucial question is:

Can the kit be built with silver behind the serial and still be correct? That remains to be proven I think.

Are we sure that the photos referred to in SAM Vol.8 and the Mini Monograph show silver and not LAG schemes? I don't have those publications to look at unfortunately so cannot verify or refute them.

Best wishes, Nige

[Starfighter]

If you go to the Aero-spot website there is a photo of XM709 which clearly shows the serial on a "silver" panel, and the aircraft, although quite grubby, would appear to be silver, and not LAG. HTH.

[dambuster]

On re-looking at the photo referred to in the Rissy book, which I have, I now think it does show a silver rectangle behind the serial....

Starfighter - thanks, great find, that confirms it for me!

Peter

Edited November 8, 2014 by dambuster

[GregW]

Airfix got it right. The first six pre-production aircraft, XM704 to XM709, coded 90 to 95, were delivered in the very light dayglo orange/silver scheme with the serial on silver panels. After this the orange dayglo became a different shade and the serials were applied directly to the dayglo. When the above aircraft were repainted it was in the later dayglo with serial directly applied to the dayglo, and they were re-numbered, XM704 to 95, XM705 to 98, XM706 to 94, XM707 to 91, XM708 to 99, and XM709 to 92.

Peter

So the sixty four thousand dollar question is now, what colour were they originally painted in?

I normally use Xtracolor X253 Leuchtorange (RAL2005) to represent Dayglo, but clearly this will be to dark for XM709 as originally delivered!

Greg

Edited November 9, 2014 by GregW

[Starfighter]

I think given that Dayglo colours fade so easily then the exact colour might not need to be that accurate ? I've seen many German F-104's with every shade from pale yellow to a rich, brand new Dayglo on their wing tanks.

[Andrew Jones]

Roy Conyers Nesbit's book , "The Illustrated History of the RAF", has a photo on page 300 showing XM706 /92 and XM709 /95 , both in flight , in the Dayglo / Silver scheme and both have the fuselage serial on a silver background. The photo is credited as " RAF Museum PO19098 ".

Andrew

[AMB]

Airfix got it right. The first six pre-production aircraft, XM704 to XM709, coded 90 to 95, were delivered in the very light dayglo orange/silver scheme with the serial on silver panels. After this the orange dayglo became a different shade and the serials were applied directly to the dayglo. When the above aircraft were repainted it was in the later dayglo with serial directly applied to the dayglo, and they were re-numbered, XM704 to 95, XM705 to 98, XM706 to 94, XM707 to 91, XM708 to 99, and XM709 to 92.

There is a photo in the aviation mini-monograph of XM705 and XM706 which shows the silver painted areas behind the serial, and also a picture in SAM vol 8 number 2 that shows this.

Sorry for creating a bit of a wild goose chase....

Peter

Quite correct, I have an air-to-air photo of XM706 and XM709 over Little Rissy in early 1962 clearly showing the serials on silver panels on rear fuselage and beneath the wings. These were probably the only two finished like this and quickly repainted with 'Fire Orange' dayglo and the serials applied without the silver panels. Therefore either is correct.