Export Hunter Colour Question

[John]

On Hunters that carried a desert camouflage finish, like the Saudi examples, what was used for the light blue undersurface colour?

John

[Antoine]

Azure blue.

And dark earth/light stone above.

[John]

Azure blue.

And dark earth/light stone above.

Yes, thats what I would have thought too, but wasn't Azure Blue dropped as an Aircraft Finish just after the War? Middle Stone was, which is why the BS381 colour Light Stone was used on the upper surfaces.

John

[Gary West]

Check out the build article on this very topic in this month (May 2007)'s Model Airplane International.

I have said magazine in front of me and the colour is given as RAF Azure Blue

[Dave Fleming]

it's NOT Azure Blue, it's not even a BS381C colour.

The reference is upstairs at present, but the blue colour used on the underside of Hunters was to an ICI spec. It may have been close to Azure blue, it may have looked like Azure Blue, but to call it Azure Blue is wrong.

[John]

Yes, that's my recollection as well. I think it's a brighter blue than wartime Azure, and totally different to BS381 Azure.

I'm thinking about a Hunter for the GB, which is what prompted the question.

John

[thx6667]

Dave is right, they were not BS 381C colours. According to my refs the camouflage colours for the export Hunters were:

Brown ICI F407-1815

Sand ICI F407-1814

Deep Sky Blue ICI F407-1813

[John]

These colours ring a definite bell with me. Dave Klaus quotes the same upper surface colours for Dubai Hawks with F407-1915 Light Sky Blue undersurfaces.

My feeling is that the ICI Deep Sky Blue was a brighter blue than the old MAP Azure, somewhere around Humbrol 44 Pastel Blue (which was available as an acrylic but is no longer listed) or 47 Sea Blue.

Neither MAP Middle Stone or Azure Blue seem to have survived in use much after the end of the war. As to whether the upper surface colours matched the quoted BS381 shades, I have no idea!

John

[John]

Squinting at the instruction sheet for the XtraDecal set of International Hawker Hunters, it looks like the recommended undersurface colour for the desert schemes is Deep Sky Blue.

http://www.hannants.co.uk/search/?FULL=X72063

John

[thx6667]

It does, although it also quotes Light Stone and Dark Earth from the BS381C range whereas all my refs here quote the ICI colours for the Saudi, Kuwait and Qatar Hunters.

[John]

Yes, noticed that. It's always a possibility that the ICI colours were a close match for the BS381 shades, on the other hand maybe any sand and brown will do - memories of a very early Airfix Kittyhawk painted in Humbrol No.9 Tan, 10 Service Brown and some unidentified light blue on the bottom, pinched from my Dad's paint stock! Looked fine to me.

John

[thx6667]

Yes, noticed that. It's always a possibility that the ICI colours were a close match for the BS381 shades, on the other hand maybe any sand and brown will do - memories of a very early Airfix Kittyhawk painted in Humbrol No.9 Tan, 10 Service Brown and some unidentified light blue on the bottom, pinched from my Dad's paint stock! Looked fine to me.

John

From the research point of view its always nice to be able to pin down what the actual colour was, but given that aircraft painted the same colour vary anyway (not to mention the whole "scale colour" thing), when it comes to a scale model I think any paint that fits the bill to your own eye is the best solution.

Now, I wonder what the best Humbrol match for those Saudi "Green Falcon" Hawks would be..?

[John]

Hmmmmmmm - I wonder??

[StephenMG]

Apologies for jumping on to an old(ish) thread but I'm new here and thought I might be of help.

As has already been said the export desert camo colours were definately not BS381C colours but were specific ICI colours. Jonathan has already quoted the correct code numbers so I won't repeat them again. As to which Humbrol colours match, well that's tricky because none do exactly!

The "Brown" is very close to "Dark Earth" to be fair, so that's a perfectly acceptable alternative. There was some slight variation in the Brown anyway (certainly on the Qatari Hunters) so Dark Earth is close enough.

The "Sand" colour is also misleading because "Light Stone" as recommended by the XtraDecal sheet is far from a good match. The ICI "Sand" as specified for the desert Hunters is much yellower and is much more of a Mustard colour. It's not easy to match this one but I'm working on it!

The ICI "Deep Sky Blue" is not RAF Azure Blue. If anyone wants to compare them with Humbrol colours then I can tell you that the proper "Deep Sky Blue" is an exact match for Ford Caribbean Blue! It's a bit of a cock-eyed way of matching a colour I know but if you can find a model paint colour that matches Ford Caribbean Blue then you'll be spot on. If you happen to have a Ford car that's Caribbean Blue then park it outside your LMS and give it a try! A good starting point is Humbrol 109 if I remember correctly - better check that though because it's a while since I tried this colour and I'm working from a distant memory there!

I haven't finished researching this yet but I should be able to get the colours matched perfectly given a bit of time.

Cheers.

[keefr22]

The ICI "Deep Sky Blue" is not RAF Azure Blue. If anyone wants to compare them with Humbrol colours then I can tell you that the proper "Deep Sky Blue" is an exact match for Ford Caribbean Blue! It's a bit of a cock-eyed way of matching a colour I know but if you can find a model paint colour that matches Ford Caribbean Blue then you'll be spot on. If you happen to have a Ford car that's Caribbean Blue then park it outside your LMS and give it a try! A good starting point is Humbrol 109 if I remember correctly - better check that though because it's a while since I tried this colour and I'm working from a distant memory there!

Cheers.

Or if you have the code for that paint, you could see if Steve at Hiroboy can mix it (you could ask him even without the code). He can produce almost any car colour as a basecoat paint. These are becoming very widely used by car modellers - they have to be clearcoated for cars, but out of the bottle they spray beautifully & dry to a matt/satin finish - just like a good model acrylic. He also does 'general' colours like white, black etc & dayglo red/orange etc., & he also has a RAL colour chart listed They may seem expensive at £4 odd a bottle, but said bottle is bigger than most hobby paints. He also carries a growing range of very useful 'general' modelling products;

www.hiroboy.com

Usual disclaimer - no connection other than a very happy user when I'm building my "dark side" models!!

Keef

PS - Halfords might still do Caribbean blue in their aerosol range - that still consists mostly of 1970's colours!!

[StephenMG]

Well I haven't got a definite answer on the underside blue yet, but I have determined two very good 'off the shelf' matches for the upper surface camo colours for the export Hunters if anyone's interested.

I dropped in to my local(ish) model shop today and, to my horror, they no longer sell Humbrol paints only Revell. Nonetheless I arrived at the following conclusions,

For the original Brown (ICI F407-1815) Revell 82 (Dark Earth) is a good match. The Humbrol version (Matt 29) is as well, but I knew that anyway.

For the original Sand (ICI F407-1814) Revell 16 (Sandy Yellow I think it's called) is a very good match indeed. According to the conversion charts on t'internet Humbrol 94 (though some say 93) is the closest. Can't comment on the Humbrol ones at present but the Revell is an excellent match.

As for the blue, well I've commented on that already but Revell Gloss 50 looks reasonably close but it's gloss - which I don't like much! There is no matt version so a mix is needed to get it right. Revell Matt 56, as a starting point, lightened with white shouldn't be far off.

I have access to original export Hunter fuselage panels with their original paint on them so the I can say with some certainty that Revell 82 and Revell 16 are THE colours for the upper surfaces.

Hope that's helpful for anyone building export Hunters like me!

See http://www.hawkerhunter.com for some reference material.

[Paul Bradley]

Well I haven't got a definite answer on the underside blue yet, but I have determined two very good 'off the shelf' matches for the upper surface camo colours for the export Hunters if anyone's interested.

I dropped in to my local(ish) model shop today and, to my horror, they no longer sell Humbrol paints only Revell. Nonetheless I arrived at the following conclusions,

For the original Brown (ICI F407-1815) Revell 82 (Dark Earth) is a good match. The Humbrol version (Matt 29) is as well, but I knew that anyway.

For the original Sand (ICI F407-1814) Revell 16 (Sandy Yellow I think it's called) is a very good match indeed. According to the conversion charts on t'internet Humbrol 94 (though some say 93) is the closest. Can't comment on the Humbrol ones at present but the Revell is an excellent match.

As for the blue, well I've commented on that already but Revell Gloss 50 looks reasonably close but it's gloss - which I don't like much! There is no matt version so a mix is needed to get it right. Revell Matt 56, as a starting point, lightened with white shouldn't be far off.

I have access to original export Hunter fuselage panels with their original paint on them so the I can say with some certainty that Revell 82 and Revell 16 are THE colours for the upper surfaces.

Hope that's helpful for anyone building export Hunters like me!

See http://www.hawkerhunter.com for some reference material.

Useful info Stephen, and a nice website too!