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Malta Spitfire questions


Jens

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I recently bought four of the new Special Hobby Spitfire Mk. Vc kit, and I want to finish two of them as Spits that saw action over Malta, more specifically BR344/M-3 of 601 Sqn and BP955/J-1 also of 601 Sqn. Both are featured on the kit decal sheet.

BR344/M-3 is shown as being painted in the temperate land scheme of dark green and dark earth with sky lower surfaces. From the picture in 'Spitfire at War 3' by Dr Alfred Price it sure does seem to be darker than the desert scheme so perhaps the temperate land scheme might not be incorrect even though I believe 1942 would be too late for this scheme to be painted on a Spitfire. If it wasn't DG/DE, what would it have been?

BP955/J-1 is shown in the desert scheme which I guess is correct.

Any comments on the colours of these two aircraft?

Thanks in advance.

Regards,

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Hello Jens,

The Spits over Malta hat a desert scheme in the beginning, but since the desert colour was too visible over the water, they had been repaint with whatever dark colour was available. When the aircrafts were shuttled on a US carrier to Malta, they have even used standard USN colours for that.

So, if you don't have any photographic evidence or real accurate information about this specific aircraft - be creative. They had to be as well. In this time, not beeing shot down was more important than having a 100% correct camouflage scheme...

Alex

Edit: just found something in the Ospreys "Spit Mk. V aces": about the visibilty: "To overcome this problem aircraft were repainted in the darker colours to make them less conspicuous, groundcrew using whatever paint was avilable locally, giving rise to a host of unofficial schemes. Later reinforcement spitfires arrived in slate grey/dark green camouflage".

The colour profiles in the book show some spits, where the midstone segments have been darkened with a blue-greyish colour.

Edited by alex
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Thanks Alex.

I am aware that many of the Malta Spits were repainted with blue/grey paint, but I am pretty sure the two aircraft I want to make were in factory finish - at least at the time I want to represent.

I forgot to mention that M-3 had a very distinct wavy upper/lower demarcation line. Perhaps that indicates something?

Regards,

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There's some people here that have spent some time studying the Malta based spitfires, and I'm sure they'll be able to give you better info than I can, however one thing to keep in mind is the temperate land scheme was officially used until the end of the war in the mediterranean theatre. Therefore 1942 might not be late at all for a TLS spitfire.

Giorgio

Edited by Giorgio N
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The wavy line almost certainly indicates some creative thinking on board the carrier. British demarcation was always set as a straight line, at a particular point on the lower fuselage. Everyone has their favourite colour, for the blue; mine is Deck Blue 20B, with which Wasp's deck was painted throughout her career.

Edgar

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Hello Jens,

The Spits over Malta hat a desert scheme in the beginning, but since the desert colour was too visible over the water, they had been repaint with whatever dark colour was available. When the aircrafts were shuttled on a US carrier to Malta, they have even used standard USN colours for that.

So, if you don't have any photographic evidence or real accurate information about this specific aircraft - be creative. They had to be as well. In this time, not beeing shot down was more important than having a 100% correct camouflage scheme...

Alex

Edit: just found something in the Ospreys "Spit Mk. V aces": about the visibilty: "To overcome this problem aircraft were repainted in the darker colours to make them less conspicuous, groundcrew using whatever paint was avilable locally, giving rise to a host of unofficial schemes. Later reinforcement spitfires arrived in slate grey/dark green camouflage".

The colour profiles in the book show some spits, where the midstone segments have been darkened with a blue-greyish colour.

I'm backing up Alex 200%.

After reading numerous books on Malta spits in the past 20 years (My prefered one => Malta, the spitfire year, Grub street, C. Shores, B. Cull and N. Malizia), I've never found anything very precise about their "blue" camo.

For the references, maybe you should also check this recent Osprey book:

9781846033056.JPG

I'm sorry, I didn't get it yet.

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If it is carrying the codes 3-M, then it was still in the delivery scheme for Operation Bowery from the USS Wasp. This was the desert scheme, as can be seen in the clearer photos on the deck. 3-M is seen in one of these photos. The latest Osprey book suggests that some repainting was done in Gibraltar but if so this applies to aircraft from HMS Eagle - coded C-xx of which no photos appear to have survived. (Beware of 4-C photographed on Wasp. This is coded in Wasp's 4-x series, x being a letter, not Eagle's C-xx series, xx being a number).

Note that both operations launched in the early hours, presenting problems for the photographs and resulting in the camouflage appearing darker than usual.

If it went to 601 sq, then it will have been at Hal Far. Apart from the deliveries from Operation Calendar, the blue-grey schemes appear to be mainly on aircraft operated from Takali. Photos of Hal Far aircraft in this period are rare.

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Thanks for the replies.

At the moment I am not interested in making one of the blue ones so I will focus on the ones I have mentiones. A blue Mk. Vb might follow later on.

I already have the Osprey book on the Malta Spits, but little is mentioned in the text regarding colours, and I do not trust colour profiles.

Graham, I agree with you that 3-M is still in the delivery scheme as it is way too neat to have been the blue scheme. You mention that it was in the desert scheme. However, the lower surface colour is lighter than both upper surface colours, something which azure blue is not in pictures of other Spits in the desert scheme (in these the azure blue appears darker than the mid stone). To me this indicated that 3-M was either not in the desert scheme, or the lower surfaces were a lighter colour than azure blue. Which one to you think is more likely?

I have read somewhere that the temperate land scheme would not have been unlikely. What's your opinion on this Graham?

Regards,

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Be very careful with Azure Blue. This has been confused in the past, either with Mediterranean Light Blue or with the prewar Azure, both of which are indeed dark(ish). MLB was used in the Middle East as a replacement for the unacceptably light Sky, and was an optional colour for the Desert Scheme. I suspect this is what you have seen.

The true Azure Blue is not a dark colour, but a light blue. The light undersurface colour you mention could indeed be Azure Blue, or it could be Sky Blue. I have been told that Castle Bromwich used Azure Blue, but Supermarines used Sky Blue. This does lead to problems as to what is meant by Sky Blue, as there are at least two different colours of this name. The wartime Sky Blue is very pale, lighter than Sky, so unlikely to have been acceptable for the tropical aircraft. The prewar Sky Blue appears to have a greenish tinge. The early wartime RAAF and SAAF both have a Sky Blue that is a pure "baby blue", but curiously(and uniquely?) this does not seem to have an RAF origin. I do wonder if the RAF had a prewar Sky Blue that differed from the 1930 BS shade, but I've no direct evidence for this.

Whatever, this Sky Blue and Azure Blue appear to have been very similar: I believe both WEM and Xtracolour do accurate Azure Blues, but I must admit to using a rather nice Humbrol "baby blue" on my Op. Calendar Spit.

I know of one recent historian who believes in the widespread use of the Temperate Land Scheme on Malta Spitfires, but I think there is little evidence for this, at least for the summer 1942 deliveries. TLS did reappear in the Mediterranean after the Axis collapse in North Africa, it being more appropriate for the Italian campaign in 1943.

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Thanks for all this useful information. Unfortunately we simple souls who like to be told what to do will rather frustrated. The fascinating but annoying thing about the "Blue Spitfire" debate is that there are so many variations of possibilities. So it is with some sence of foreboding that I pose the question - what colour were the spinners?

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The fascinating but annoying thing about the "Blue Spitfire" debate is that there are so many variations of possibilities. So it is with some sence of foreboding that I pose the question - what colour were the spinners?

Yes, but if everything was well known and/or according to "the book", they wouldn't be as fascinating.

OK, I'll stick my neck out here. 1942 deliveries to Malta in the Desert Scheme will have had Dark Earth spinners. Those partially (EDSG on top of the Mid Stone) repainted are likely to have retained this. Those fully repainted in the dark colour, assumed to be in the blue-ish Extra Dark Sea Grey or something similar, are likely to have had EDSG spinners. Or whatever. Those coming to the island in 1943 from the Desert Air Force should have had red spinners. So if you know when your subject arrived on the island, you've a good hint. If you can tell Dark Earth from EDSG from Red in most b+w photos, you've a better eye than I have.

Spinners are the kind of detail that squadrons tend to adopt to display their individuality. So there could be a lot of variation hidden in b+w photos, but I don't recall mention of this in any of the references.

Edited by Graham Boak
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I'm probably a bit late to this discussion but does this help?

MaltaSpitfires.jpg

Source: The Hamlyn Concise Guide to British Aircraft of World War II - David Mondey

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Jens,

There's a build review of this kit by Tony Gloster in this month's (December) Scale Aviation Modeller if you're interested?

Tim :rolleyes:

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