Lazy8

No problem, Gooney Fan. If it works for you, that's the most important thing.

A bit late to the party, but I'll help as much as I can. The blue we used for the 747-400 BOAC retro-jet was BAC5148. We think that's a very good match, but the honest and slightly embarrassing truth is that it appears no-one really knows for sure what the original colour was. In almost all documentation it is referred to simply as "Corporation Blue", perhaps with a stores reference, but those stores are long gone... We believe it is the same blue used throughout BOAC's existence, and, for that matter the same blue used by Imperial Airways, who also just called it "Imperial Blue" or "Company Blue". The best we could manage by way of a colour reference is in the 1947 BOAC aircraft painting guidlines, where it gives Dulux paint codes. Sadly a check with them revealed that that particular code was part of a set of customer-specified paints (i.e. for many different customers), that the numbers were issued chronologically depending on when the first order was placed and otherwise meant nothing, and that they hadn't kept the records anyway. I live in hope that lurking somewhere in our archives is a complete discourse on the paint colours, their chemical composition and so forth, but if it's there it's very well hidden!

Serials on wartime camouflaged BOAC aircraft were officially black with a 1" silver outline on top and sides, plain black underneath. It looks from photos as if the silver outline was regularly wider, but it might just be that its relative brightness makes it seem more prominent. In the early days of the war the camouflage was applied hastily (and often removed after only a day or two to meet other perceived requirements) and it is clear that, for instance, the Frobisher fleet retained their blue reggies for quite a time. Once camouflage was regularised (early 1940 or thereabouts) the registrations remained black with an outline until after the war. The only variation was the grey registrations applied to a few Moquitos and Yorks towards the end of hostilities, but these still had the silver outline.

Imperial's archives are frustratingly light on detail. The registrations were supposed to be dark blue on all passenger-carrying aircraft. There is circumstantial evidence that aircraft intended only to carry cargo were supposed to have black registrations, but they were so few in number that it's difficult to be sure (just the two Bolton-Paul mail carriers, really). Shorts got into trouble for delivering the two L.17s, Scylla and Syrinx, with all the markings in black, but I have yet to unearth any evidence as to when, if ever, they were repainted correctly. Again, there is some circumstantial evidence that some of the C-Class boats were delivered with black markings, but by the time this may have happened there was a lot going on in the world and there were other things to think about (like camouflage). If the colourised photo you're talking of is the one I think it is (with the Shell bowser in the foreground), the blue is way too light. The actually colour was dark - almost certainly the same colour as BOAC used, although there is no specification for it in the archives (that we've uncovered so far). The regular use of a yellow filter by photographers using monochrome film (primarily to make the sky more 'interesting') tends to make the already dark blue indistinguishable from black in most photographs, which has perhaps added to the confusion.

In the 1947 BOAC scheme, the outline to the Speedbird and so on is painted Gold. No specification, just Gold. In the printed Design Standards book it is a metalic gold. In the 1965 BOAC scheme, all the gold parts are gold Scotchcal - a decal, very shiny, comes in big sheets and still available. First use of this seems to have been on the VC10s, or possibly 707s. In between, there was no one standard. The outline to the blue stripe was first applied to the 'Monarch' class Stratocruisers - the other external difference on those is that they have the crest on the nose. That should have been metallic gold to match the gold on the crest decal, but it would appear that some of the maintenance people interpreted 'gold' as a shade of yellow. Non-metalic paint was cheaper and easier to apply, so yellow-called-gold was fine. Again there doesn't seem to be a single published standard, but it's most likely that the contemporary Dulux catalogue would hold the shade that most, if not all, used.

Think it through. Either the elevator is split with a variable gap in the middle when it is deflected (and some potentially interesting aerodynamics), or it has to have a straight hinge - otherwise it can't move.

The Negus scheme for the Viscount has the tailplanes in Grey F338-3801. They were white for the BEA Red Square livery, and polished metal for the BEA Speedjack livery.

The gold edging was originally applied only to 'Monarch'-configured Stratocruisers, and the original intention was that it should have been only on aircraft with single 'First' class or similar configuration. Aircraft didn't always get repainted when their interiors changed and so it's difficult to tell from the outside what the interior was. It's unlikely that your model is a pre-delivery manufacturer's model, as following test flights BOAC initially refused to accept the aircraft, the first few of which were built with the short fin and no underfin. The configuration you have is for an aircraft in service. That does look like a Westfield stand (and the odd-shaped nose could be one of theirs too), but the hexagonal plate at the top is decidely non-standard - there should just be two pins pointing up from the top of the stand to push-fit into holes in the model. I'd guess one or both of those pins has snapped off and a previous owner made a repair.