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RAF Dark Green 1942


224 Peter

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Interesting site Rob, did you notice that their address is Marfleet Road, Hull? Very close to where Humbrol used to be. 

 

I've started to do volunteer work at http://www.boscombedownaviationcollection.co.uk/: they have RAF Aircraft mostly from the 50s onward, but at the moment they are restoring an Auster. It is dark earth and dark green.

I'll prepare some colour swatches and see what matches best and also find out where they get the paint!

Then I'll do the same with the Jaguar, the Harrier GR3 cockpit area and so on.  

 

Peter

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5 hours ago, 224 Peter said:

Interesting site Rob, did you notice that their address is Marfleet Road, Hull? Very close to where Humbrol used to be. 

 

I've started to do volunteer work at http://www.boscombedownaviationcollection.co.uk/: they have RAF Aircraft mostly from the 50s onward, but at the moment they are restoring an Auster. It is dark earth and dark green.

I'll prepare some colour swatches and see what matches best and also find out where they get the paint!

Then I'll do the same with the Jaguar, the Harrier GR3 cockpit area and so on.  

 

Peter

 

Hi Peter I didnt notice that. But that is very interesting. I must order some of their paint and have a go with them, Might paint my car with them :)

 

I look forward to seeing the swatches.

 

I just received some new Gunze Mr Colour and Mr Hobby H73 and 330 Both are excellent and Id Happily use them on any Raf Subject. H73 is lighter and looks more like the older paint type. But nothing Like Hu30 which seems a very vivid green in recent years. Though I am hearing it has possibly been changed again.

Cant go wrong with Humbrol 116, 163 Though. Especially the enamel shades.

If you want it to be somewhere inbetween and more toward the Green than brownish green try Pheonix Precision. One of the best Enamels you will find today.

 

https://www.phoenix-paints.co.uk/products/raf

 

https://www.phoenix-paints.co.uk/products/precisionmilitary

 

I am about to buy some more :pilot:

Cheers Rob :)

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  • 2 weeks later...

Talking to the guys at the Boscombe Down Aircraft Museum about this subject there are a number of interesting facts. 

 

First, Dark Green is Dark Green, it is the same BS Colour reference it has been since the 1930s. 

Second, it weathers badly and the degree of weathering depends on many things: who made the paint, what is underneath, where the aircraft has been and how much sun it has had. 

 

They are presently restoring Meteor WD686, an NF11 built by Armstrong Whitworth in 1952, delivered to the Telecommunications Research Establishment where it stayed until 1955. Then after a short period with No. 14 Maintenance Unit, Wroughton, it went to the Royal Aircraft Establishment, Bedford. It was transferred to the Imperial War Museum in 1974. It ended up at Weybourne on the coast and moved to Old Sarum a couple of years ago. 

The aircraft was finished in the night fighter scheme of the day, Medium Sea Grey overall with Dark Green upper pattern, as doesn't seem to have been repainted. 

The wings are outside at Old Sarum and it looks to me as though the MSG is very much the colour it always was. 

But the Dark Green? 

This is a photo taken 4 years ago"

 

Meteor-WG-686-in-2014.jpg

 

Since then the "Dark Green" has become more like Dark Earth. I'll take a new photograph later this week. 

I'll also take my FS 595a chips up and see what matches best. 

 

So, you can paint the Dark Green area in a number of colours.... a new aircraft of any age should be a match to the present BS number. As the aircraft ages it goes more and more olive and then brown green.

OK. few aircraft are 60 plus years old and still in much the same colours they were delivered in, but this convinces me that other than "as new" there is no "correct" RAF Dark Green!! 

 

 

 

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By that logic there is no "correct" colour as every one will fade/weather/change with time.  I'd say the Medium Sea Grey on that Meteor was a lot lighter than it was, and certainly more so than on aircraft painted more resdently.  Of course, if you are already light grey then where isn't a lot of ways to become lighter and greyer, but fresh MSG is perhaps surprisingly blue.

 

However, as to DG changing to a chocolate brown, can I refer you to my post #3?  That photo is quite an excellent example of what I was seeing in places such as Newark Museum, back in the early 90s.  So a mere 30 years old then - if that in some cases?.

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Graham, 

 

you are/were absolutely correct, I just had not appreciated just how brown the green could go. 

I'm going to take bit of card painted with MSG Humbrol Acrylic and compare with various bits of WD686.

Logically, the undersurface of the wing should be less faded and more blue than the fuselage and upper wing.

Photos to follow....in a few days. 

 

 

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Three photos:

Dark-Green-B.jpg

 

Dark-Green-G.jpg

 

Dark-Green-N.jpg

 

Same photo, one original image of WD 686 taken in the rain this morning. 

The last photo is as taken, the second adjusted using photoshop to slightly enhance the dark green to make it look more as expected and the first to make the Medium Sea Grey to match a sample of Humbrol MSG Acrylic. 

 

What does this show?

First, Dark Green applied in the 1950s fades to almost dark earth whilst the Medium Sea Grey changes very little. 

Second, a photograph can change the apparent colour, especially if the original was a colour film and it has been converted to digital. 

Digital cameras are also subject to variation....

 

My conclusions.

1. Dark Green is defined by a BS Colour and that colour reference has not changed since the 1930s. 

2. The only true match is "as new": the colour fades and ages, depending on local conditions.

3. The rate of age related change will depend on both the conditions and the pigments used in the paint. 

4. The pigments used change with time and manufacturer. 

 

So, I shall in future consider how old the aircraft being modelled is, where it has spent its life, how it has been cared for and how old it is.

Dark Green ages through olive green to almost khaki brown, it never increases towards the blue-green so I'll modify Dark Green accordingly! 

Edited by 224 Peter
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  • 3 years later...

Hi,

As Jamie says, the correct colour is in the back of RAF museum series Vol 3 British Aviation Colours of WW2. Its just a question of which model paint matches that. Simple as that.

Jamie matches to that by the way.

Rather than try and spin three plates on three sticks, I will refer you to the thread on RAF Dark Green:-

I aim to spray out all Model paint Dark Greens I have, compare them in north light, cloudy sky, using grey card with holes, at midday to the MAP paint sample in RAF British Aviation Colors of WW2 RAF museum series Vol3 book 'the bible', and post the results using photos taken technically correct, as spectro scan numbers etc dont mean much unless one can create colours from such, but all my colour cards laid together in best match order will be meaningful. Then I will do Dark Earth, then sky, and so on, many days of work if not weeks.

 

Merlin

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On 4/4/2018 at 5:22 PM, 224 Peter said:

My conclusions.

1. Dark Green is defined by a BS Colour and that colour reference has not changed since the 1930s. 

2. The only true match is "as new": the colour fades and ages, depending on local conditions.

3. The rate of age related change will depend on both the conditions and the pigments used in the paint. 

4. The pigments used change with time and manufacturer. 

 

So, I shall in future consider how old the aircraft being modelled is, where it has spent its life, how it has been cared for and how old it is.

Dark Green ages through olive green to almost khaki brown, it never increases towards the blue-green so I'll modify Dark Green accordingly! 

I entirely agree that 1950s Dark Green fades to a brown approaching Dark Earth, as could be seen at any British aircraft museum that keeps aircraft in original paint outdoors, and there is a fair bit of photographic evidence from WW2 showing the same effect,  (E.g. Mosquitos on Malta.)   However I wouldn't say that it faded through olive green, but always was at the beginning.  There is a lesser amount of evidence showing a brighter green that perhaps has moved somewhat towards the bluer (or at least grassier) side.  Presumably from a different manufacturer.

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I talked to the people at BDAC who do the restoration work about paint matching. They buy paint from a local industrial paint maker against the BS Specifications, BUT the pigments used are very different from the ones used in the 1940s, so the way the modern paints age will be very different. 

Red paint is a real problem, the modern pigments are far more sensitive to UV than the pigments used in the past. They have had to re-paint the upper surfaces of the ETPS Hunter after just 12 years as it has faded very badly. 

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"Just 12 years" seems an awkward expression to me, given WW2 lasted less than 6 in total.

But real machines are PITA compared to models when talking lasting finish.
Repainting is simply part of the remembrance ...

Edited by Steben
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