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BEA grey


flieger

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In the subject of airliner greys, what would be the acrylic alternatives? I don't use enamels any more so prefer to use acrylics wherever possible. For instance US Navy Light Gull Gray always looks very similar to some airliner greys to me.

 

Like the book says, there are at least "Fifty Shades of Grey".

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It does depend on what you're looking to depict.

The standards were:

BOAC (VC.10)
ICI 431/2042 - ACT 273 - 5137

BEA (Trident (Speedjack))
Polyurethane F407-515 or F407-715

but these would apply only after the aircraft had been repainted by their owners.  Out of the factory, both BEA and BOAC allowed the manufacturers to use their own choice of light grey.  This may have been the same, but I'm not aware of any correspondence which would have let the airlines know what had been used.  I would not be at all surprised to learn that for the VC.10 the grey ex-factory was RAF Light Aircraft Grey, and that probably holds true for other manufacturers and aircraft.  The company repaint colours are generally almost indistinguishable.  One can, particularly on photos of Tridents, sometimes pick out a number of shades of grey in the same line-up, which perhaps shows that they weren't too fastidious about following the standard for a 'non-livery' colour, but it may also reflect the fact that the Tridents went back to Hatfield for a number of modifications and may well have been repainted by DH as well as the airlines during their lives.

 

For what it's worth, the light grey colours used on the BA centenary retrojets were these:

747s
BAC 7025

Airbus
Wings 'Aeroflex'

Fuselage BAC 707

Edited by Lazy8
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23 minutes ago, Lazy8 said:

It does depend on what you're looking to depict.

The standards were:

BOAC (VC.10)
ICI 431/2042 - ACT 273 - 5137

BEA (Trident (Speedjack))
Polyurethane F407-515 or F407-715

but these would apply only after the aircraft had been repainted by their owners.  Out of the factory, both BEA and BOAC allowed the manufacturers to use their own choice of light grey.  This may have been the same, but I'm not aware of any correspondence which would have let the airlines know what had been used.  I would not be at all surprised to learn that for the VC.10 the grey ex-factory was RAF Light Aircraft Grey, and that probably holds true for other manufacturers and aircraft.  The company repaint colours are generally almost indistinguishable.  One can, particularly on photos of Tridents, sometimes pick out a number of shades of grey in the same line-up, which perhaps shows that they weren't too fastidious about following the standard for a 'non-livery' colour, but it may also reflect the fact that the Tridents went back to Hatfield for a number of modifications and may well have been repainted by DH as well as the airlines during their lives.

 

For what it's worth, the light grey colours used on the BA centenary retrojets were these:

747s
BAC 7025

Airbus
Wings 'Aeroflex'

Fuselage BAC 707

Thanks. How well do those shades equate to model or automotive (i.e. Halfords)  paints?

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