Graham Boak

The RAF did have a black distemper for temporary operations at night, but this is not what was applied to the port wing underside. As a marking, it was to last for several months, hardly temporary. Even viewed from the distance of 80 years. It was no more temporary than the Sky band and spinner, or yellow leading edge. These were markings dictated by Fighter Command, and possibly were not painted on at the factory but at the MU. Aircraft intended for overseas use did not (normally) have the Fighter Command markings, but did carry the black underwing. It would seem logical that this was therefore painted at the factory.

Sorry, my experience of Matchbox kits did not include "ease of assembly" unless perhaps this included being willing to accept a range of values for wing dihedral (to think of just the one example.) Simple, yes, with few but crude parts by modern standards, but not good fit without working on them? The quality did admittedly vary considerably across the range.

The Almark transfers are a better match for the wartime RAF colour, but that's not allowing for fading in service nor finding something to match the others in the kit.

The wedges were developed to help get the aircraft off aircraft carrier decks. I don't recall any reference for them in use by the RAF in wartime.

It would be a little surprising to confirm two separate sources of spinner production for such a short run of aircraft. Yes the spinner went on for further use on later variants, but not for some time after the decision was made to go ahead with the Mk.XII.

Not quite your key area of interest but the Eduard Ju.52 should be mentioned: it is also available (at least on ebay) in Revell boxes. Another source, if with limited RAF interest, is FToys. As you've probably gathered by now, there is a wide range of 1/144 aircraft and perhaps a more restricted request might have been more helpful. Especially as you can also get 1/144 ships and a wide range of AFVs. N gauge railway products could also be considered.

This isn't going to change the advice given above, but the history may be slightly murkier than suggested. A slight jump in assumptions there, Troy. The question however is not when the Day Fighter Scheme (DFS) was introduced for Fighter Command but when it was applied to Mosquitos. The Mosquito was in service for over a year before these publicity photographs were taken, and Paul Lucas did venture into the murky worlds of rare available photos, AM and DH records in search of just how they were painted before this. This is described in the Guideline booklet. He could not find definitive evidence, nor (IIRC) come up with a date from which they were definitely in DFS. Logically there will be a dated memo to that effect. So there is some doubt about the initial service colours of the DK series. To avoid going anywhere near that matter, the question would be knowing that DK333 was painted (or repainted) after DFS is confirmed. I would suggest that the likeliest answer is DFS, before the Night underside as applied..

I have recently made the AModel I-17 and Bf.109X, both very early AModel kits and definitely somewhat crude. However neither of them caused as much trouble as the recent Airfix Blenheim (shelved partway for future struggles) or Hurricane. (Not quite true about the Bf.109X, but that's a long and irrelevant story involving a conversion. Self-inflicted, no fault of the kit.) I can well imagine the problems with a Tu.128... However the Dove is more recent, and I would expect it to be similar to their Jetstream which I do have, Still not exactly Tamiya, but even at their previous standard there's no comparison to the problems presented by Airmodel conversions. However, as the OP has said he doesn't have the money for the AModel kit and is prepared to work with what he's got, how good AModel kits are becomes irrelevant. Personally I'd sooner save up a bit longer, but everyone differs. The more important thing now is to find out what is still needed, for example does the kit come with the correct canopy for a Devon? Aer there differences in wheels, engine cowlings etc between Herons and a Devon? Did Devons differ among themselves (bet they did)?.

I recall there being a drawing posted in the thread dealing witn SAAF Spitfires, but I didn't keep a reference to find it.

If you are talking about the stereoscopic fitting with tw downward facing cameras, then that's probably true. However from comments on 40 SAAF Spitfires in italy, there was a standard modification for FR work permitting either one sideways-looking camera (either way) or one downward facing camera, This was not something fitted in production.

I think that I first saw this in an issue of SAM. At this stage it was possibly linked to an intended scheme for RAF Hurricanes in Norway, although later-published photos of 46 Sq showed that it hadn't been used. It was later that the 880 Sq photo appeared, showing the mixed-scheme formation. I suspect that it may also have appeared in a profile for a proposed Hurricane on floats. None of which explains P3114..

Given the age of the reference, have you cross-referenced this with more recent plans for the Magister, and indeed compared the kit to Magister kits? Just as an independent check (or two?) There is also a Hawk Major in the Museum at Montrose, so it may be possible to obtain measures of the fuselage depth. I used to work with Pete Amos at Dunsfold, so know that he is (or was) a keen modeller, so it is unlikely that he will just have copied the early plan for his magnum opus without having done some checking. However given the size of his task it is possible that such things creep in. I know that errors in KP kits are not exactly unknown, and entirely agree about warning fellow-modellers, but it would be best to rely on more than one source before risking damaging sales of the smaller producers - or indeed anyone else!

Agreed, but there are more important aspects of this than the use of a specific pigment. RN use was very small, and I don't think that there's any evidence of the Army being adversely affected by using brown for a few years - they did manage to produce a perfectly acceptable olive green with SCC15 without using chromium oxide. But unless evidence is found of specific Japanese problems with pigments (as opposed to oil and other strategic materials) then suggesting it as a cause of late-war colour changes is just imaginative. Maybe: but if the Allies didn't have the Chromium Oxide, and the Axis powers suffered from severe shortages of strategic materials, then who did?

Not just the British Army but also the RN had to remove green from their camouflages - in this case the Western Approaches scheme invented by Peter Scott. This was indeed said to be because of priority given to the RAF.

This would because rare, as the Night underside of the Intruder scheme had rather fallen out of use by the time the Mk.VI was commonly in use. Mk.VIs were used in small numbers in 100 Group as escorts to Bomber Command, so this is likely to be your best place to look.