Blenheim Mk.I internal colours?

[Seahawk]

From Warner: The Bristol Blenheim (p.472):

"Most of 113 Sq's Blenheim IV-F aircraft had the local modification of a long-barrel 20mm Hispano cannon mounted on the floor of the Observer's position and projecting through the starboard panel of the bomb-aiming window. This made strafing attacks more effective and was later adopted by some of the other squadrons, such as 14. The standard bomber aircraft were not modified although they sometimes left off the bomb doors, allowing them to fit more bomb carriers into the bay and avoiding the problems caused when the fins of light bombs occasionally caught in the bomb doors, which were held closed by bungee cords and forced open by the weight of the released bombs above them. A few of the cannon-armed 'strafer' Blenheims had the 'shark's mouth' markings made famous on the noses of the Kittyhawks of 112 Squadron"

From caption to 2 nice clear photos of the mod on the same page:

"To increase fire-power for ground strafing, 20mm cannon were mounted in the Observer's position of some Blenheim IV-Fs of 14, 45 and 113 Squadrons. The 'lash-up' blocked the emergency exit and the ammunition feed caused the pitot head to be moved forward."

Hispano it is, then. (False memory syndrome is a dreadful thing.) Borrowed from RAF Regiment LAA? The approximate time-frame is Op Crusader (November 1941).

PS The barrel visible in the photos looks much more like a Hispano than that of the Breda shown in Work-In-Progress's link.

Edited June 11, 2016 by Seahawk

[Work In Progress]

I appreciate that it's probably neither big nor clever to draw pleasure from being proved right on a chain of reasoned speculation, but on this occasion I can't resist...

[bentwaters81tfw]

Went to a talk recently given by the chap who was in charge of all three Blenheim restorations at DX. Lots of pictures, and although it's a restoration, they had a guy who worked on Blenheims at Bristols, and another chap who was the World expert on the Mercury. The Mk.1 nose came direct from a former Bristol employee who converted it to an electric car. All the original bits where possible. It is grey green inside, and restored exactly as an original machine. The only exception is the CAA wanted a steel mainspar cap added, which has stiffened up the airframe. All replacement parts are to original or equivalent spec.

[mhaselden]

From Warner: The Bristol Blenheim (p.472):

"Most of 113 Sq's Blenheim IV-F aircraft had the local modification of a long-barrel 20mm Hispano cannon mounted on the floor of the Observer's position and projecting through the starboard panel of the bomb-aiming window. This made strafing attacks more effective and was later adopted by some of the other squadrons, such as 14. The standard bomber aircraft were not modified although they sometimes left off the bomb doors, allowing them to fit more bomb carriers into the bay and avoiding the problems caused when the fins of light bombs occasionally caught in the bomb doors, which were held closed by bungee cords and forced open by the weight of the released bombs above them. A few of the cannon-armed 'strafer' Blenheims had the 'shark's mouth' markings made famous on the noses of the Kittyhawks of 112 Squadron"

From caption to 2 nice clear photos of the mod on the same page:

"To increase fire-power for ground strafing, 20mm cannon were mounted in the Observer's position of some Blenheim IV-Fs of 14, 45 and 113 Squadrons. The 'lash-up' blocked the emergency exit and the ammunition feed caused the pitot head to be moved forward."

Hispano it is, then. (False memory syndrome is a dreadful thing.) Borrowed from RAF Regiment LAA? The approximate time-frame is Op Crusader (November 1941).

PS The barrel visible in the photos looks much more like a Hispano than that of the Breda shown in Work-In-Progress's link.

Thanks for sharing...fascinating info. Must dig out my copy. To my mind, it makes much more sense for it to be a standard RAF weapon than something captured from the Italians just from a maintenance perspective.

[Seahawk]

Couple of further points on this mod:

- the caption to the lower photo in Sloegin's post 12 says that the port bomb-aimer's window was removed to accommodate the gun. The photos in the Warner book show that actually it was a rather neater job than that, with the gun projecting through a small port in the outside lower corner of the window, with the hole and the first 10" or so of the projecting gun barrel wrapped neatly in fabric or cloth, presumably to reduce draughts.

- on the particular aircraft illustrated by Warner, there appear to be curved ejection shutes over the gunpack ejection ports, one serving the 2 inner guns and the outer ones having shutes of their own. Same photo, bit larger and hence clearer, appear on p.79 of Chaz Bowyer's Bristol Blenheim. The same feature is visible on the photo in Sloegin's post but there one might be inclined to dismiss it as possible damage during or post the crash-landing.

[Nick Millman]

FWIW the 20mm cannon mod was applied to 45 Sqn's new Blenheim IVFs too collected at the end of January 1942. The head on photo in Warner's book is included in Wg Cdr C J Jefford's Air Britain book on 45 Sqn where it is identified as Z6094 flown by Sqn Ldr Hughes. According to the book the modification was an urgent response to a new German offensive with the Blenheims intended as "tank busters".

Nick

[lasermonkey]

Zombie necro-bump!

 

I remembered that I had done some screen grabs of a colour film that was shot inside a Blenheim factory and, having seen a few posts recently enquiring about how the engines were painted, thought I'd share them again in a more useful place. There's some other interesting details, such as the colour of the exhaust collector rings, the primer colour, etc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hopefully these will come in useful to some of you.

 

Cheers,

Mark.

 

 

[dogsbody]

NICE!!

 

Proof again that the Bristol engine gear casings are black.

 

As a note about the exhaust collector rings, the ones in the photos are un-used. The engines have not been run yet. Soon after firing them up, the colour of the collectors would start to darken from heat staining.

 

 

Chris

[jimmaas]

Yes, the collector would darken (but to to a uniform bronze color so beloved in ancient painting instructions).  There's one bit that is often overlooked - the front lip remained 'steelish' since it was a separate part.  Easy to do - paint and smudge up the collector ring with the burnt metal of choice.  Then use a circle cutter to make a thin ring from dull silver decal (Tauro made a great sheet for this) with the inner diameter equal to the  collector ring opening.  The ring will be thin enough that some decal softener will settle it down properly. 

[dogsbody]

54 minutes ago, jimmaas said:

Yes, the collector would darken (but to to a uniform bronze color so beloved in ancient painting instructions).  There's one bit that is often overlooked - the front lip remained 'steelish' since it was a separate part.  Easy to do - paint and smudge up the collector ring with the burnt metal of choice.  Then use a circle cutter to make a thin ring from dull silver decal (Tauro made a great sheet for this) with the inner diameter equal to the  collector ring opening.  The ring will be thin enough that some decal softener will settle it down properly. 

 

Or you could dry-brush some lighter metallic colour onto the front bit and also a bit to the rear of the dis-coloured ring.

 

Actually, the front of the ring wasn't a separate part on the earlier Bristol collector rings, as it was on the later Hercules engines.

 

 

 

And please, please do not paint them a nice shiny bright copper/bronze. There was un-even heating of the ring causing variations in the colour. Look at colour photos and take a close look at the rings. There are still a few Bristol powered aircraft flying about. Look at photos of those aircraft.

 

Chris

[nsmekanik]

 

Nice, thanks for posting those, here are a few of my MK 1's

 

To my mind it looks like the landing gear could be interior green or primer grey? on at least the MK 1, with either aluminum or black hubs

 

Looks like the canopy the canopy frames are black interestingly enough, I wonder if the seats might be that bus seat green? 

[dogsbody]

I've been wondering about the colour of the interior framing of canopies, especially on WW2 RAF aircraft for a while now. Somewhere in the past I remember reading that the framing was black, at least on Hurricanes, but I can't remember just where I read it and so far I haven't found it in any of the old magazines that I have amassed. Part of my problem is that my magazines are in such a state of disorder. There was the sewage backup of 2016 ( nothing lost as everything is at least an inch off the floor and I have a backup valve in the basement floor drain ) and the water heater blow out of February 2019.

 

 

Chris

[Muddyf]

I have access to a Bolingbroke restoration, the original cockpit framing that I have seen is all in the Canadian version of grey-green.

[dogsbody]

I took these at the Nanton Lancaster Museum ( now The Bomber Command Museum ) in 2004.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chris