Blackburn Shark colours used in Malaya? (and other questions)

[phat trev]

A few questions about the Blackburn Shark that I am hoping others here may know or provide help with..

What schemes would the Sharks that were sent out to Malaya and the East be? Would I be correct in guessing camoflaged such as the Vickers Vilderbeasts (green/blue over a lighter blue) or even with black undersides?

Would the cowls have been removed during use to keep the engines that bit cooler in the tropical heat? and would they have fillters?

Would there have been any MK.II with 3 bladed props?

(just found this http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=234915076 so a good start!)

Edited September 26, 2012 by phat trev

[Edgar]

This is the designated pre-war scheme:-

Edgar

[gingerbob]

A proper cowling helps to cool the engine, so I doubt they'd remove it.

bob

[mhaselden]

Unfortunately, very little is known about the Sharks in Malaya. Indeed, to say that they might have worn the same camo as the Vildebeests is fraught with assumptions, not least because we don't know what colours were used on the 'Beest. We had a long-running thread a while back on that topic and the general consensus was that Vildebeest camo and markings changed over time. It's not entirely clear whether they had black undersides, Sky Blue undersides or both at different times.

Association of the green/blue scheme with the Vildebeest was made Lucas' work on camo during the early stages of the Far East war but it originates in pre-war camo trials. As far as I know, there's no documentary proof that it was actually implemented (although it looks very nice and is an unusual scheme). Other alternatives include the "standard" Extra Dark Sea Grey/Dark Slate Grey scheme or the more mundane Dark Earth/Dark Green.

For the Sharks, I'd probably plump for Dark Earth/Dark Green...but that's just me.

Cheers,

Mark

[Seahawk]

An important thing to remember is that these aircraft were not intended as operational maritime aircraft but had been sent out to the Far East as target tugs. So when they were camouflaged I would have expected the second-line scheme of DE/DG with yellow undersides, maybe even with TT stripes. I would also imagine that the undersides would have been overpainted before the aircraft started doing anything warlike.

The earlier thread that you have found mentions a photo in Bloody Shambles that looked like DE/DG.

NB: no facts on colours in the above, just opinion and surmise!

[mhaselden]

Wondered when you'd chip in on this, Seahawk...not that you have a "thing" for Malayan Sharks! :-)

[Seahawk]

Wondered when you'd chip in on this, Seahawk...not that you have a "thing" for Malayan Sharks! :-)

Have kept quiet till now because I dumped all I know in the earlier thread.

Except that now we can use the bombs and racks from the new Airfix Swordfish to bomb up our Malayan Sharks.

[Seahawk]

STOP PRESS!

Some brilliant reference material on the Shark's cockpit interior here:

http://www.clubhyper.com/forums/groupbuildframe.htm

It's for a Shark III but I doubt whether the Shark II was very different, canopy excepted.

[Mark Mackenzie]

n/m

Edited January 5, 2020 by Mark Mackenzie

[phat trev]

This is the designated pre-war scheme:-

Edgar

Much like the Skua and Gladiator I suspect looking at these drawings?

[Edgar]

A letter, with the drawing, says that the Swordfish was substantially the same, though that doesn't help much, since Farnborough didn't have a copy of the Swordfish drawing for comparison.

Edgar