Best way of getting an authentic looking Matt black finish for night fighters

[Spitfires Forever]

Hello, I will soon be the lucky recipient of the Airfix 1/48 Defiant and would like to use a Matt black, night fighter finish but would like to know how to give the finish that weathered look. I want to avoid just painting the plane flat black like it just came out of the paint shed. I have seen some aircraft that looked like the painters sloppily brushed on black paint with a brush (complete with brush strokes and lightly coated areas) and areas completely missed, where the original paint scheme showed through. Any suggestions? There should be streaks of light grey behind the exhaust stacked of course but I am not sure about chipping and such. I'm sure someone has done weathered night fighter black paint schemes out there.

Cheers

Edited December 17, 2016 by Spitfires Forever
Misspelling/grammar

[Graham Boak]

I don't know about the "best" way, but I'm attempting this myself in 1/72.  The matt paint was applied on top of the usual, rather smooth, Night finish, so start the same way.  Then add the matt finish on top, perhaps using the dry brush method to build it up, avoiding the areas you choose to accentuate wear.  These would be the leading edges, the nose and the wing roots, the fuselage where the crew get into the aircraft.  You could try avoiding pure black by mixing some very dark grey (Humbrol 67, for example) in some areas, at least.  Work from photos to judge what's needed where.

 

Sorry that this isn't terribly  helpful in the way of more direct tips.

[stevej60]

I recently bit the bullet and tried a night fighter scheme on a couple of builds,I avoided the Matt black route and after priming in dark gray

decided on which areas I wanted to wear the paint down to the metal and brushed on aluminium ten dabbed on maskol before using Tamiya

NATO black which isn't a true black(hope that makes sense) using my very basic airbrus I made passes along the direction of airflow with slightly

lightened shades a better airbrush would have meant finer lines but I was pleased with the result,I just don't have the skill to get the great exhaust

staining we see on some of our members builds so use powdered pencil lead dry brushed on,final job is a lighter gray wash in the panels before

matt coating,here's the build's

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235012613-night-huntertamiya-148-beaufighter/

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235010535-nocturnal-spitfire-vb/

And the 1/48 Defiant is superb here's the day fighter option.

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/235011224-flawed-fighter-airfixs-148-defiant/

 

[Guest]

Thanks for the tips guys. I too am not very professional when it comes to air brushing (painting Luftwaffe aircraft give me the chills!) but I get lucky sometimes and can pull off a decent Spitfire or Seafire on occasion. I have done a few "rattle canned" night fighters which were pretty simple, like the P-70, P-61, and the Mk II Mossie, but they needed something, just too "clean" looking. So now I have a few ideas to throw into the mix. Thanks again.

Happy Holidays to you and yours!

Spitfire Addict

[TheRealMrEd]

Make sure you check documentation for the night black. Early in the war, flat black was the deal. After a couple of years, the trend was toward semi-gloss, and late in the war (and into the 70's) gloss black was the norm. Obviously, some finishes might have lingered on, and the longer the aircraft had been in service, the paint would have been affected. The very flat black early in the war on British a/c were found to slow down the aircraft's top speed from 7-26 percent!

 

I have found that generally, a fine pigment flat black, rubbed down with skin oil from the forehead, rubbed on with the fingers looks pretty good, excepting the dead flat black and very glossy schemes.

 

On my dark blue P2V-3 Neptune, I used very thinned streaks of a lighter color, in the direction of airflow, and vertically on the fuse, sort of like rain run-off markings.

 

Good luck,

 

Ed

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

If you're going to try paint chipping, I'd suggest a duller aluminium (or metallic medium grey) as the undercoat as a brighter one will have a huge contrast against a black finish and will probably look over done. If you haven't tried it, then lightly sprinkling table salt on to a water-moistened undercoat can give some nice masking effects. If you have too much salt on, just scrape some off once it's all dried. You can then paint over the top and once that has tried, you knock off the high bits (salt) and are left with chipped paint exposing the undercoat. Less is definitely more with that technique.

 

I'm not too deft with an airbrush either and use pastels and weathering powders for exhaust staining (and pretty much everything else - I'm not a fan of panel line washes personally).

 

Plenty to think about. I try to use a new technique every model, which is probably why I botch something on every single one 😂

 

 

[Greenshirt]

I've used Tamiya NATO Black (green black) to good effect with an "earth" scheme, such as two greens or gree and brown. For either all Night or a more grey scheme I prefer either Mr Color Tire Black (a sort of blue black) or Mr Color Cowling Color (a blue black). I also tried a mix of Midnight Blue (aka USN glossy sea blue) with a few drops of Black until it "looked right" to my eyes. 

[Nick Millman]

When considering paint chipping and wear bear in mind that two coats of the Special Night (matt black) finish were applied over a single coat of Night (blue-black) which in turn was applied over a coat of grey Sobac primer. It was recognised that the application of the ether based topcoat Special Night to the nitrate based intermediate and primer coats could cause adhesion problems unless carefully applied. This was also the case where the finish was applied over existing paint schemes where the aircraft was not completely re-painted.

 

Unfortunately I'm not sure if the intermediary Night coat was Type M (matt) or Type S (standard/smooth) as the date of the introduction of the latter is uncertain. 

 

Nick

[dfqweofekwpeweiop4]

I usually paint the model in Black and then go over the panels with a very Dark Grey and never use the awful light grey panel lines. I find Dark Brown looks more natural in the panel lines, light grey just looks weird and wrong to me.

 

thanks

Mike 

[gingerbob]

10 hours ago, Nick Millman said:

...a coat of grey Sobac primer.

 

Is that a brand name?  I don't recall hearing it before.

[Nick Millman]

12 hours ago, gingerbob said:

 

Is that a brand name?  I don't recall hearing it before.

 

Don't know for sure. It has been suggested elsewhere that it is an acronym which then stood for Society of British Aircraft Constructors. The primers were designated as 'U.P' followed by a number which presumably stood for "Universal Primer". In July 1942 a memo from RAE referring to problems with the application of Special Night to Handley-Page Halifax aircraft mentioned the introduction of Sobac UP.7 as potentially solving the primer problem and allowing for the flooding of Special Night to create a smoother finish coat without causing adhesion problems. Elsewhere in this memo the Sobac primer is referred to as "the Pool primer" which perhaps reinforces the suggestion about the acronym.  

 

It has been mentioned here before iro Seafires and Spitfires. There were also Sobac fillers and thinners, etc.

 

Nick

[gingerbob]

Thanks, that sounds plausible.

[john224]

According to Flight magazine, 15 June 1961 (p.836) Sobac was a "scheme under which paint manufacturers joined a pool for the supply of aircraft finishes manufactured by standard formulae". It doesn't explain the derivation of the name, but the acronym explanation sounds right.

[gingerbob]

I searched Flight from 1930 to 1950 and got NO results, so thanks John!

[Doug Rogers]

Something I did before was mix the black with red. The red doesn't show at all  but it does stop the black being so...black. 

Tip I got from Hyperscale, apparently you can go up to 30% with the red,  but I did 10-15%. Looked good on the underside of an early Spitfire.

[Fernando]

Hi, Spitfire Addict,

 

I would back what Doug has just said. To create a "scale Black" that doesn't look like "a very dark Grey" the colour to mix is Red or Brown (actually, the same thing). Even a Tan would do. You can mix in a surprisingly large amount of the second colour to the Black without it losing its "blackness". I think it has to do with keeping it warm (a "Dark Grey" tends to be a "cool" -bluish- hue)

 

Fernando

Edited December 23, 2016 by Fernando

[Aidrian]

On 12/23/2016 at 10:03 PM, Fernando said:

 

I would back what Doug has just said. To create a "scale Black" that doesn't look like "a very dark Grey" the colour to mix is Red or Brown (actually, the same thing). Even a Tan would do. You can mix in a surprisingly large amount of the second colour to the Black without it losing its "blackness". I think it has to do with keeping it warm (a "Dark Grey" tends to be a "cool" -bluish- hue)

 

There are several different ways of getting a black that isn't quite so black that light just falls into it.  Adding warmer colours to neat black takes the edge off, but black does weather in various ways depending on what its applied to and what it is exposed to. "Night" has quite a strong blue component, so warmer colours may not be appropriate.

 

When painting things that need to look black but where you still need to be able to get some contrast for shadows, try mixing a very dark brown shade such as bunt umber with with a very dark blue. You end up with a very dark grey shade that has a bit more interest to it than just mixing white and black - on a scale model it has the happy knack of looking like slightly weathered black paint without being black so those who like washes and filters have a canvas to work with. You can get quite a range of near blacks by varying the proportions of the mix, by  using lighter shades of blue or adding a bit of neat black to darken it and make the paint look newer. 

 

Sadly since I mix my stuff by eye I can't give an exact mix other than about 50% Umber/50% Blue to start with then play with it until you are happy.

 

Edited December 26, 2016 by Aidrian
typo

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

As Nick said above, Night is a blue-black, but Special Night is matt black.

 

This is Colourcoats' ACRN17 Night used on a 1/350 ship because I felt pure matt black would just kill it - but the boot topping line is C02 Matt Black so the photo serves to show the contrast between Night and Matt Black

 

To soften pure black to mimic Special Night, adding some red might not be a bad idea?

[Aidrian]

Maybe things didn't come across quite as I meant them to.  Because the brown/blue mix uses both warm and cool colours to produce a middle ground you can play with the balance to produce warmer and cooler variations as you prefer.  In the case of "smooth night" the balance should be towards the blue end - special night a neutral mix, and add some neat black.

 

For "special night" you have a couple of extra things going on - it was made of pure carbon* black (no Ultramarine) in rather coarser grind than used for other paints. The finish was dead matt when fresh and new, but also quite soft so that contact with rags or boots or overall sleeves woudl mark it very easily. On a brand new machine, it resulted an amazingly featureless look, but once a few flights had been made panels and hatches had been lifted it had quiet a lot going on, with variations of both colour and texture. Whichever mix you prefer, I suspect that provided it looks sufficiently black, the actual colour is going to be less of a factor than effectively simulating that dead matt finish and the way in which it wears.

 

Assuming a gloss finish before transfers followed by a matt varnish to represent "smooth" finishes, we need to emphasise the dead flat look of special night especially as the roundels and other markings were applied in smooth colours and the contrast in finish is quite noticeable.   We need an extra matt finish which gets applied over the whole machine, but not over the markings. Tape's not going to work for masking as it will just lift the transfers but low tack materials such Post-it notes are usually transfer friendly.  I think I'd be inclined to just mask codes and roundels - serials and stencils will have to be left to the imagination.

 

For the final matt, Testor's Dullcote sprayed with a very light touch is hard to beat - the trick is to have it land on the surface very nearly dry. Other folks may prefer their own mix of flat bases and floor polish - the key thing is that the final coat is rather more dull than the one used to seal the transfers.   Since we now have have a soft finish similar to the real thing, a little bit of polishing with soft cloths and cotton buds in strategic areas will take some of the edge off that dead matt finish  - handle the model with gloves as any oils from you skin will tend to mark the surface.

 

* Please see post from Nick Millman  below - not carbon black      

 

Edited December 27, 2016 by Aidrian

[Nick Millman]

18 minutes ago, Aidrian said:

 

For "special night" you have a couple of extra things going on - it was made of pure carbon black (no Ultramarine) in rather coarser grind than used for other paints.

       

 

 

The Special Night formula used Monolite Fast Black B.S. Powder as pigment, one patent for which describes it as an aniline black distributed through and over the surfaces of granules of an oxidic compound of trivalent chromium, i. e. chromic oxide or hydroxide. Aniline black is usually considered to be a synthetic dye and that form is confirmed by RAE documents which describe Special Night as a "a special black dye on a metallic oxide base". So, not pure carbon black. 

 

It was mixed with benzyl or ethyl cellulose, toluol to DTD 112, xylol, butyl alcohol and dibutyl phthalete to DTD 114. Originally the formula included standard fuel for aero engines or alternatively "light petroleum" but that was dispensed with in the final preparation.  

 

Whereas the reflectivity of Night was around 3%, the reflectivity of Special Night was reduced to around 1% but in practice there was variance of up to 2.25% according to paint manufacturer, which included Cellon, ICI, John Hall, Titanine and Dockers, and as applied by different aircraft manufacturers. This variance was a matter of concern for RAE, as was the fact that Special Night was not being used as intended - only on the under surfaces of aircraft to defeat searchlights. RAE criticised its use as an overall finish for night fighters.  

 

Nick

[Aidrian]

Thank you Nick

 

The information I had access to is obviously dated and I've edited the previous post to reflect this. 

[John_W]

I used Tamiya NATO Black, which is a very dark grey, weathered with oils.

[MalX]

brilliant, whatever the case definitely not pitch black, it would need to be weathered like that

[Neil]

Don't use pure Black for large(ish) areas, it usually doesn't look right. On the walkways and fins of an F-18 I built a while back, I painted the areas a Dark Grey instead, but then ran a pure Black wash in the panel lines using Oil Paint.

 

 

 

[MalX]

black is a colour you never see in real life on matt paint jobs, it's always dusty looking dark grey, it's only ever pure black with a brand new gloss finish......i.e a car

 

a black model would look odd, esp at night, it would have no definition or detail......i once had a black Hercules gun ship, you couldn't see anything of it at night when you were watching tv......it was like a black cardboard cut-out