Skyraider propeller tip colours

[Planebuilder62]

Hi there

I am building 2 skyraiders from the Vietnam war, 1 USN, 1 USAF. Do the proplers have the same stripes on the back of blades or just yellow, or black?
 

regards Toby

[72modeler]

I prepare to be corrected, and I'm sure Tommy T. alias @Tailspin Turtle, has done the subject in one of his Tailhook Topics blogs, but IIRC and looking at photos, USN and USAF VN-era Spads had white-red-white prop tips, front and back. Korean War era Spads had the yellow prop tips.  That being said, I don't recall the width of the W-R-W prop warning stripes, but four inches each rings a bell.

Mike

[Creepy Pete]

You can find quite a few pics of Vietnam era USAF Skyraiders with yellow tips. The USN ones always appear to have had the red/white ones (like all the US Navy props), and some USAF ones as well, but I guess the USAF liked the yellow tips better.

 

 

 

 

 

[72modeler]

1 hour ago, Creepy Pete said:

You can find quite a few pics of Vietnam era USAF Skyraiders with yellow tips.

True, Pete; in the photos I looked at, more than half of the USAF Spads had the WRW tips, but all of the USN ones had them. Maybe, since all of the AF AD's came from the USN/USMC  inventory, they had the WRW tips, but when they went through re-paint or prop overhaul, the tips were painted yellow. Just a guess, but as the sages say- find photos of the chosen subject.

Mike

[Tailspin Turtle]

If I read Elliott correctly for Navy/USMC airplanes, in 1942, propellers were to have four-inch orange yellow tips, both sides. In 1943, propellers of 15 feet or more in diameter were to have six inch tips. In late December 1961, that was changed to white/red/white (three/six/three inches), both sides except single engine airplanes where the back side of the blade was to be black. That was changed in September 1962, with the back side to be four-inch orange yellow if the propeller was less than 15 feet in diameter and six inches if 15 or more feet in diameter. Of course, actual implementation on a particular airplane might have occurred later or even earlier than the date given.

[Finn]

Here are a couple of examples of the back side:

 

 

 

Jari

 

 

 

[I Dole]

Not about prop tips, but I had always though the USAF skyraiders with dark undersides were black. As the top picture.

The picture of 'Corn Fed' is clearly not. It looks more like neutral grey.

Digging a bit I found an image of a bellied in single seater with the same underside colour.

A thread on FSM forum had one post referencing grey undersides, but that seems to have been discounted.

 

Anyone know anything about this?