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Question re Spitfire WHEELS UP ... stencil


Seawinder

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Were the WHEELS UP WHEN INDICATOR FLUSH stencils deleted on the airframes that didn't have the indicators? Seems obvious, but I've never seen any statement that nails it down.

Thanks,

Pip

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Seeing that nobody has responded to the question (there may not be any answers), let me ask this: Were stencils generally applied once the airframes were all assembled or as part of the manufacturing process? If the latter, then it could be that there were batches of wings pre-manufactured with the WHEELS UP ... stencils that predated the order to omit the indicators. If the former, it's hard to see why they would apply a stencil referencing a non-existent item. Anybody?

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Spares were supposed to be delivered in primer, only, so the stencils should have been painted after the camouflage/roundels were applied, and that would be more likely at an M.U., rather than the user unit.

When wings, which had the mechanism fitted, were to be modified, the work included a small patch to be riveted under/in the hole(s.) As that would have needed to be touched in with filler and paint since it involved drilling out 6 rivets over a 2" x 2.15" area, it seems likely (but I have no proof, since the leaflet makes no mention) that the rigger or Aircraft Finisher would have painted over the redundant stencils (possibly even sanded them off first, before smoothing down the surface.)

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