ARMA HOBBY 1/72 Hurricane Mk.II B/C Set decals

[Brian J]

I recently picked up the new Hurricane Mk. II B/C from ARMA HOBBY and am very impressed with the tooling compared to earlier 1/72 Hurricane kits from other companies.  My posting has to do with the markings of BE581/JX-E flown by F/L Karel Kuttelwasher.  Back in February of 2015 I started a long thread on the markings of this aircraft and received numerous comments which included comments by Nick Millman.  It appears to me that the markings of this aircraft that are included in the ARMA kit are based on Nicks comments about the 1942 artwork of J H Striebel, a small coloured imaage of which was included in his comments.  In other words, what do you think of the ARMA markings/decals?

 

  Would any interested members concur with my conclusion or are the ARMA markings new findings?  There have been so many interpretations of these markings over the decades it is difficult to draw any positive conclusions...ain't that the truth about so many WWII markings/paint schemes!

 

Brian James

[Troy Smith]

2 hours ago, Brian J said:

In other words, what do you think of the ARMA markings/decals?

best guess using available information,   there is a photo of a 1 sq Hurricane downed in France with red codes and small roundels

see here for a long description of how they arrived at the markings

http://armahobbynews.pl/en/blog/2020/10/13/karel-kutterwascher-the-most-effective-hurricane-night-fighter-pilot/

 

NO evidence has ever surfaced that BE581 ever had green/grey uppers,  IMO the idea that 1 Sq Hurricanes had this scheme are from bad reproductions of JX-Y having been repainted into DFS and the paint flaking off the undersides

 

 

see here for more photos

 

 

Note also that the Green/grey over black night intruder scheme was only ever seen on 87 Sq Hurricane round Dieppe, see here for more on this, 

 

HTH

[fishplanebeer]

The pic of a 1 squadron machine being salvaged by the Germans is on pages 7 and 8 of 'In Enemy Hands' by Bryan Philpott published in 1981 and the aircraft in question is JX@J /BD949. Red codes and serial plus small fuselage roundels as mentioned by Troy plus the starboard codes read J@JX. Pilot was P/O R. Marcinkus who was captured and became part of the 'Great Escape', sadly being one of those executed upon recapture.

 

Regards

Colin.

 

 

[Troy Smith]

35 minutes ago, fishplanebeer said:

The pic of a 1 squadron machine being salvaged by the Germans is on pages 7 and 8 of 'In Enemy Hands' by Bryan Philpott published in 1981 and the aircraft in question is JX@J /BD949.

The photo is on the Arma Hobby blog I linked,  and has been posted on here,  but good to know where it was published originally I presume.

It has been a very useful addition to how 1 Sq Hurricanes were marked in early 1942. 

One detail that I do not recall being commented on is the use of the C type roundel proportions, even though it was smaller size (18 inch?) than what became standard of 36 inch,  before it became standard type of roundel in May 1942, as BD949 was lost  12 Feb 1942. 

though there is the photo of BD949 which confirms this style by 1 Sq 

 

there is some commentary on roundels in the Ducimus guide,  note on the 2nd page here it refers to 3 Sq, 

EDIT

I forgot this image,

note.  the canopy frames have not been repainted, or the flexing of the canopy has caused it to flake off, like the famous colour shot of BE500/LK-A?

Hurricane pilot, c1942. by Etienne du Plessis, on Flickr

 

 

 

 

P/O Marcinkus story is here

http://aircrewremembered.com/marcinkus-romualdas.html

[fishplanebeer]

The 4 photos of BD949 in the book I mention do not include the one posted in the blog but due to copyright I can't post them, however they are available from the Bundesarchiv in Koblenz. Alternatively the book is still available on Amazon for less than £6.

 

Regards

Colin.

[Brian J]

I have given thought to the various responses to my initial question on this topic.  I tried to e-mail ARMA for clarification on their part but failed after trying to contact them.  After reading the various posts that members were kind enough to include I can't help but agree with the opinion of Troy Smith that, "...never trust a profile without a photo."  One of the reasons is that the ARMA profile suggests a yellow or red half spinner while other profiles suggests it was all black or all red.  The size of the fuselage roundel also comes into question. I have the Xtradecal sheet X72-113 and two b&w photos of BD867/QO-Y from 3 Sqdn and may end up doing a model with markings I can verify using photographs.  I seems like a modeler can have too many references that often contradict each other and can't make up their mind.  Being wishy-washy is terrible burden!  

Brian

[Fukuryu]

1 hour ago, Brian J said:

I tried to e-mail ARMA for clarification on their part but failed after trying to contact them.

 

@Wojtek Bulhak and @GrzeM from Arma Hobby are BM members; you can try to contact them here.

[Troy Smith]

1 hour ago, Brian J said:

One of the reasons is that the ARMA profile suggests a yellow or red half spinner while other profiles suggests it was all black or all red.  The size of the fuselage roundel also comes into question.

Well, You want to BE581 JX-E,  and certainty, they do it as seen in the IWM photo, with an A1 roundel, and Sky Grey codes. 

 

The controversy is over how BE581 looked later in 1942,  there is the famous James Goulding profile from Aircraft in Profile,  which no one has ever seen any photos of,   though there are the air to air shots in mid 1942 of other 1 sq planes, JX-Y in particular have a very tatty repaint.

 

What Arma have done is used what information there is available to make a 'best guess',  that there is no reason to believe that BE581 ever got the uppers repainted, but 1 sq did reduce the roundel size and change type, and switch to red codes by Feb 42, as shown on the photo of BD949, and assume this was a squadron wide change. 

That there are photos of other night Hurricane units using the reduced C1 type roundels, as in 3 Sq and 274 Sq.

 

And that's it.   

1 hour ago, Brian J said:

 

I have the Xtradecal sheet X72-113

Xtradecal are famous for mistakes.  

https://www.hannants.co.uk/product/X72113

note they have BE500/LK-A as having a yellow spinner.  Because the colour photo of BE500 could be yellow, but other B/W pics taken on the same photo shoot clearly show that the spinner tone is the same as the roundel red, not the yellow.

 

In 2014, one of the decal designers started a thread here on BoB decal sheets.  I contributed,  for some reason these threads have gone, but I had to draw lines on a photo to make a point on code letters, and various other glitches, and the sheets STILL have errors.

And they didn't even give a complimentary sheet as thanks either.

1 hour ago, Brian J said:

and two b&w photos of BD867/QO-Y from 3 Sqdn

I only know of QO-A/BN185, which has QO-W/BD788  in the background.  See this crop

1 hour ago, Brian J said:

and may end up doing a model with markings I can verify using photographs. 

If you want accuracy, then work from photos.    I spend a lot of time image hunting and cross referencing, but it's part of my hobby. 

1 hour ago, Brian J said:

I seems like a modeler can have too many references that often contradict each other and can't make up their mind. 

This is a different problem,  which is older references being still used by the lazy.   This is a particular bugbear of mine, and the reason why I added my sig line.  It's knowing what references are to be trusted,  which is a area of study on it's own.

A Google image search will turn numerous profiles,  we have had had quite a few threads on here on Hurricane schemes whose only source are profiles from the Aircraft in Profile series,  the whole series are up on Boxartden, and they are filled with dubious profiles,  but bear in mind that these were being churned out in the mid 1960's,  it was only in the late 60's that various documents got declassified,   which allowed the Ducimus Camouflage and Markings series to really sort out the details. 

These are still pretty much the benchmark on RAF Fighter colours in NW Europe 50 + years later. 

 

The problem is simply that once a profile has been copied so many times, it becomes "fact". 

 

Case in point, the Goulding Night Reaper profile is now "fact" as  at one point PZ865 of the BBMF flew in EXACTLY these markings...  but then while the BBMF does a great job,  they don't always get the markings right....  because unless you are a fairly OCD model nut you won't have waded through model forums and and had the desire to pick your way through various bunfights to see what is verifiable or not, and I can understand why.

 

That specialist companies don't  follow current research is not excusable,  examples are Xtradecal and Valiant Wings, whose 2020 Hurricane book has a profile of ..... who  have respectively have decals and a profile of  BE581 as per the 1966 Goulding profile.. 

Caveat Emptor.  

 

 

[brewerjerry]

On 4/1/2022 at 3:30 AM, fishplanebeer said:

The 4 photos of BD949 in the book I mention do not include the one posted in the blog but due to copyright I can't post them, however they are available from the Bundesarchiv in Koblenz. Alternatively the book is still available on Amazon for less than £6.

 

Regards

Colin.

Hi

    seems other photos of the a/c are also here, but sadly not online 

  

 

 

https://imagesdefense.gouv.fr/fr/hurricane-ii-c-du-squadron-1-raf-du-flight-lieutenant-romas-markinkus-capture-et-un-avion-leurre-sur-un-terrain-d-aviation.html

 

 

there was also/ is ?  another french  archive, something like ECPA  ? with loads of ww2 a/c photos 

 

   cheers

      jerry

[fishplanebeer]

When I search for the Ducimus Camouflage and Markings references it keeps coming up with the free pdf's on the Boxartden site which I assume are the Aircraft in Profile series that are referred to.

 

Apologies for being dim but are they one and the same, or if not how can I find/access the Ducimus reference materials instead please?

 

Regards

Colin.

[Fukuryu]

The Ducimus Camouflage and Markings series is also available in Boxartden on a different folder. Will post the link as soon as I find it.

 

ETA: Here's the link: https://boxartden.com/reference/gallery/index.php/Camouflage-Markings

Edited April 5, 2022 by Fukuryu
Link added.

[fishplanebeer]

Many thanks for the link which confirms that the ones I've been looking at on Boxartden are the correct Ducimus profile books after all and not the Aircraft Profile series of booklets. Only just realised I have three of the latter, on the Do217, Lancaster B.II and Seafire, and they are quite good albeit a little brief.

 

Also I did a quick search on Amazon and there is a book published by Ducimus entitled 'Camouflage and Markings: R.A.F. Fighter Command Northern Europe, 1936-45' so is this just a amalgamation of these various books into one volume possibly or is it worth buying separately?

 

Regards

Colin.

 

 

 

[Chuck1945]

Yes, the  hardcover is the complete set. It followed the individual booklets. For me, having all the subjects in one book is preferred to keeping track of all the individual ones.

[Troy Smith]

1 hour ago, fishplanebeer said:

the Aircraft Profile series of booklets. Only just realised I have three of the latter, on the Do217, Lancaster B.II and Seafire, and they are quite good albeit a little brief.

ALL of the Aircraft in Profile are on Boxartden.   Yes, they are dated now,  but when first published they were ground breaking,  cheap (2 shilling/10p in 1965) a potted history, some photos and those wonderful colour profiles,  they fed directly into a growing market, both aviation enthusiasts and model builders,  if you look on archive.org there are many scans of 60 era Airfix magazines,  again, while crude now,  but also containing important series on markings, and often fascinating letters from ex-servicemen, sometimes with photos,  these are some of the bedrock of what the hobby is now, the late 60's is when you start to see aftermarket decals and vacforms begin to emerge, along with more adult model magazines,  in particular in the UK, Scale Models,  I started buying that in 1978, and have picked up older issues, and they were the Britmodeller of their day,  even now they are still  worth reading, their kit reviews  are often still accurate assessments now, as well as making you aware of new books,  again, this was made me aware of things like @Dana Bell USAAF Camouflage and Markings ETO-MTO 42-45 book, which was an incredible book when it came out,  and was one of the things that helped me to 'look' at photographs....    That he is still researching and posts on here and Hyperscale and will answer your questions still greatly pleases me....    

 

These things turned plastic modelling from  slapping your 2 bob Airfix kit together on a Saturday afternoon to meet it's fate with air rifles and fireworks, to creating researched scale models.    

 

Back to the Boxartden, there are loads of scans up there, they did have all the Detail And Scale book at one point but they got removed. 

 

This is the reference section

https://boxartden.com/reference/gallery/index.php/

 

of note are the Aircraft in Profile series, and there is some good photos in some of the Aircam books as well,  which were step on from the Profile series, and certainly were more aimed at the modeller with more in depth information on camouflage and markings.  

Also of note are the Monogram Monographs,  these were cutting edge research at the time on very esoteric subjects, I learned of these from reviews in Scale Models, and these were not cheap and I had to buy mail order....  Essential reading for the serious teen 109 nut....    Scale Models was where I first read about late war Luftwaffe colours, and used their published mixes to make my mixed colours....  Recalling this make me aware of just how much I had absorbed then.....  of course I had nothing to reference this against, so I had no idea how far down the rabbit hole I'd gone then...       

 

The Ducimus series though have dated extremely well,  as i keep saying, the RAF titles  benefitted from then recently declassfied documents.  The RAF Mustang book has some flaws,  and the USSAF titles are less detailed than the RAF ones, but often cover more theatres. 

 

 

 

1 hour ago, fishplanebeer said:

Also I did a quick search on Amazon and there is a book published by Ducimus entitled 'Camouflage and Markings: R.A.F. Fighter Command Northern Europe, 1936-45' so is this just a amalgamation of these various books into one volume possibly or is it worth buying separately?

Yes, it's a bound set of all 12.   Probably cheaper than finding all the individual booklets as well.   I remember when I first found these on sale at the RAF Museum in the late 70's,  they less popular titles but at 15 p each they were an absolute bargain, given they were 30p each when new around 1970....   Again, regarding my post above, revelatory levels of information. 

 

 

13 minutes ago, Chuck1945 said:

the  hardcover is the complete set. It followed the individual booklets.

AFAIK, it's just the actual booklets made into a  bound set, but, yes, it's a better format.  They did the same thing with the Aircraft In Profile series, I had a bound set when I was 10, one of my first real aircraft books.....

 

 

[fishplanebeer]

Being a little dim I didn't realise that all the Aircraft Profiles were also there as I didn't click on all the links to reveal them but that's a really great resource if used wisely. I certainly found the one on the Do217 incredibly useful during my build as books on this particular subject are not plentiful apart from the Warpaint publication.

 

There are copies on Amazon of the Ducimus combined set for around £15, albeit in very well read condition but still a bargain, so that's another book to add to my ever expanding library as being of a certain generation I much prefer to have actual paper rather than a digital image. So if things go pear shaped either with my pc or the web site I still have the information available.

 

Just to add that I wasn't aware of the archive.org web site so thank you for bringing it to my attention as it looks incredible and I've just found and downloaded some plans plus lots of extra details for the Mosquito - amazing!

 

Regards

Colin.

[Bigos]

On 31/03/2022 at 22:22, Brian J said:

 In other words, what do you think of the ARMA markings/decals?

 

 

Brian James

Hey Brian! You're right that the Arma Hobby interpretation is a fairly new discovery. I am partly responsible for this project. I relied on all possible sources and then found a great article in the Czech magazine "Letectvi a Kosmonautika" 1/2019 describing all aircraft used by Kuttelwascher. The conclusions that the Czech author Jiří Šebek described in it were completely in line with mine, and this helped me in my decision to go against the earlier traditional interpretations known from British sources. I made only minor changes to the paint scheme developed by Jiří Šebek. Everything comes together in a logical whole and Arma Hobby's proposal, as Troy writes, is the best possible guess of the BE581 markings. 
Jiří Šebek has ruled out the possibility that Hurricane BE581 received a day camouflage. I also researched the history of this aircraft myself by studying the ORB of the unit. Anyway, I described the whole story in detail on Arma Hobby blog. I recommend reading my article, it will probably give you answers to all questions. 

http://armahobbynews.pl/en/blog/2020/10/13/karel-kutterwascher-the-most-effective-hurricane-night-fighter-pilot/