Spit5 X from Malta

[Bullethead]

I'm currently redoing a spit5 I did in AH1, which might have made it into a Malta scenaro--I forget.  It's spit "X", BR112.

This plane was one of those flown off USS Wasp in the spring of 42, and was oversprayed in some blue color while at sea to make it harder to spot during the unarmed ferry flight.  There's been a lot of debate as to what color blue was used, but since it was done aboard a USN ship, I figure they used the light blue the USN used at that time for upper camo.  Certainly, one Malta squadron liked the idea and kept repainting its planes blue at Malta long after this episode, but then they used RAF colors.  The photos of other spits in this batch from Wasp, while aboard before launch, tend to support my conclusion that they used USN early 1942 blue, but you can say a B&W photo proves anything .

Like I said, this plane arrived early in 42 and was used long and hard all through the spring and summer before finally being shot down over Sicily in September.  It made a wheels-up landing on the beach and was extensively photographed by Germans and Italians.  By this point in time, the plane was in pretty sad shape from all the rough use.  And that's how I'm doing this skin.

I don't have the AH2 version far enough along to show off, but here's what the AH1 skin looked like.  I've changed computers several times since I made this skin the 1st time, so I no longer have pics of it completed, but here's the AH1 skin itself



As you can see, much of the blue overspray has worn off.  In addition, much of the underlying desert camo has been scraped off by all the servicing and the Malta dust.  The exhaust stain has a nice streak of burned paint in the middle of the sooty area, too.

[Krusty]

A very unique paint scheme

[Kev367th]

Would go along with the 'Blue' Malta V I'm doing, although mine is in the condition it actually flew off the carrier.
Mine has the code U*2 on the side and is going to use USN deck blue for the uppers (same as the one that was previoulsy in-game).

The exact blue has been a matter of great debate over the years, the concensus is this -
1) They were definately loaded onto the carriers in desert camo.
2) Somewhere on the voyage the uppers were painted (less the rudder, elevators and ailerons)
3) They arrived at Malta 'Blue"
4) A blue that would be found aboard ship would have been used
5) Therefore most probably USN Deck Blue.

[Kev367th]

This is as far as I had got with the Malta V prior to a request for a specific VIII skin -

[Krusty]

Question: Why not the control surfaces?

[Kev367th]

They were concerned it would affect them adversely.
They weren't exactly done in a controlled environment , pics show overspray, uneven coats etc, was a very rushed job.

Which also expalins why which blue they used was never documented .
As I said concensus is it was either USN Deck Blue, or USN Navy Blue.

[Guppy35]

Sure wish the nose of the AH Spit V looked better.  It just looks off to me.

Skin looks good though

[Kev367th]

Dan check out my post on the Aircraft / Vehivles forum - "Somethings up with the Spit models".

Tks - Like I said it's sure very, very early stages, I broke off to do one of the XVI's you requested.
Now concentrating on this one and finishing up the Pink IX.

[Bullethead]

Kev367th said:

Would go along with the 'Blue' Malta V I'm doing, although mine is in the condition it actually flew off the carrier.  Mine has the code U*2

Yeah, there's a good photo of that one in the Wasp's hangar.  You can really see how they didn't bother to to make a round mask for the roundel but just used straight pieces of tape, leaving jagged interface between the yellow ring and blue overspray.  Then when they pulled the tape off, it took a good deal of the yellow ring with it.  It also took the top of the 1 in the serial number, and pieces of the U and 2 .

Your blue is a darker than mine, more like the top color in the 3-tone USN camo, whereas I'm using the lighter blue they had all over the top before the 3-tone came out late in 42- early 43.  I did that because I figured at this early point in 42, maybe they didn't have the darker color aboard yet.  It's kinda hard to tell from the photos I have.  OTOH, if it really was the darker shade, I can say the Malta summer sun faded it out while it was being worn away.  And who knows?  Maybe in the circumstances, they painted some spits with both colors because they didn't have enough of 1 of them, or didn't want to use it all up because the USN still needed it for its own planes aboard.  I think 249 Sqd used a fairly dark blue later on when it painted its planes on Malta long after all this.

2) Somewhere on the voyage the uppers were painted (less the rudder, elevators and ailerons)

I've seen pics of some that had the blue on the control surfaces, too ("B" BR246, for instance).  Looks like mine had it, judging from the pics of it on the beach, so I did it that way in AH1.  Yours, however, at least doesn't seem to have the blue on the left aileron, but that could just be a trick of the light from the different reflectivity of metal and fabric (if yours still had fabric ailerons).

[Kev367th]

Yeah
I think the problem is the whole episode was never documented at all. Most 'decisions' have to be based on pictures and the general concensus of opinion.

I think the which blue debate will go on long after we've shuffled off the mortal coils, lol.
Never seen a picture which shows any Malta Spit with really light uppers indicating a really light shade of blue though.
I think this comes from - some bombers (Beauforts?) on the way to deployment were given two tone blue uppers (Dark and Light Mediterranean Blue) at Alexandria MU.
Early guesses to which blue relied on that to try and figure out which blue was used.

Found this snippet from "Merlins Over Malta"

When the aircraft were put aboard the USS Wasp they were wearing standard camouflage schemes but on the deck of an aircraft carrier sailing through the Mediterranean these camouflage patterns offered no protection. The solution was to paint the top surfaces of the aircraft blue. Paint was taken from the stores and applied to the aircraft. There is no definitive colour match because paint was mixed and watered down to ensure there was enough to go around.

Backed up by a guy whos Grandfather was RAF groundcrew on USS Wasp -

My late grandfather was an RAF ground crew member who was put on Wasp to maintain the Spitfires and prep them for the flight to Malta.
Both my father and I remember him saying that the Spitfires were painted with deck paint from the US stores during the voyage. I remember him also saying that they repainted them several times on the way, and were quite surprised when they actually took off due to the extra weight of the paint! I suspect they were delivered in desert camouflage, I seem to remember him saying that at one stage there was some green added to the scheme.
I also remember him saying that the underside was repainted at least once, but I couldn't say what colour.
Unfortunately by the time I was old enough to realise this was "significant" information, his memory wasn't sufficiently good to recall it.

So basically pick a blue that would have been available on-ship and knock yourself out .

249 sqn in Malta continued painting their aircraft in non-standard colors.
Do a search youll find many many threads on it and discussions if it was actually even blue at all.

[Kev367th]

Update on mine -

[Krusty]

The blue's too smooth and professionally painted.

It would cover everything (stencils, walk lines, etc) and show the old paint scheme in the gaps around roundels and markings, and would be uneven.

As it is, it looks like it was factory-applied. Still in progress, I realize, but it's the feedback I have at the current progress.

[Kev367th]

Removed stencils from upper surfaces.
Used multiple cloud layers to get different 'thicknesses' of paint.
Roundels - they just oversprayed, hard to see on wings, easier on fuselage.
Will re-instate red spinner, prob with little blue overspray on it.

[Krusty]

Muuuuu-uuuuu-uuuuch better!

[Bullethead]

Kev367th said:

...There is no definitive colour match because paint was mixed and watered down to ensure there was enough to go around.  ... So basically pick a blue that would have been available on-ship and knock yourself out

That's been pretty much my position whenever this has come up.  You can argue it, with equal justification, any way you want, based on the same available evidence.  So I go with the lighter blue in this case, because it goes worse with the exposed desert colors.  This is supposed to be an ugly plane, and I think the clash of colors enhances that effect .

Off topic but kinda not...  I did something similar to this in real life.  When I was in Desert Storm, all our vehicles arrived with the standard ETO green/black/brown scheme they left the States in, which made them highly visible against the pale tan sand.  We managed to steal a small supply of standard desert camo paint from the Army, which we had to thin down to go around all our vehicles, and still spray on thin.  So you could see darker areas on them where the black and brown blotches kinda showed through, and especially the outlines of all the blotches were their colors overlapped a couple inches and made darker wavy lines.  We also masked off the stencils and serial numbers, leaving them black on ETO camo, like on these spits.  And as we went along, we realized we didn't have enough paint so we started leaving first the brown spots exposed, then some of the green spots as well, on the later vehicles.  The whole job was done by unskilled labor, in a huge rush, in the dark, with a strong wind blowing, so it looked like crap all in all.  Lots of overspray on window glass and tires, missed spots here and there, general unevenness, drips and runs, handprints, etc.  Then later on, we had to put these black "good guy" triangles on them, which we did with a couple cans of household spraypaint we stole from somewhere.  This looked like gang graffiti, just 1 curved, irregular hand pass for each line.  Then the oilwells burned and all this blackish gunk came down on the upper surfaces and streaked all down the sides in the rain.  

I imagine that even with color photos (most of which were taken with disposable cardboard cameras, carried around in packs for weeks in the field, and finally developed in-country by questionable means), future modelers will argue long and hard over the colors of these vehicles .