Spitfire BR112... yes, more thoughts about Malta's Spitfires...

[Giorgio N]

BR112 is one of the best known of the Spitfire Mk.Vc operating from Malta, for the simple reason that is probably the only "blue" Spitfire for which a colour picture exist, taken after the aircraft crash-landed on the Sicilian coast after sustaining combat damage.

Yes, this is a well known aircraft but I was wonder about the pictures showing this aircraft and a detail I hadn't noticed before...

The famous colour pictures show BR112's port side in a single dark blue grey colour on the uppersurfaces. Nothing is really visible of the undersurfaces. Really the picture already gives a lot of information to a modeller interested in this subject... however this was not the only picture taken of the same aircraft over the beaches of Sicily, there are other B/W pictures around.

One of them, included in the book "Spitfire Italiani", published by the History Office of the Air Force, show a close-up of the spinner that features quite a lot of damage to the paint coat revealing a different, lighter paint coat. At first I thought this was just bare metal, but it is not as shiny as I expect bare metal to be.Now just for curiosity I checked the colour picture, expecting to find something like traces of the paint used on the undersurfaces, or again bare metal... but no, what the colour pictures seem to show is a lighter, bluer coat of blue grey. Now this is interesting....

If I got all the info together right, BR112 was one of the aircraft flown from USS Wasp as part of Operation Calendar. These aircraft, according to the latest info from Lucas, were repainted in "mediterranean blue" before being embarked on the carrier. Lower surfaces seem to have been in Sky Blue.

All good, now the colour picture may well show a weathered  Dark Mediterranean Blue, afterall she was shot down in September, 4 months after arriving on Malta. However, what's the lighter colour on the spinner supposed to be ?

Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but I'm now wondering if the aircraft carried this lighter colour on the arrival in Malta and then a darker colour (EDSG ?) was painted on top. If so, what was this lighter colour ? Now it may also be that the lighter original colour on the spinner is the paint applied before the aircraft received the  (dark?) mediterranean blue coat, but if the aircraft was in TSS (Lucas again), where does the lighter blue grey come from ? EDSG is quite a dark blue-grey. Or maybe the aircraft was not repainted in Dark Mediterranean Blue but in a lighter, bluer colour ?

Of course the lighter colour may have been confined to the spinner... if so, was this part of the original undersurfaces ? In such case, the undersurfaces could not have been Sky Blue, that is much lighter than what the pictures seem to show. Or maybe it was a colour applied to the spinner at some point in Malta... but I doubt that the aircraft got repainted too many time and I can't remember any mention of blue or blue grey coloured spinners.

I know, maybe I'm readin too much into one little detail, but that B/W picture in the book does not seem to be too consistent with the colour picture of the same aircraft shown in the same book and in other titles...

 

For information, this thread includes a reproduction of the pictures I mentioned, although in worse quality, and another B/W picture of the same aircraft

 

https://unosetentaydos.mforos.com/2152956/13017438-spitfire-mk-vc-kenneth-el-indio-charney-malta-1942/

 

Now all the above is of course academic from a modeller point of view... my plan is indeed to build BR112 from the recent Airfix kit (that I finally managed to buy) but really I can simply build this subject as would have been before taking off for that last mission, with what looks like a single coat of a dark blue grey. That of course still leaves doubts about the undersurfaces, but at least the upper half of the aircraft is kind of confirmed

[Giorgio N]

I should add that in a different Italian publication (Ali d'Italia's book on captured aircraft) the same aircraft is described as being in grey and green and the reproduction of the same famous colour picture they have in the book may support this thesis.... the book IMHO incorrectly mention this aircraft as wearing the Day Fighter Scheme, the authors likely did not consider TSS that on the other hand may make some sense... really what we'd need would be a good reproduction of this well known picture...

[ilj]

The spinner colour was sky (a.k.a., Sky type S') factory applied.  The bluish gray overpaint was heavily chipped, revealing it.  IMHO

[MACALAIN]

17 minutes ago, Giorgio N said:

BR112 is one of the best known of the Spitfire Mk.Vc operating from Malta, for the simple reason that is probably the only "blue" Spitfire for which a colour picture exist, taken after the aircraft crash-landed on the Sicilian coast after sustaining combat damage.

Yes, this is a well known aircraft but I was wonder about the pictures showing this aircraft and a detail I hadn't noticed before...

The famous colour pictures show BR112's port side in a single dark blue grey colour on the uppersurfaces. Nothing is really visible of the undersurfaces. Really the picture already gives a lot of information to a modeller interested in this subject... however this was not the only picture taken of the same aircraft over the beaches of Sicily, there are other B/W pictures around.

One of them, included in the book "Spitfire Italiani", published by the History Office of the Air Force, show a close-up of the spinner that features quite a lot of damage to the paint coat revealing a different, lighter paint coat. At first I thought this was just bare metal, but it is not as shiny as I expect bare metal to be.Now just for curiosity I checked the colour picture, expecting to find something like traces of the paint used on the undersurfaces, or again bare metal... but no, what the colour pictures seem to show is a lighter, bluer coat of blue grey. Now this is interesting....

If I got all the info together right, BR112 was one of the aircraft flown from USS Wasp as part of Operation Calendar. These aircraft, according to the latest info from Lucas, were repainted in "mediterranean blue" before being embarked on the carrier. Lower surfaces seem to have been in Sky Blue.

All good, now the colour picture may well show a weathered  Dark Mediterranean Blue, afterall she was shot down in September, 4 months after arriving on Malta. However, what's the lighter colour on the spinner supposed to be ?

Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but I'm now wondering if the aircraft carried this lighter colour on the arrival in Malta and then a darker colour (EDSG ?) was painted on top. If so, what was this lighter colour ? Now it may also be that the lighter original colour on the spinner is the paint applied before the aircraft received the  (dark?) mediterranean blue coat, but if the aircraft was in TSS (Lucas again), where does the lighter blue grey come from ? EDSG is quite a dark blue-grey. Or maybe the aircraft was not repainted in Dark Mediterranean Blue but in a lighter, bluer colour ?

Of course the lighter colour may have been confined to the spinner... if so, was this part of the original undersurfaces ? In such case, the undersurfaces could not have been Sky Blue, that is much lighter than what the pictures seem to show. Or maybe it was a colour applied to the spinner at some point in Malta... but I doubt that the aircraft got repainted too many time and I can't remember any mention of blue or blue grey coloured spinners.

I know, maybe I'm readin too much into one little detail, but that B/W picture in the book does not seem to be too consistent with the colour picture of the same aircraft shown in the same book and in other titles...

 

For information, this thread includes a reproduction of the pictures I mentioned, although in worse quality, and another B/W picture of the same aircraft

 

https://unosetentaydos.mforos.com/2152956/13017438-spitfire-mk-vc-kenneth-el-indio-charney-malta-1942/

 

Now all the above is of course academic from a modeller point of view... my plan is indeed to build BR112 from the recent Airfix kit (that I finally managed to buy) but really I can simply build this subject as would have been before taking off for that last mission, with what looks like a single coat of a dark blue grey. That of course still leaves doubts about the undersurfaces, but at least the upper half of the aircraft is kind of confirmed

For myself, I feel the  sky blue spinner repainted in a darker color and waetered

 

Alain

[Magpie22]

16 hours ago, Giorgio N said:

BR112 is one of the best known of the Spitfire Mk.Vc operating from Malta, for the simple reason that is probably the only "blue" Spitfire for which a colour picture exist, taken after the aircraft crash-landed on the Sicilian coast after sustaining combat damage.

Yes, this is a well known aircraft but I was wonder about the pictures showing this aircraft and a detail I hadn't noticed before...

The famous colour pictures show BR112's port side in a single dark blue grey colour on the uppersurfaces. Nothing is really visible of the undersurfaces. Really the picture already gives a lot of information to a modeller interested in this subject... however this was not the only picture taken of the same aircraft over the beaches of Sicily, there are other B/W pictures around.

One of them, included in the book "Spitfire Italiani", published by the History Office of the Air Force, show a close-up of the spinner that features quite a lot of damage to the paint coat revealing a different, lighter paint coat. At first I thought this was just bare metal, but it is not as shiny as I expect bare metal to be.Now just for curiosity I checked the colour picture, expecting to find something like traces of the paint used on the undersurfaces, or again bare metal... but no, what the colour pictures seem to show is a lighter, bluer coat of blue grey. Now this is interesting....

If I got all the info together right, BR112 was one of the aircraft flown from USS Wasp as part of Operation Calendar. These aircraft, according to the latest info from Lucas, were repainted in "mediterranean blue" before being embarked on the carrier. Lower surfaces seem to have been in Sky Blue.

All good, now the colour picture may well show a weathered  Dark Mediterranean Blue, afterall she was shot down in September, 4 months after arriving on Malta. However, what's the lighter colour on the spinner supposed to be ?

Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but I'm now wondering if the aircraft carried this lighter colour on the arrival in Malta and then a darker colour (EDSG ?) was painted on top. If so, what was this lighter colour ? Now it may also be that the lighter original colour on the spinner is the paint applied before the aircraft received the  (dark?) mediterranean blue coat, but if the aircraft was in TSS (Lucas again), where does the lighter blue grey come from ? EDSG is quite a dark blue-grey. Or maybe the aircraft was not repainted in Dark Mediterranean Blue but in a lighter, bluer colour ?

Of course the lighter colour may have been confined to the spinner... if so, was this part of the original undersurfaces ? In such case, the undersurfaces could not have been Sky Blue, that is much lighter than what the pictures seem to show. Or maybe it was a colour applied to the spinner at some point in Malta... but I doubt that the aircraft got repainted too many time and I can't remember any mention of blue or blue grey coloured spinners.

I know, maybe I'm readin too much into one little detail, but that B/W picture in the book does not seem to be too consistent with the colour picture of the same aircraft shown in the same book and in other titles...

 

For information, this thread includes a reproduction of the pictures I mentioned, although in worse quality, and another B/W picture of the same aircraft

 

https://unosetentaydos.mforos.com/2152956/13017438-spitfire-mk-vc-kenneth-el-indio-charney-malta-1942/

 

Now all the above is of course academic from a modeller point of view... my plan is indeed to build BR112 from the recent Airfix kit (that I finally managed to buy) but really I can simply build this subject as would have been before taking off for that last mission, with what looks like a single coat of a dark blue grey. That of course still leaves doubts about the undersurfaces, but at least the upper half of the aircraft is kind of confirmed

 

HI Giorgio,

 

A few comments re BR112. I find that I don't agree with some of your conclusions. I have not read Lucas' articles on the subject so don't know what he said in detail, but I do not agree with the statement you quote that all the aircraft of Operation Calendar 'were repainted in "mediterranean blue" before being embarked on the carrier. Lower surfaces seem to have been in Sky Blue.' 

 

My hypothesis follows:

1. BR112 rolled off the production line in the standard RAF Day Fighter Scheme of Dark Green / Ocean Grey / Medium Sea grey with Sky spinner and fuselage band.
2. After acceptance at No. 39 MU, she went to RAF Abbotsinch, (Glascow), for preparation for overseas shipment.
3. RAF Orders at the time allowed for fighter aircraft serving abroad to be finished in the DFS, TLS, or Desert schemes. It is my belief that although most of the aircraft for overseas service were repainted in the Desert scheme before despatch, some were left in the DFS and some were repainted in the TLS.
4. I believe that RAF Abbotsinch repainted eight Spitfires, that were earmarked to be placed aboard USS Wasp in April 1942, (Operation Calendar), in the TLS. These were: BP955, BP961, BP966, BP970, BR112, BR124, BR187, and BR190. Photos of several of these A/C show them to be in TLS and not in desert colours or DFS. Another point that distinguishes these Abbotsinch painted aircraft is the non-standard serial style. The mid-horizontal bar in the letters and numbers is not in the middle but above that level. This 'new' serial suggests to me that the A/C had had a complete repaint, most likely at Abbotsinch, after the A/C had left the factory.

Photos of BR112.  I realise that you already have these but I put them up to aid discussion.

 

I am not conviced that this is a genuine colour shot but, accepting that it is for this discussion, it is quite clear to me that it has

a two colour camouflage in the standard pattern. It appears to me that the colours are Dark Earth and Dark Green, i.e. the TLS.

I have been told that it is finished in the TSS, but I can't see that - to me one of those colours is brown - I don't see a grey.

 

From the same angle as the shot above, the two colour camouflage in the standard pattern is again evident. The rendering of the blue and red in the roundel and, the mid tone of the yellow,

suggest that an Ortho film, possibly with a R/Y filter may have been used. This would have rendered Dark Earth and Dark Green in close tones. If the DFS scheme had been used, the contrast

between the colours would have been much higher. The spinner is quite light in tone suggesting Sky.

 

This shot gives another perspective on the spinner. Is it overpainted Sky or is the darker colour caused by water?

I believe that yellow is also a possibility but, that is contrary to the colour shot if it is indeed an original and not 'colourised'.

Note also the lack of a rear view mirror. Taken off by the pilot for added speed, or souvenired after the forced landing?

 

The other side. Again the demarcation between the two colours of the standard pattern upper surface camouflage is evident near the roundel and in front of the coscpit area.

 

To sum up, I do not believe that the A/C was painted in Mediterranean Blue, or any other blue for that matter.

Probably just adding more confusion, Giorgio, but them's my thinks on the matter, FWIW.

 

Peter M

[Peter Roberts]

Amazing how sometimes we see what we want to see. I have looked at photos of this plane dozens of times, and would have sworn it was a blue painted Spitfire, but I am looking at it with very different eyes in your post Peter. I have always felt a bit uneasy about the colour shot, but wasn’t sure why. I think the spinner puts me off and makes me a bit suspicious. But those B/W shots look pretty conclusive. Bit of a revelation for this modeller - thanks for posting Peter, and thanks for raising this Giorgio.

[Graham Boak]

I think that this is the blue overpaint fading/wearing off and signs of the earlier colour showing through.

[Phoenix44]

I've made comments on that colour photo elsewhere because I don't trust the colour at all, if it is actually a colour photo. One place I find suspicious is the sky either side of the tail - it appears to change colour. The spine is also very vague above the roundel which might be a consequence of the very bright light or poor colorisation. There's also far too much pink in it, as it doesn't appear to be taken at dusk or dawn (more like midday given the shadow). Both the white in the fin stipe and the top of the door (aluminium?) have a real pink tinge to them, as does the foam. It's interesting that the first  B&W shot is taken at a different time as the shadows are different and of course the pilot's door is closed, the canopy slid forward and the taiil wheel faces the other way. That shot shows further problems with the colour photo - note in the B&W one how the turn of the rudder creates a variation in shade with the fin, but that variation is absent in the colour shot. As to the spinner, the colour photo shows two shades if you really zoom in, but then it really looks colourised. It just looks wrong whereas the B&W photo looks right.

 

Personally i think that either the colour shot is (badly) colourised or it has very poor colour reproduction. I do see two tones though, including a green that is very poorly reproduced sweeping forward of the serial number and then up and towards the tail and a similar green on the port wingtip. I see a different colour forward of the roundel to the green as well. If I had to guess based on the colour photo I'd say Dark Slate Grey and EDSG rather than Dark Green and Medium Sea Grey, but it could be the latter if it's colourised or very poor colour. I really don't think it's some kind of single dark blue but these things are not easy to discern.

[Super Aereo]

AFAIK it is an original colour photo and there is no way the Temperate Land Scheme would look so blue and faded in an Agfacolor photo. If anything else, the beach at Scoglitti should have golden, rather than grey-white sand, but I have never seen any original Agfa photos showing the TLS as blue...

 

[MACALAIN]

3 hours ago, Graham Boak said:

I think that this is the blue overpaint fading/wearing off and signs of the earlier colour showing through.

Exactly what I had said before, 

May be Sky blue, with a darker color on( DMB)?

 

Alain

[Giorgio N]

I'm glad that this topic has raised some interest and that this is leading to an interesting discussion, so please do not worry if you're confusing me farther !

I am myself realising in these last few days how that famour colour picture can actually be more confusing than else...

Thanks a lot to @Magpie22 for not only his interesting comments but also for posting pictures of much better quality than the ones in the link I originally posted. The B/W pictures in particular are similar in quality to the ones included in the "Spitfire Italiani" book.

There are some areas in particular that keep puzzling me...

 

Starting from the spinner, I don't think that the darker areas in the picture taken from the front are due to water. The shape of the edges is compatible with the way paint splinters and this would make me believe that the spinner was indeed dark... and then other pictures seem to show a light spinner. This could of course be due to the sun reflecting on the spinner surface or may be due to a combination of film and filters (I have no deep knowledge of these effects so I'll leave this to others to comment on). 

Now assuming that the darker areas are indeed paint, the lighter areas below in the picture taken from the front still look a bit dark to me to be Sky or Sky Blue. Sky tend to show as very light in most pictures, I'd have expected something looking almost like white and not the kind of tone I see in that picture. Notice how toward the rear of the spinner there seems to be an area that is even more reflecting and I'd expect this to be natural metal. Then of course there's the matter that the colour picture shows the lighter areas in a lighter blue grey.... but this brings me to another area...

 

The colour picture: is this an original? Is this colourized ? Good question ! For a starter I have 3 different renditions of the same pictures in 3 different books. The one that seems to be of better quality is in Woitek Matusiak's book on the Spitfire V published by MMP. Then there's one in each of the two Italian books mentioned above. The picture in the Ali d'Italia book seems to show more signs of a camouflaged aircraft, the one in Spitfire Italiani is the worst.

When I first saw the picture I was very happy, here was an indication of what one of those fabled Malta Spitfires actually looked like... now I'm much more sceptical. Just to mention one point, several pictures were taken of this aircraft. Why one colour pictures and a number of B/W pictures ? There are other examples of colour pictures taken by Italian troops in WW2, generally we see a series of pictures taken on the same field at the same date. Here however there's only one pictures. Of course it may be that other pictures were lost over time. It would be interesting to understand when this picture appeared.

Of course if the picture is colourized, then this would explain the lack of a clearly lighter colour on the spinner and a few other things.

her

Now assuming that the aircraft is indeed in a standard, or at least more standard, colour scheme, there's the matter of what scheme this is.

Personally I can see a grey in all 3 "versions" of the pictures in my books, I really can't notice a brown. Temperate Sea Scheme is something I would consider consistent with the picture and again IIRC Lucas mentioned that the aircraft for Calendar were finished in TSS.  I would rule out DFS because the contrast does not seem right while IIRC TLS was indeed used for other deliveries.

And of course the possibility that the original scheme is showing through a blue/grey coat is something I'm not ready to discount yet...

 

[alt-92]

Casually dropping BR124 in here

[expositor]

Has the possibility that these Spits were coated with USN Blue grey enroute been discounted?  The pic above posted by Alt looks like the original scheme was TLS,   as Sky under surfaces tend to appear quite bright in most black and white photos.  But then again, I could be wrong....

[Graham Boak]

Yes: partly because they don't look like anything like the Wildcats next to them (much darker) but mainly because we now know there are surviving records telling us which paints were used.

 

If you didn't get/can't get the copies of Scale Aircraft Modelling in which this was described, in a few months Guideline are proposing to produce a book of Paul Lucas' Colour Conundrum articles including those on the Malta Spitfires.

 

 

[alt-92]

23 minutes ago, Graham Boak said:

Guideline are proposing to produce a book of Paul Lucas' Colour Conundrum articles including those on the Malta Spitfires.

Now THAT is a good idea.

[Phoenix44]

2 hours ago, Super Aereo said:

AFAIK it is an original colour photo and there is no way the Temperate Land Scheme would look so blue and faded in an Agfacolor photo. If anything else, the beach at Scoglitti should have golden, rather than grey-white sand, but I have never seen any original Agfa photos showing the TLS as blue...

 

I believe Agfacolour from that period had a reputation for both "European" colours rather than the more vibrant colours of Kodachrome and for real problems with changing colour over time. 

 

Personally I'm not actually seeing blue when you get close in, except perhaps on the spinner. I just see green and grey, with "blue" when you zoom out.

 

If you zoom in the area between roundel and serial number and then filter slightly, I get a green and grey in quite different shades.

 

Edited September 29, 2021 by Phoenix44
Added photo

[ilj]

Assuming the colour photo is genuine, my guess (using parsimony) would be as follows:

 

Early 1942 (February 15th ish) , the aircraft left the factory in the tropical land scheme (dark earth and 'middle stone' over light blue, spinner sky, no rear fuselage band) (there was no 'Desert Scheme' at this point, it hadn't been invented yet).

 

Early 1942, BR112 allocated for shipment to Malta.  

 

April 14, 1942 BR112 transported to Malta via Wasp, Operation Calendar.  Paint scheme judged inappropriate for Malta before or after loading.

 

Spring-summer 1942 at some point, aircraft's tropical land scheme roughly overpainted with an unknown bluish gray colour (Ocean Gray, Extra Dark Sea Gray, Intermediate Blue et c.)

 

September 9, 1942, crashed on beach on Sicily, photo taken showing largely blue-grey aircraft with minimal contrast except for a patch of middle stone on the fuselage spine.

 

^this model invokes the fewest overpaints, explains the absence of any trace of a Temperate Land Scheme sky fuselage band (band also not seen in carrier loading or Gibraltar images), explains the light Middle Stone patch on the fuselage spine and is consistent with a dark blue-grey spinner chipping pant to reveal sky.

 

 

[Graham Boak]

Or, better still, painted before loading onto Wasp with Dark Mediterranean Blue.  As the records say.

 

Not "it looks like to me..."  (having been guilty of that in the past)

Not "they had X,Y, Z available so it must have been one of them..."

Not "I met this man in a bar/my grandfather told me..."

 

As Paul pointed out in his article, many people have offered ideas on the colours (guilty!) but didn't go digging into the archives.  Or, at least, not deeply enough - Edgar Brooks did find the memo from Malta calling for a maritime scheme.  He didn't find, for example, the memos saying what they had been painted, nor the one from Jumbo Gracie when he arrived from Malta, saying no, that's not what we want, This is what we want.  So they were repainted...  

 

What I find personally disappointing is that ten or more years ago I'd decided (logically etc) that it was either DMB or EDSG, and picked the wrong one.  But I never imagined quite how complicated it turned out to be.

[FinnAndersen]

What I remember from my early days as an amateur photografer was that Agfa films produced pictures that were very much warmer than the equivalent Kodak or indeed other films. Also, I never used a filter when shooting colour films and are not sure of anyone doing so. Filters were used when shooting B/W films to get the clouds out in the sky. I would not use this photo as more than illustration of the Spitfire on the beach.

 

1 hour ago, ilj said:

Early 1942 (February 15th ish) , the aircraft left the factory in the tropical land scheme (dark earth and 'middle stone' over light blue, spinner sky, no rear fuselage band) (there was no 'Desert Scheme' at this point, it hadn't been invented yet).

 

 

Are you sure of this (no Desert scheme at the time)? There's a well known photo of BR226 being loaded onto Wasp in what looks like a Desert scheme. See Osprey Aircraft of the Aces #83 p.25 

 

59 minutes ago, Graham Boak said:

Or, better still, painted before loading onto Wasp with Dark Mediterranean Blue.  As the records say.

 

So, what we have is a Spitfire that was over sprayed with DMB, which had worn off a bit to show the underlying scheme? And what colours would that be? Desert, TLS or ?

 

Like this?

 

 

I'm very intrigued 🙂

 

/Finn

[Graham Boak]

There certainly was a desert scheme at this time, it was originally specified in February 1941, although a variant had been in use in the Middle East before then.  Barnham, after mentioning his own aircraft as being blue, observed a desert-camouflaged Spitfire being shot down.  The very first deliveries from Eagle were in Desert scheme, with examples of "exchanged" colours just to confuse matters.  It was repainting these on Malta that started this problem.

 

I know the Wasp pictures you mention.  However the second Wasp delivery were painted in Temperate Sea Scheme, and this is notorious for appearing different on different film types and filters.  Jack Rae, on this trip, noticed that the undersides of these aircraft were a light blue - methinks he might have commented had he seen yellow and brown tops!  There are at least three photos of Spitfires on this trip showing a two-colour camouflage with less contrast than Desert: though in fairness it must be said that the light at the time was not the best.

 

However, an A code means Calendar not Bowery.  AFAIK all photos of Calendar Spitfires during or around the time of this delivery show a single dark colour. 

 

Now we do not have photos of every single aircraft throughout this time period, before, during and after.  Therefore it may be possible that some aircraft, perhaps late delivery, were rushed through without being repainted.  If they went to Hal Far then there may have been less emphasis on repainting, which began at Takali and appears to have been continued there well into 1943.  Or, of course, those aircraft delivered from Gibraltar by Eagle as part of Bowery or the following LD are likely to have been in Desert.  The one Barnham saw must have come from somewhere.

[Magpie22]

17 hours ago, alt-92 said:

Casually dropping BR124 in here

What makes you think it is BR124? I cant see the last digit. Do you have some other source?

BR121 thru BR129 all went to Malta aboard USS Wasp. BR126 and BR128 went on Operation Bowery in May and the others, earlier, on operation Calendar in April.

Peter M

[alt-92]

Happy to have about every decal sheet or kit using the combination BR124 and Uo2 to be shown incorrect. 

[Olmec Head]

Brian Cauchi - Malta Spitfire Vs - 1942

 

With some trepidation I thought I would wade into a Malta Spitfire thread, albeit to quote Brian Cauchi's 'take' on BR112 in his Malta Spitfire book over pages 55-57.  I thought it worth paraphrasing his ideas and I emphasise that I am not claiming these for my own.  It is a good book by the way and well researched and presented on what can be a contentious subject!

 

Mr Cauchi sees the aircraft as being originally Desert Scheme, i.e DE and Stone with Sky underneath.  The peeled nose cone is originally Stone or Sky.  This ties in with the pictures and evidence of Desert Scheme Spitfires being winched aboard USS Wasp for OP CALENDAR before being repainted onboard.

 

Mr Cauchi then sees that the repaint could have been USN Non Spectacular Blue Grey (Gray) applied over the Stone rather than all over.  The tail area has been further then repainted as a result of repairs after crash landing in June with the repaint colour being any of the usual Malta blue possibilities.   This would explain the non-standard serial code application.

 

The above is very much a precis of Mr Cauchi research and ideas, and I apologise if I have overly simplified his views.

 

 

[ilj]

^ excellent summary of Brian Cauchi's informed hypothesizing Mr. Head... technically I think the Desert Scheme was implemented later but the tropical land scheme with its dark earth and middle stone topside was very similar and no need to get bogged down in terminology.  I would speculate the underpart colour was more likely sky blue than the greyish green 'Sky', while the spinner could likely have been Sky.  I doubt the exact shades of blue gray overpaint or its origins will ever be known.  As an exercise in speculation I modelled nine of these ac here:

 

https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/hyperscale/dusty-blue-hell-spits-malta-1942-43-mostly-canadia-t522178.html

 

and

 

https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/hyperscale/rcaf-spitfire-vc-malta-1942-1-32-tamiya-conversion-t524599.html

[Graham Boak]

Brian's views, and excellent book, are a product of the "logical thinking" approach to the subject.  But logic depends upon the assumptions made.  Later research into the records have produced contemporary records that the aircraft delivered on Calendar were painted Dark Mediterranean Blue, on direct advice from Sq. Ldr Gracie, flown back from Malta for the delivery.  It therefore appear most likely that earlier deliveries to Malta in the Desert Scheme were overpainted with DMB.  Aircraft delivered on Bowery were painted in the Temperate Sea Scheme.

 

Azure Blue had been standardised over the winter 1940/41.  There is therefore no good reason for suggesting that undersides were anything other than this colour.  References to a sky blue are simply generic terms for any light blue rather than the specific and very light Sky Blue.  Sky had been rejected by the ME Command as being too light for Mediterranean skies, so painting the undersides in the even lighter Sky Blue does run counter to that.