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Right colors for Swiss Airforce Hawker Hunter Mk.58


WildeSau75

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Hi guys,

I want to build a Swiss Airforce Hawker Hunter Mk.58 and not know which the right colors are.

Can someone help me? I can get a hold of Mr.Hobby Colors, Revell and Tamiya paints - I really would appreciate if someone can let me know which are the right ones to use.

I got different information - also for FS-no's but no conversion chart showed me useful data...

TIA.

Cheers,

Michael

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I suppose British supplied Hunters may have initially been in British colours, but Mike McEvoy wrote once that the Swiss used French paint so may have been repainted accordingly. I hasten to add that I have never seen reference to this elsewhere.

Maybe someone else can shed light on this?

Trevor

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Probably am wrong but I hav always assumed they were the same as RAF or the closest match under FS[/quote

As far as I know they where close to the RAF colors but not exactly like RAF colors. Sure is that different colors where used on the early Mk58 machines (more gloss colors and silver underside) compared to the later Mk.58a (more dull and light grey underside).

What would the RAF colors be? Do you have Gunze/Mr. HobbyColor equivalents?

Cheers,

Michael

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Well the raf colours were raf dark sea grey and raf dark green with undersides in raf high speed silver or raf light aircraft grey

Cool - thanks. Would you or somebody else know the Gunze/Mr.Hobby Color no. ?

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Here a link: http://www.ipms.ch/search.php?q=hawker+hunter&r=0&s=Suche&in=&ex=&ep=&be=&t=forum&adv=0

As a German this time in german. Schau auf der Seite erstmal nach, was der Lackierung entspricht oder welche Du genau bauen möchtest, weil die sich da am meißten mit schweizerischen Flugzeugen beschäftigen werden. Aber ich glaube die Lackierung wird eher der britschen entsprechen, da sie importiert wurden. Ich bin aber auch kein ausgesprochener Hunter Fan.

I will translate the essential things, but not tonight. Cheers to you all.

Is it this on ? Dieser hier?

http://www.ipms.ch/files/public/1296664692_13_FT58_werbung_hunterbuch.pdf

Edited by bbudde
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Here a link: http://www.ipms.ch/search.php?q=hawker+hunter&r=0&s=Suche&in=&ex=&ep=&be=&t=forum&adv=0

As a German this time in german. Schau auf der Seite erstmal nach, was der Lackierung entspricht oder welche Du genau bauen möchtest, weil die sich da am meißten mit schweizerischen Flugzeugen beschäftigen werden. Aber ich glaube die Lackierung wird eher der britschen entsprechen, da sie importiert wurden. Ich bin aber auch kein ausgesprochener Hunter Fan.

I will translate the essential things, but not tonight. Cheers to you all.

Is it this on ? Dieser hier?

http://www.ipms.ch/files/public/1296664692_13_FT58_werbung_hunterbuch.pdf

Hi, Du, vielen Dank. Damit hast Du mir wirklich geholfen. Übersetzung ist nicht nötig ;-) Ich habe drei versch.Hunter, die ich bauen möchte - zwei Schweizer und eine Britische. Mit diesem Link hast Du mir echt geholfen - nochmals danke. Und hey - wie kann man kein Hunter Fan sein?!? ;-) - Gruess us dä Schwiiz

guys, what would be the closest for RAF Highspeed Silver?

Cheers,

Michael

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Hi Michael,

You mentioned you've got some information including FS numbers so this might be well known to you by now:

http://www.eusebio.ch/farben.htm

But perhaps the British colleagues here might be able to confirm, after checking the FS numbers given in the above link, if the colours were indeed the same on the Swiss Hunters as on Her Majesty's ones :) and go on from there in suggesting appropriate solutions in scale (Mr. Hobby, Revell or Tamiya).

Cheers,

Niki

Edited by niki
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The Hunter 58 was up to, and including, J-4100, and all were painted in gloss polyurethane to the normal RAF standard.

There was no such colour as High Speed Silver; it was "silver, to a high speed finish," which was plain silver with a gloss varnish. How well it lasted is solely due to how well it was looked after; on RAF Hunters' undersides it became impossible to tell silver from grey, even at arm's length.

The 58As were J-4101 to J-4152, and were a lighter, matt finish, with grey undersides.

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Hi - thanks a million. That helps - cheers,

Michael

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Hi Michael,

You mentioned you've got some information including FS numbers so this might be well known to you by now:

http://www.eusebio.ch/farben.htm

But perhaps the British colleagues here might be able to confirm, after checking the FS numbers given in the above link, if the colours were indeed the same on the Swiss Hunters as on Her Majesty's ones :) and go on from there in suggesting appropriate solutions in scale (Mr. Hobby, Revell or Tamiya).

Cheers,

Niki

Thanks a million Niki - I do know the page from Eusebio - a good source of information for SAF colors but unfortunately not containing all information.

I would really appreciate if someone could double check the FS numbers - I will post them here.

Your help is really appreciated Niki.

Cheers,

Michael

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The Hunter 58 was up to, and including, J-4100, and all were painted in gloss polyurethane to the normal RAF standard.

There was no such colour as High Speed Silver; it was "silver, to a high speed finish," which was plain silver with a gloss varnish. How well it lasted is solely due to how well it was looked after; on RAF Hunters' undersides it became impossible to tell silver from grey, even at arm's length.

The 58As were J-4101 to J-4152, and were a lighter, matt finish, with grey undersides.

Thanks a lot Edgar.

What confuses me a bit is that it's being called - at least by some - high speed silver which indicates it's silver but many - incl. kits instructions - call for aluminum. So what's the best to use to get it right? A concrete call for a Revell, Tamiya or Mr. HobbyColor paint no would help.

Did the RAF Hunters also had different gloss and Matt paints as the Swiss Airforce machines had?

Cheers,

Michael

Edited by WildeSau75
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The Hunter 58 was up to, and including, J-4100, and all were painted in gloss polyurethane to the normal RAF standard.

There was no such colour as High Speed Silver; it was "silver, to a high speed finish," which was plain silver with a gloss varnish. How well it lasted is solely due to how well it was looked after; on RAF Hunters' undersides it became impossible to tell silver from grey, even at arm's length.

The 58As were J-4101 to J-4152, and were a lighter, matt finish, with grey undersides.

Edgar

would the lighter upper surfaces be different colours or would this be the effect of moving from the original glossier paints to the later matt finish as used by the RAF ?

Thanks a lot Edgar.

What confuses me a bit is that it's being called - at least by some - high speed silver which indicates it's silver but many - incl. kits instructions - call for aluminum. So what's the best to use to get it right? A concrete call for a Revell, Tamiya or Mr. HobbyColor paint no would help.

Did the RAF Hunters also had different gloss and Matt paints as the Swiss Airforce machines had?

Cheers,

Michael

Silver or aluminum are in these instructions used one for the other. The best paint to use depends on what you can find locally and on what degree of weathering you want to represent. This was a aluminum paint, therefore you don't want something shiny as natural metal. It also weathered and the more weathered your aircraft is, the less shiny the paint should be, up to the point of not being really different from a grey.

Personally my favourite is Citadel's Mithirl silver, that however is not in production anymore. Some use Tamiya aluminum spray can. Vallejo's 171 silver also looks good. And of course, Xtracrylic has a specific paint for this. Don't use Humbrol 56 though, this is IMHO too dark.

The RAF Hunters started their life with a semigloss paint and silver/aluminum undersides. In the late '60s the RAF changed paint specifications and they found that it was not possible at the time to have a silver paint with these new specifications. For this reason, a light grey was selected for the undersides. A few years later the paints became matt. Roughly speaking, an RAF aircraft with red/blue roundels would have matt paints, those with red/white/blue roundels woild have the semigloss ones... ok, the story is a bit more complicated than this but it's just to give an idea of what happened. This happened not only on the Hunter but on all RAF types using the dark green/dark sea grey scheme

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Edgar

would the lighter upper surfaces be different colours or would this be the effect of moving from the original glossier paints to the later matt finish as used by the RAF ?

Silver or aluminum are in these instructions used one for the other. The best paint to use depends on what you can find locally and on what degree of weathering you want to represent. This was a aluminum paint, therefore you don't want something shiny as natural metal. It also weathered and the more weathered your aircraft is, the less shiny the paint should be, up to the point of not being really different from a grey.

Personally my favourite is Citadel's Mithirl silver, that however is not in production anymore. Some use Tamiya aluminum spray can. Vallejo's 171 silver also looks good. And of course, Xtracrylic has a specific paint for this. Don't use Humbrol 56 though, this is IMHO too dark.

The RAF Hunters started their life with a semigloss paint and silver/aluminum undersides. In the late '60s the RAF changed paint specifications and they found that it was not possible at the time to have a silver paint with these new specifications. For this reason, a light grey was selected for the undersides. A few years later the paints became matt. Roughly speaking, an RAF aircraft with red/blue roundels would have matt paints, those with red/white/blue roundels woild have the semigloss ones... ok, the story is a bit more complicated than this but it's just to give an idea of what happened. This happened not only on the Hunter but on all RAF types using the dark green/dark sea grey scheme

Thanks a million Giorgio - that helps a lot. Appreciate your help.

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