Rolls-Royce

I believe RAL 7034 is the closest color from a current recognized standard. You can view that in an online viewer, or, as already suggested, check out Nick Millman's blog (www.aviationofjapan.com). Its background color is another example of what you should be going for.

Nick Millman quoted the March 1942 Kugisho 266 report on test camouflage schemes for the Zero: “The paint color currently in use for the Type 0 KanSen is J3 (Haiiro - ash or gray colour) leaning slightly toward amber colour (Ameiro - caramel or candy colour). However, it differs from the experimental colours in being glossy.”

Sorry, but it wasn't a varnish coat. The anticorrosive elements giving the warm tint were in the paint itself, which was glossy at delivery. Shots of the Kamehameha Zero show the gloss, both at the crash site and when the wreckage was assembled in a hangar.

I know this is an older thread, but when I was in the 100SRW at Davis-Monthan AFB, one of the U-2s I was assigned to was 56-6953, then configured as a two-seat U-2CT. Then as now, that designation didn't follow the regulations. When I asked why (being relatively recently out of technical training), I was told that it was because no pilot would admit to flying a TU-2 (say it out loud and you'll understand). I believe it!

Exactly!

Not only is that document a great resource, but he is personally, as well.

Try plugging R148 G143 B116 into a paint program and see what you come up with. Those are sRGB numbers calculated from the Munsell number of the Pearl Harbor-era Zero color Nick Millman describes in his "Painting the Early Zero Sen" PDF document...

Indeed. There are documented examples of Mk I Spitfires with VHF radios and no antenna wires flying during the Battle of Britain. One was X4179, "QV0B", flown by George "Grumpy" Unwin on 15 September 1940...

Having owned and worked on a 1964 Austin-Healey Sprite Mk II, I can confidently speculate that no mid-century British designer ever made anything easy for mechanics...

I agree. But the more hard info/data points, the better. They were also considering producing paint chips based on those colors found and including them in the book when it was published. Remember, this was the 2008/2009 timeframe when all this was originally being talked about.

This subject is one of the reasons I'm really hoping that JaPo finishes their Volume 3 of the Focke-Wulf 190D series someday. Among other things, they were going to discuss the discovery of cans of RLM paint, one of which was marked "81" on the remnants of the label, but which contained a dark green paint instead of the expected violet- or olive- brown.

Hmm. I believe "specified" and "used" are two different things when we're talking about the sooty dark green that has previously been identified as 83. While it was definitely used and has been found on a number of recovered relics, I don't think that any official RLM directives or painting diagrams from that period ever specified it for use, instead calling for 81/82.

There was just a thread on the 219 here last week:

That appears to be the Atlantic scheme, in which if memory serves, Intermediate Blue was not used, but gray and white.

You might try rolling it over a small-diameter rounded object like a pen , x-acto knife handle, or pencil...

I haven't let that stop me yet! Someday, however, the wife is gonna notice... The major restraint for me is this state's draconian air quality laws limiting what types of paints and solvents are readily available.

If I didn't already have an acrylic paint I'm very pleased with (MMP-110), I'd definitely be interested in trying the MRP shades. From Tank152's photos, they look darned good in the bottle (I know, I know, you can't trust photos on the Web). I find water-based acrylics tougher to spray overall than enamels or lacquers, but their ease of cleanup can't be beat, with no real worries about damaging airbrush seals...

You could probably get that by mixing MRP-411 and MRP-419, but having a single-bottle color would definitely be neater and less work...

It was a lacquer.

The Japanese used the clear blue-green "aotake" coating on internal (and some external) surfaces of their aircraft. In some cases aotake appears to have been applied several times during a part's production - it has been found sandwiched between riveted assemblies - and was sometimes oversprayed with the external paint finish. As far as its having been used as extensively as Lionoil apparently was to protect aluminum sheet, I haven't yet seen any evidence of that.

And aluminum cans are coated inside with polymer to seal the aluminum away from contact with the material being contained...

Could be any of a number of reasons, Jack. The stacked RC color representations may very well be from a scan of a four-color printed box, a process not known for fine color reproduction under the best of conditions. The person who did the scanning is concerned only that the scanned image matches the original within their acceptable tolerances, while the web designer is going to work with what he is given.

He did with AK and their acrylics, too. They chose their own path at the end. It will be interesting to see what MRP does.

Thank you for your kind comments, Colin. The key is the dE (essentially "distance of Error"). As Nicholas Millman says, a dE of 2 or less is a very close match to the reference color. Do note that dE does not give direction of error, only distance, rather like the scoring rings on a rifle target or dartboard. The smaller the dE, however, the less direction has an impact on the actual color being reported vs the reference. It is useful when additional detail describing the color differences is given, which I have attempted to do. This started because I basically was curious about how Eduard's suggested mix of Mission Models paints stacked up, especially given that Mission already produces an outstanding out-of-the-bottle match for early Mitsubishi-built Zeros. For enamels, I respectfully bow to Jamie's passion for accuracy (I just recently purchased a range of his RAF WWII colors and the matching thinner, no easy feat here in the former Colonies). EDIT: In correspondence with me earlier today, Mr. Millman postulated that the Eduard mix may have been meant to match the IJN's standard J3 Grey, as the RGB numbers he has calculated for the original J3 and uses in his .pdf are only a few digits off of those I derived for the Mission Models mix. It is extremely close to his J3, with a dE at 1.73-1.74, and just slightly cooler.

Here we go. I just finished measuring the patch of the Eduard-suggested 70-30 mix of MMP-107 (IJN J3 Lt Grey) and MMP-056 (RLM 02 Grau) respectively. To make a long story short, the better choice for Pearl Harbor machines still appears to be the MMP-110 J3 (SP). In comparison to Nicholas Millman's suggested Munsell 7.4Y 5.8/2.0, RGB 148 143 116 for the Mitsubishi-produced A6M2, the mix gives Munsell 2.2GY 6.0/1.2 RGB 147 149 132 at a dE2000 of 5.02. It is overall cooler (very much so in the case of Nakajima machines, with a dE there of 10.0). In 2018, the Mission Models MMP-110 measured out at Munsell 7.2Y 5.7/2.2 RGB 146 140 111 (at a dE2000 of 1.31). One can plug the RGB numbers into any paint program to get an idea of the relative colors on their monitor.