Spitfire FR.XVIII Post War Desert Scheme

[DaveWilko]

Please forgive me if one has put this into the wrong section.

 

Last year as a Father's Day present,one was given the Airfix 1/48th scale Spitfire XIVe model.(garnering one for the not too distant retirement one fears)

 

One would like to do an FR.XVIII of 208 Sqn in the Post War Desert Scheme,but after reading up quite extensively on the history of these machines,

it seems that they were rather hastily re-painted into the Desert Scheme after encounters with hostile and other forces also flying Spitfires in the

region similarly painted in the then standard RAF day camouflage scheme.

 

Having picked up on the modifications required to the kit to portray an FR.XVIII plus studied many photographs of the two airworthy examples

of the marque to achieve the aim,the remaining questions one has are thus.

 

Were the 208 Sqn machines repainted at unit level or at a regional M.U ?

 

The reason for this question leads to the second.

 

If the machines were repainted at unit(for example; in 208's squadron hanger(s)what level of airframe stenciling might has been applied?

(all factory or just relevant to operations).

On the other hand,what if done at an M.U?

 

I thank you in anticipation for your responses.

 

Dave

Edited May 28, 2020 by DaveWilko

[Bedders]

My understanding is that the aircraft were repainted at unit level, with slight variations in roundel/fin flah size and location. My interpretation of photographs led me to conclude that stencilling was non-standard: a few bits & bobs relating to safety and maintenance around the cockpit and engine, probably in yellow rather than black, but not the full set e.g. no walkway lines. And as far as as I can see, most instructions for the desert scheme decals seem to be incorrect in that they reverse the colour scheme, putting the light slate grey where the dark earth should be, and vice versa. In the thread below there's a photo of an original, unrestored nose section of a desert scheme XVIII, which appears to bear this out.

 

https://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/11687-spitfire-fr-mk18-camouflage-question/

 

Justin

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

This is from my build of a 208 Sq. Mk.XVIII. There is a link in the RFI with more info that may help you. 

Dennis

[DaveWilko]

Thank you both for those most informative links.

 

Very few photographs of these rare machines are available and certainly,many of the men who flew and maintained them

are either no longer with us or certainly well into their dotage and therefore,their memories not as clear as they once were.

 

Indeed,studying what is available,reveals these machines to be quite hard worked,poorly stenciled,faded,well worn and exhaust stained.

 

Bedders Sir(quite how you chaps get these names....but having spent many years in heavy engineering one's self..),

I do believe one is correct in that they were repainted at unit rather than M.U level,but that then raises another slight conundrum.

 

If that is the case,plus the fact that the underside colour was part of the then RAF standard day camouflage,would it be possible

does one think,that the under surfaces were left "as-is"with just the upper surfaces actually having their camouflage colours

repainted???.

Most squadrons it appears had an airframe fitter whom was rather handy with a paintbrush/spray gun and therefore did

the paintwork repairs/repaints.

 

If that was indeed the case(and one realises that 70 plus years after an event that wasn't possibly well recorded)and,indeed pure

conjecture,that most of the original underside stencils may well have been left in situ and not overpainted????

 

Again,thank you for your time and responses.

 

David.

[Giorgio N]

All aircraft wearing this scheme receveid it between July and September 1949 at 109 MU at Fayid. It was not a squadron level job

 

Edited May 29, 2020 by Giorgio N

[DaveWilko]

1 hour ago, Giorgio N said:

All aircraft wearing this scheme receveid it between July and September 1949 at 109 MU at Fayid. It was not a squadron level job

 

Thank you for that Sir.

 

What is your take on the stenciling questions above please?

 

Dave.

[Bedders]

21 hours ago, Giorgio N said:

All aircraft wearing this scheme receveid it between July and September 1949 at 109 MU at Fayid. It was not a squadron level job

Interesting fact Giorgio. 

 

On undersides it think they were repainted too: the underwing roundel was certainly moved outboard from its traditional position to a new spot at the wingtip, to accommodate the rather large underwing serials.

 

Justin

[DaveWilko]

On 5/30/2020 at 7:42 AM, Bedders said:

Interesting fact Giorgio. 

 

On undersides it think they were repainted too: the underwing roundel was certainly moved outboard from its traditional position to a new spot at the wingtip, to accommodate the rather large underwing serials.

 

Justin

Good point Sir.

 

Is it possible minimum work just to remove and replace the original underwing serials and roundels took place

leaving the stencils in place(especially the trestle markings)?

[Giorgio N]

I don't know exactly on the stencils, being repainted by a MU should mean that all standard stencils of the era may have been reapplied. However I don't have an official diagram for the stencils on the Spitfire in the late '40s, I assume standard wartime plus the ones added around the cockpit after the war. Best I can do is check a few pictures and try to assess from them

 

Regarding a full repaint or not, I don't have clear evidence one way or the other, however it's interesting to note that the units that used the desert scheme received this in the middle of a different change of scheme... in 1948 the overall silver scheme had been introduced but aircraft were supposed to receive it only when going through maintenance. At the time of the clash with the Israelis, one a couple of 208 Sqn. Spitfires had received this according to Lucas. There was then some correspondance between commands about a new scheme and in the end the desert scheme discussed here was applied while other units (like those equipped with Tempest) were transitioning to the silver scheme (that for some meant polished natural metal).

Based on this I'm tempted to throw in the theory that the aircraft received a complete repaint, as they were scheduled for a repaint anyway. I should make clear again that this is only my personal theory and could well be disproven at any time by proper evidence.

Edited June 3, 2020 by Giorgio N

[DaveWilko]

5 hours ago, Giorgio N said:

I don't know exactly on the stencils, being repainted by a MU should mean that all standard stencils of the era may have been reapplied. However I don't have an official diagram for the stencils on the Spitfire in the late '40s, I assume standard wartime plus the ones added around the cockpit after the war. Best I can do is check a few pictures and try to assess from them

 

Regarding a full repaint or not, I don't have clear evidence one way or the other, however it's interesting to note that the units that used the desert scheme received this in the middle of a different change of scheme... in 1948 the overall silver scheme had been introduced but aircraft were supposed to receive it only when going through maintenance. At the time of the clash with the Israelis, one a couple of 208 Sqn. Spitfires had received this according to Lucas. There was then some correspondance between commands about a new scheme and in the end the desert scheme discussed here was applied while other units (like those equipped with Tempest) were transitioning to the silver scheme (that for some meant polished natural metal).

Based on this I'm tempted to throw in the theory that the aircraft received a complete repaint, as they were scheduled for a repaint anyway. I should make clear again that this is only my personal theory and could well be disproven at any time by proper evidence.

Thank you again for your reply Giorgio.

 

Personally,one would think that an M.U repaint entailed replacement of the relevant stencils.

[Giorgio N]

1 hour ago, DaveWilko said:

Thank you again for your reply Giorgio.

 

Personally,one would think that an M.U repaint entailed replacement of the relevant stencils.

 

Yes, I agree, it's what I'd expect, I've also in the meantime checked a few pictures and IMHO the stencils on the upper surfaces at least were all there, including walklines over the wings. I'm not sure on the undersurfaces as the only picture where these are somewhat visible is not clear enough. It is however a safeish bet that these were also present

[DaveWilko]

39 minutes ago, Giorgio N said:

 

Yes, I agree, it's what I'd expect, I've also in the meantime checked a few pictures and IMHO the stencils on the upper surfaces at least were all there, including walklines over the wings. I'm not sure on the undersurfaces as the only picture where these are somewhat visible is not clear enough. It is however a safeish bet that these were also present

Excellent Sir.

 

Many thanks,one will proceed accordingly and use the kit's supplied stencils.

Although for the kit XIVe,one would imagine(and indeed studying pictures of the two airworthy machines)

the stencils for the XVIII would not be particularly dissimilar.

In one of the pictures seen(in Naval 8's(208 Sqn galleries)TZ223/T and TP391/N are seen flying in formation,

it certainly does appear that TP391/N has the black walkways very faintly(under the dirt and dust)visible on the

spar line of the starboard wing roughly where the leading edge fuel tank would be.

 

Many thanks to all of you that have posted replies and help.

 

David.

[Giorgio N]

Stencils in the XVIII would be mostly similar to the XIV, I'd have to check if there was any difference where the XVIII had room for some survival equipment in the wings.

Also to keep in mind is that the RAF introduced a new range of markings for escape doors, hatches and break-in panels in 1946. Such markings would be missing from a stencils set meant for a wartime aircraft while may have been present on these desert painted aircraft

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

These photographs are from my grandfather's album from his time on 208 Squadron - he's in a couple of them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Plus these two:

 

 

 

 

[David Womby]

Thanks for that. The silver one is new to me from that squadron.   I wonder if it's a fresh delivery?

 

What is it I am seeing fitted to the cowling just ahead of the windscreen on the port side of Q-RG?

 

MK728 is a MkIX.

 

David

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

I think that could be a shield (one either side) to prevent the flames from the exhaust stacks blinding the pilot whilst flying at night. Nightfighter Hurricanes carried similar plates between the pilot's eye position and the exhaust stacks.

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

4 hours ago, David Womby said:

Thanks for that. The silver one is new to me from that squadron.   I wonder if it's a fresh delivery?

 

What is it I am seeing fitted to the cowling just ahead of the windscreen on the port side of Q-RG?

 

MK728 is a MkIX.

 

David

 

Regarding the silver one - I'm not at all sure it's from 208 Squadron. He came back from the Middle East / Cyprus on 208 Squadron's Spitfires to join 73 Squadron on DH Venom F.B.1s and 43 Squadron with Meteor F.8s. The silver Spitfire may well have been photographed back in the UK. He's got a photo of a camouflaged Harvard in the album, lots of Venoms, a Varsity, an Auster, a Dakota, and even a snapshot showing a Bristol Fighter with a Fokker DR.1 behind, presumably from some air display he attended. There's a single photo of the Royal Navy destroyer HMS Volage in the album, which is curious because of this tidbit of her existence:

 

"Volage returned to Trincomalee for local duties and subsequently departed for service in the 3rd Destroyer Flotilla, with the Mediterranean Fleet in Malta. Prepared for service at Portsmouth before passage to Malta. On 22 October 1946, she struck a mine in the Corfu Channel, close to Albania (at a time of mutual suspicion) and lost her bow section as far as "A" turret (see section below). She was repaired in Malta, returned to Britain in 1949 and went into Reserve.[2]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Volage_(R41)

 

In the photograph the ship is very much intact and looking entirely ship-shape though!

 

 

One thing my grandfather did tell my father and I before he died was that the two sections on 208 Squadron had different coloured spinners, one section had red spinners and the other blue.

 

He always did like Spitfires - this was his last visit with us to the airshow at RAF Leuchars each September which we'd all go to every year since I was in a buggy and inventing technical terminology such as "fire noise" (the din jets made in reheat) as a toddler. My dad @skyscooter could probably tell you more stuff I'd come out with as a child, although "could" is not necessarily the same as "should"

[gingerbob]

The silver one is probably TZ212: 33MU 5-1-46 St Mw 11-5 MED(ME) 21-8 109MU 25-11-48 208S 13-1-49 FA3R 29-10-49 SOC 10-12-51

 

bob

[fastterry]

Great photos Jamie@sovereign hobbies, I love a big Griffon with five blades. Having a browse through the serial numbers for FRXVIII Spits I believe that RG-Q is TP447 and that RG-A is TZ440, the last FRXVIII built.

TRF

Edited June 5, 2020 by fastterry