Bristol Superfreighter 'Silver City Airways

[Ray S]

Hello all, can someone please help me out with the colour scheme for the Silver City Airways Bristol Freighter.

 

I have started the Airfix offering and have the 26Decals laser-printed transfer sheet for it too. The 26Decals guide is a little tricky for me to interpret, and shows an overall colour for the wings and lower fuselage, which does not (in my view) match the colour callouts, as the engine cowlings are shown natural metal:

 

 

The Airfix guide, which has Silver City Airways' associate company Cie Air Transport shows the underside of the wings grey, the wing uppers silver (with grey either side of the engines, the lower fuselage grey and the fuselage sides below the cheatlines silver. I would imagine the scheme would have been similar to Silver City's as they were so closely related. As in this:

 

https://www.scalemates.com/products/img/8/7/7/134877-17-instructions.pdf

 

Does anyone know which is correct? I am minded to go with the Airfix way, as it is what I seem to remember from 1966 when I last built this one. I will also need to fill in the blue on the nose, but I think I can work that out.

 

I hope someone can help,

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Ray

[bzn20]

I've  seen them in a few Schemes .... NMF lower Fuselage and Silver paint lower Fuselage and the light ish Grey (you have above) schemes . White Fin with 2 Blue lines , grey with blue lines , Silver paint fin and Rudder  2 Blue lines . This Kite , G-AMWA ended up with (BUAF) British United Air Ferries , part of BUA . Crashed just after take off in the Channel Islands early 1960s . 

[Dave Swindell]

As above, various schemes, depending on airframe and timeframe, but there's a bit of a clue in the airline name. The difficulty is in determining whether the silver is natural metal or silver paint. The Superfreighters started out natural metal, but in later years some areas appear to have been painted. It's not easy to spot the difference in a lot of photos. One point that does appear  later on in their life is light grey areas behind the engines, with the whole of the nacelle behind the cowling (and exhausts), the carburettor intake and a chordwise stripe above and below the wing being painted light grey. The cowlings, lower fuselage, undercarriage legs and the rest of the wings remained natural metal or silver. The chordwise stirpe is as per the airfix upper wing diagram, and this painting is almost certainly to do with keeping this area clean/ease of removing exhaust staining. I'd also hazard a guess that this appeared around the time of the RAF switch to light aircraft grey rather than high speed silver for their aircraft. LAG was used because it wasn't possible at the time to make the new polyurethane paints in silver, this was the closest alternative. 

There's several photo's of G-AMWA around on the internet, some in the early 60's in the same scheme as the decals

http://www.silvercityairways.com/Images/SiteImages/13-13_bristol_superfreighter_final_livery.jpg

https://abpic.co.uk/pictures/registration/G-AMWA

http://www.british-caledonian.com/images/B170 SC AMWA copy.jpg

 

From the photo's above I'd say for your scheme the light grey nacelle and wing stripe is definitely there, but it's less clear whether the silver is natural metal or paint. Given the age of the aircraft I'd tend towards a silver paint, as whilst there's reflectivity there the finish looks rather too uniform for natural metal to me. As you'll be painting the model I'd be aiming for a reasonably uniform semi polished silver finish.

As @bzn20 says G-AMWA had a rather sticky end, fortunately without fatalities 

https://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19630924-0

[bigbadbadge]

Used to watch these coming in to Land at Lydd Airport under a different company in the late 70s,  very impressive machines, I built the Airfix Kit as a Silver City machine using S&M decals and went with the call out on the Airfix kit,  very pleased with the outcome. Had to go to tge Airport for our covid jabs and they have a picture hung in the bar entrance ghat has been painted showing a Super Frieghter loading a car and all the pilot's signed it. 

I thought the Airfix kit was a nice kit to build.

Chris

 

Found an image of mine

 

[bzn20]

10 minutes ago, Dave Swindell said:

silver paint 

 

The above photo has Aluminium / Silver painted Fin , NMF Rudder ( with stripes! ). Forward Engine Cowl / first couple of feet NMF , Aft cowling Grey ,started off as anyway , Leg fairing  ,NMF . I'd say the lower Fuselage is Aluminium/Silver Paint . I Can't tell you what the wing is though .

[Dave Swindell]

5 minutes ago, bzn20 said:

 

The above photo has Aluminium / Silver painted Fin , NMF Rudder ( with stripes! ). Forward Engine Cowl / first couple of feet NMF , Aft cowling Grey ,started off as anyway , Leg fairing  ,NMF . I'd say the lower Fuselage is Aluminium/Silver Paint . I Can't tell you what the wing is though .

The light grey stripe wraps around underneath the wing, and the rest of the wing looks the same as the lower fuselage, so aluminium/silver paint?

[bzn20]

12 minutes ago, bigbadbadge said:

Lydd Airport

What a place that was back then  . I also had an Aunty lived on the aproach to Eastleigh/ Southampton Airport , had stacks of BUA/BUAF Mk32 s coming over .  I was last at Lydd in the 90s my outlaws lived in Hythe , Had a Saudi VIP 727 , made a change . 

Edited March 9, 2022 by bzn20

[bigbadbadge]

 

7 minutes ago, bzn20 said:

I was last at Lydd in the 90s my outlaws lived in Hythe , Had a Saudi VIP 727 , made a change . 

 

 

I didn't see that 727, that's a shame, I saw the 737 doing tests and taking off, but the faves were Heralds,  Viscounts and SuperFreighters.  

Not been to Eastleigh Airport,  I had seem them coming in at Hurn Airport and remember the traffic lights to stop traffic when they came I'm to land.

There is a very impressive photo of a Super Frieghter landing low over road there on t'internet.

Chris

[Ray S]

Thank you all for the information @bzn20, @Dave Swindell and @bigbadbadge, it is very useful indeed, and very much appreciated.

 

I did this back in 1965/6 when I were a nipper, and I had totally forgotten just how big it was! I think it was also one of the first which had paint on in my building career, I had not reached double figures in age by then.

 

All the best,

 

Ray

[chopper61]

Hello Ray,

 

There is a video on You tube that outlines the history of Silver City from the Royal Aeronautical Society delivered by Paul Ross, the Chairman of the Silver City Association. 

 

For sheer volume of primary source material is a goldmine but to answer your question, go to time reference 47.50. from this point onwards he describes I think, precisely the information you are looking for. Hope this helps.

 

Linz

Edited March 10, 2022 by chopper61

[Ray S]

Thanks @chopper61, I will look into that.

 

All the best,

 

Ray

[chopper61]

Would anyone by any chance have a copy of the June 1960 Airfix Magazine Volume 1, No1?

In it there was an article about how to detail the Airfix Bristol Superfreighter. 

 

[bzn20]

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