F-4C gunze FS greens

[lesthegringo]

The Academy callouts for the SEA camo are tan FS30219 (gunze C310), green FS34102 (gunze C303) and green FS34079 (gunze C309). Having used the two greens, I'm questioning the gunze colours as they seem to have less difference than what I see in reference photos. It is hard to see the demarcation clearly between the two shades

 

Can anyone confirm whether they really are that close, and if not what  (preferably gunze) alternatives I should use?

 

Cheers 

 

Les

[Hook]

47 minutes ago, lesthegringo said:

Can anyone confirm whether they really are that close, and if not what  (preferably gunze) alternatives I should use?

Those are the correct shades. You could try lightening the FS34102 a bit.

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

They were quite close but they faded at different rates and in different ways.

 

If you are going to bleach the 34102 a little, I proffer that the result will look a bit odd if you don't also adjust the 30219 which also faded and seemed to shift before the 34102 did. I recommend cutting your 30219 with a sand such as Afrika Korps yellow or similar and would even suggest going as far as 50/50  on it to make a faded 34102 look natural in context.

[iainpeden]

I was on duty in the American Air  Museum at Duxford on Saturday and spent quite a time looking at the F-111 from the gantry above.  I started by trying to compare the 2 greens used on the cockpit module then had a good look at the 2 shades on the top of the fuselage. It was quite hard to spot the demarcation and even then was in the finish rather than the shade.

[JosephLalor]

Here's how they brushed out for me.  The 34102 looks a little yellower directly viewed in diffuse light

 

Edited August 21, 2020 by JosephLalor

[Creepy Pete]

That's odd. I've used the Gunze colours you mentioned a couple times, and didn't find them that close together. Here's how mine turned out on a recent build.

 

[Seawinder]

Yes, C Pete, that's been my experience with those shades as well.

[lesthegringo]

Thanks for the replies, guys - in the flesh mine seems to have less contrast. I may lighten the green a little as suggested

 

Cheers

 

Les

[Finn]

Here are a couple of F-4Cs in Vietnam:

Note how faded the greens are.

 

Jari

[lesthegringo]

Thanks, clearly a lot of tonal variation, and that bleaching is really evident to the point where it looks like three tones of green on the aircraft in the background

 

Cheers

[Ben Brown]

FWIW, my Gunze- and Xtracolr-painted models have the same contrast as @Creepy Pete's model, although the Xtracolor tan is a little lighter than Gunze's. I think the FS34079 from these brands has a slightly more brownish tone than the now out of production Model Master 34079. The Model Master greens have less contrast and their 34079 is more green than olive. If you're going to do any kind of weathering, you can probably go with the "That Looks About Right" method, since the paints weathered and faded quickly in Southeast Asia.

 

Ben

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

Again, if playing with greens don't forget to start with the tan. It'll look bizarre in a way you'll struggle to pin down with fresh 30219 and faded green(s).

 

The tan is the first of the three which seems to suffer, changing from caucasian skin/fleshy to sandy very quickly:

 

For my HH-3E in these colours I faded the 30129, then the 34102 then the 34079 with decreasing amounts of the same sand colour. The tan was near half & half, the 34102 got maybe 20% sand added and the 34079 got just a drop or two into the airbrush cup.

 

 

 

I fully realise your question was about the green - I'm just cautioning that you may not like the result if you fade it but juxtapose it with fresh tan.

 

 

 

[bar side]

For alternatives I used a Humbrol and Tamiya rattle cans.  For the tan you have Desert Yellow 93 (or for a darker tan Dark Brown 29), the lighter green was Dark Green 30, and the darker green was Tamiya Green (USAF) AS-13.  Not perfect but looked ok to me

 

 

 

[Ben Brown]

Sorry for the thread jack, but @Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies, is that model 1/144? Is it from a kit or did you convert a Sweet Sea King kit? Ive been wanting to build a Jolly in that scale but haven’t worked up the nerve to tackle a conversion, yet.

 

Ben

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

3 minutes ago, Ben Brown said:

Sorry for the thread jack, but @Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies, is that model 1/144? Is it from a kit or did you convert a Sweet Sea King kit? Ive been wanting to build a Jolly in that scale but haven’t worked up the nerve to tackle a conversion, yet.

 

Ben

 

Hi Ben, it's Whirlybird's resin kit in 1/72 scale I'm afraid. I just manage to make models look rough enough to pass for smaller scales

[CT7567]

4 minutes ago, Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies said:

 

Hi Ben, it's Whirlybird's resin kit in 1/72 scale I'm afraid. I just manage to make models look rough enough to pass for smaller scales

Really? Those are some healthy-sized tins of Colourcoat then!

[Trenton guy]

On 8/21/2020 at 2:02 PM, Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies said:

They were quite close but they faded at different rates and in different ways.

 

If you are going to bleach the 34102 a little, I proffer that the result will look a bit odd if you don't also adjust the 30219 which also faded and seemed to shift before the 34102 did. I recommend cutting your 30219 with a sand such as Afrika Korps yellow or similar and would even suggest going as far as 50/50  on it to make a faded 34102 look natural in context.

Jamie is quite right about the fading. Back in 1967 I built a series of Viet Nam aircraft in the then well known colors (if you had a FS 595, which I did). When I arrived at Pleiku AFB at the end of March 1968 I was shocked to discover that the USAF aircraft stationed there were painted in the wrong shades, so much was the fading. The 30219 was a distinct pinkish shade and the 34102 was a lightish blue green. There was no indoor storage at PKU. The tropical sun altered not just shade but hue.

[Graham Boak]

I have memories of an air show in the UK, early 70s, and the notable pinkish shade of the tan in the SEA scheme.  What I also noticed was that the top of the intake near the cockpit was coated with some black bitumen-like substance, which the attendant pilot said was to stop the ground grew slipping on the surface.  Never seen that on a model!

[Ben Brown]

4 hours ago, CT7567 said:

Really? Those are some healthy-sized tins of Colourcoat then!

Yeah, that’s why I asked! My thinking was based on the small size of the tins. I remember the 1/72 kit I built years ago as being larger. Maybe because I was just a kid back then. 😆
 

Ben

[bar side]

2 hours ago, Graham Boak said:

I have memories of an air show in the UK, early 70s, and the notable pinkish shade of the tan in the SEA scheme.  What I also noticed was that the top of the intake near the cockpit was coated with some black bitumen-like substance, which the attendant pilot said was to stop the ground grew slipping on the surface.  Never seen that on a model!

Didn’t notice it before but you can see the non slip strip on the intake here - Woodbridge/Bentwaters rather than LN