HMS FURIOUS 1943 camouflage

[Chewbacca]

I'm currently doing some research for a presentation that I'm giving in a couple of week's time entitled "War in the Fjords and rescuing Norway's gold".  While looking for an appropriate April 1940 image of HMS FURIOUS, I came across this website: https://www.globalsecurity.org/military///world/europe/history/hms-furious.htm and was struck by the image at the very bottom of the page. 

At some point in the future I'd like to model FURIOUS, probably both in her 1917 half aircraft carrier state and then in her WW2 full carrier configuration.  I've never seen any camouflage that was quite as striking or contrasting as the one purporting to be her 1943 colour scheme and if it's genuine then that's the colour scheme I will be using for the latter.  But the sceptic in me really doubts its accuracy (I suppose largely driven by the bright red anti-fouling) and I wondered whether any of our resident colour scheme experts might have a view?

 

Thanks

Edited May 8, 2021 by Chewbacca

[robgizlu]

From Raven

 

 

 

Great looking scheme - though the Raven version is going to deliver something different from the colour profile

Given the 1942 attribution in the photo, I suspect that Dick and Jamie will question the B55 suggestion and possibly the B30?

Interesting

Rob

[Graham Boak]

I suggest that you chase up a copy of Warship Profile 24.  The cover is a clear almost plan view of the camouflaged deck. repeated on the colour profile and credited there to G. Davies/D Palmer.  It is a very close if not perfect match to the one above credited to A. Raven.  The sideview pattern is shown in the Profile as dating to the Philadelphia refit in mid 1942, and clearly retained some time later.  An approximation to this is shown in the profile as 1939, with a large area of green that can probably be suggested as  something else now.  A portside photo dated to August 1939 suggest a simpler scheme, if not a monotone, in this period.  Also shown in the colour page of the profile is a much more jagged starboard profile dated to August 1941, and linked to the deck painting by a (somewhat premature) Seafire.  Possibly August 1942 is intended for this?  However the photo showing the deck scheme is credited to August 1941 and has four Sea Hurricanes.

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

The profile in the original post stands out as remarkably bad and it's got some thoroughbred dross competing for the position of worst RN camouflage profile ever.

 

I have some colour stills from a cinefilm reel, but they're on my PC. I'll post them up tomorrow and hopefully they'll clear stuff up

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

Here are a couple of stills from a colour cine reel filmed during Op Pedestal in August 1942. The paints appear to be black and tones of grey. Certainly not bright baby blue, sand yellow etc as per the profile.

 

 

 

 

What's noteworthy though is that the 4 tones are present in the close-up but less obvious from a distance. In addition, the two intermediate tones are quite close, yet distinguishable. One shouldn't rule out the standard blue-greys on the strength of this piece of film, as for instance HMS Nelson filmed at the same time looks grey and washed out from a distance but B5 is as plain as day filmed close-up. This old film and cinecamera tech is clearly prone to over-exposure and fairly brutal washing-out of the colours.

 

 

 

 

I have some good photographs of the deck camouflage too albeit in black and white. Raven's sketch is close but there are some small detail differences.

[dickrd]

According to one individual the flight deck colours in 1943 were "G45 light olive, B30 dark olive and MS4a Home Fleet grey" - I kid you not!

 

Edited May 10, 2021 by dickrd

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

There's a Straight Flush, a Royal Flush, but in the case of that source it's more the 11 litre Full Flush which is most appropriate.

[dickrd]

To return to the serious original question.

 

As Jamie says, the colours in the image found by Chewbacca are way off.

 

Raven is a bit muddled. The design of the scheme as he has drawn it in WP Vol 4, p.6 was applied to Furious in 1942 not 1943. The earliest dated photos I have of Furious in this scheme are July 1942. Colours G5, B15, B30 and B55 were not introduced until May 1943 and so are impossible.

 

The four colours in 1942 would have been from the MS&B series. My guess would be:  MS1/B5/B6 or MS4 (impossible to tell apart in B&W photos) or perhaps even MS3 (tones vary in different photos)/and 507C. There is another glimpse of Furious elsewhere in that colour cine film where panel X looks distinctly bluish.

 

 

There are then June 1943 and onwards photos showing the pattern modified to eliminate panel X. Doubtless there was a repaint and probably using the new B&G series paints introduced that May. Raven’s suggested palette of G5, B15, B30 and B55 for this timeframe is therefore possible although, based on what photos I currently have, I think would go with the 507C equivalent G45 rather than B55.

Edited May 12, 2021 by dickrd

[Chewbacca]

Thanks everyone for your input to this.  I'm glad that I was sceptical but in a way I'm sad - that original colour plate would have been a very different scheme to have used though I'm not sure that even on a dark night from a distance it would have offered much concealment.  The contrasts seem to ignore the principle that camouflage is designed to break up the outline of something so that when scanning ones eye is not attracted to it.  I think if I saw that at sea it would act as a beacon.

 

In a way it reminds me of a conversation I once had with my CO .  It was in a Batch 2 Type 22 frigate and we were playing around with disruptive lighting to try to make us look more like a merchant ship, but every one we tried my pilot and I would come back and report that it looked like a frigate trying to look like a merchant ship.  I then suggested that we put on all the upperdeck lights and from anywhere outside about a mile we looked just like a cruise liner!

 

I still plan to build FURIOUS at some point in the future and even with the more muted colours that are proposed it'll still look quite striking so I'm grateful to you all for your helpful comments..

 

Best regards

[iang]

On 11/05/2021 at 16:09, dickrd said:

 

Raven is a bit muddled. The design of the scheme as he has drawn it in WP Vol 4, p.6 was applied to Furious in 1942 not 1943. The earliest dated photos I have of Furious in this scheme are July 1942. Colours G5, B15, B30 and B55 were not introduced until May 1943 and so are impossible.

 

When Furious arrived in Philadelphia, she was wearing her first wartime disruptive scheme, and retained it until at least March 20 1942:

 

 

Given that Furious left Philadelphia for the UK via Bermuda on April 3 1942, unless repainted in the US between March 20 and April 3,  I assume she was still in her first disruptive pattern, and repainted into the second pattern while refitting in the UK in May 1942? 

 

As an aside, is it known whether RN warships refitted in US Navy yards used RN paint or US equivalents? 

[dickrd]

17 minutes ago, iang said:

 

Given that Furious left Philadelphia for the UK via Bermuda on April 3 1942, unless repainted in the US between March 20 and April 3,  I assume she was still in her first disruptive pattern, and repainted into the second pattern while refitting in the UK in May 1942? 

 

As an aside, is it known whether RN warships refitted in US Navy yards used RN paint or US equivalents? 

 May/June 1942 Rosyth refit for the adoption of the second disruptive scheme fits everything I have. 

 

I wish we knew the answer to your second question! 

[Paws4thot]

7 hours ago, iang said:

is it known whether RN warships refitted in US Navy yards used RN paint or US equivalents?

I don't think anyone knows that, including the US Navy Yards, and the RN captains of said vessels!

[Graham Boak]

Agreed!  But it is worth asking whether anyone would be shipping tins of paint across the Atlantic for the US dockyards to use.  We do know that for aircraft the US was provided with examples of colour charts and the US paint companies produced their own close equivalents which were accepted.  The same may have happened with the RN, either colour charts or ingredient mixing instructions,  but given that the ship arrived with examples of the colours on her sides perhaps they didn't need any and just copied the colours there as best they could.  Or, of course, just did what they felt like...  personally, I'd vote for the closest USN colours if it came to an election.

 

My personal interest is exactly the same question for Newcastle.

[Paws4thot]

1 hour ago, Graham Boak said:

anyone would be shipping tins of paint across the Atlantic for the US dockyards to use.

Almost certainly not, given that the paint in question would have had a petro-chemicals base in period. (FWIW my grandfather spent WW2 commissioning explosives lines in Dumfrieshire for Nobel Explosives.)

 

It is known that aeroplane paint for the RAF was matched on the basis of "this is the shade we use for the USAAF; that'll do", and I'd not be surprised if the same argument with organisation names replaced applied to ships.

[Graham Boak]

No, it is not "so known", quite the contrary.  There is a detailed history of the relationship:  the US paints prepared especially for the British (known as equivalent colours, usually a very good match):  later agreements between Britain and the US for a combined standard including both (AN series): and also agreements as to which US colours were specifically authorised by the UK for use instead of the required British hue.  So, for example, USAAF Olive Drab was permitted to be used instead of Dark Green or Dark Slate Grey, and this was seen on later Mustangs and Corsairs.  The USAAF, however, painted almost all its aircraft using two colours: Olive Drab and Neutral Grey, with a limited use of Medium Green and Sand.  Not a lot of use trying, from such a limited range, to match the wider range of colours in use by the RAF and FAA in several different theatres.

 

What perhaps you have mistaken is the Lend Lease insistence that aircraft intended for other countries had to be assumed to be intended for US services, and that includes being painted in the appropriate USAAF or USN colours.  This was initially not closely followed, as many of the aircraft provided for Britain in the years following Lend Lease were already paid for in hard cash and the companies had stocked up suitable paints ready for this.  So Curtiss continued delivering P-40s in Middle Stone and Dark Earth over Azure Blue; Grumman continued delivering Wildcats in Extra Dark Sea Grey, Dark Slate Grey over Sky, Consolidated continued delivering Liberators to Coastal Command in Extra Dark Sea Grey over White.  Though Liberator bombers were delivered in OD, Wildcats built by Eastern in Sea Blue Gloss, and Corsairs from Goodyear likewise.  During the Italian campaign even P-40s eventually began appearing in OD.  This was not a "we'll do whatever we fancy" at low level but strictly controlled after a series of agreements at high level, well in advance.

 

Similarly, Captain class destroyer escorts were delivered in some approximation of an RN scheme (as opposed to the strict patterns applied to aircraft: well, usually) using USN paints.  However,  the RN had not established production lines in the US delivering to the RN before the US entered the war and therefore had no reason to organise paint supplies.  The grey paint on US Liberty ships would be a reasonable match for the Merchant Navy greys used by the UK for its shipping.

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

There are some instances of RN vessels completing refit in the US and appearing to wear that paint for some time, but in other cases the ship was repainted again fairly soon after arriving back in the UK. Whilst not conclusive, the latter does hint that the British didn't like whatever the Americans had applied to our ship and felt it had to be redone.

 

Furthermore, whilst the USN had a fairly strict policy of not carrying paint aboard ship, this doesn't appear to be so obvious in the Royal Navy. Indeed ships had a Paint Locker, and there are examples of ships heading across the Atlantic carrying all manner of parts and materials to be fitted in a US yard safe from Luftwaffe raids etc.

 

I personally feel it likely that the US yards, if not using British paint carried over, would have matched as well as most British could have to the shade cards included with either the supplied camouflage design or the ship's copy of the CAFO or CB in effect.

[S-boat 55]

I've a pdf version of warship 24 kindly given to me if you'd like site of it drop me a message with your email address, 

[Chewbacca]

9 hours ago, S-boat 55 said:

I've a pdf version of warship 24 kindly given to me if you'd like site of it drop me a message with your email address, 

Thanks very much.  YHPM

[Ex-FAAWAFU]

On 5/12/2021 at 7:53 AM, Chewbacca said:

In a way it reminds me of a conversation I once had with my CO .  It was in a Batch 2 Type 22 frigate and we were playing around with disruptive lighting to try to make us look more like a merchant ship, but every one we tried my pilot and I would come back and report that it looked like a frigate trying to look like a merchant ship.  I then suggested that we put on all the upperdeck lights and from anywhere outside about a mile we looked just like a cruise liner!

We tried that once when playing the Bad Guys during a Thursday War.  I even persuaded the Captain that the Flight should simulate disco lights for the “cruise ship” quarterdeck, and to my amazement he went for it!  Not that the boys had any fun with that, obviously...

 

Worked though; we we got several miles inside Exocet range with a full targeting solution from us, airborne to the South right on the edge of French airspace.