Auto weathering (slightly OT)

[SFRT - Frenchy]

Guppy, I raise you 5 spitfires in your pic.

[Saxman]

By your argument #883 shouldn't have been in anything NEAR this condition.

Don't go making blanket statements, because repainting was going to depend VERY heavily on availability of supplies, time, and maintenance conditions. Aircraft operating in Western Europe would have had a much "easier" life than if the same aircraft was shipped to North Africa or the South Pacific just because of the shortness and reliability of the supply lines and the fact that a lot of airfields had modern or well-developed maintenance facilities, not to mention finished runway surfaces that weren't sandblasting wings and fuselages with abrasive surfacing material every time you powered up your engine.

[Krusty]

Look again Saxman. Then look at my statement. 883 is plenty worn. It's plenty stained. It's NOT with the paint dissolving in predictable fractal patterns along all the panel lines and rivets.

It's still got PAINT underneath all the wear and tear.

Even look at the spitfire photos posted in this thread. Even the heavily WORN ones still have paint in all the areas except high foot-traffic areas. The paint becomes faded, burnt, scorched, stained, reapplied (different shades) but nothing like Ubi's lame "the metal just shows through" weathering. Hell your weathering is leaps beyond Ubi's new programmed weathering.