Ive been thinkin alot about how to weather my bare metal skin.
I mean weather effect on painted planes is much more obvious. Wind, sand, water, personell walkin on the plane all tearing on the paint. Oil and grease is ofcourse the same if its bare metal or paint job.
So how does the environment affect bare metal? Well one obvious is corrotion (sp?) if the plane operated in a environemnt with alot of salt, like the pacific. But here is another question how well did they maintain their planes? Did planes actually get rusty, where they so badly maintained?
Next thing I can see as a weather effect on bare metal is dirt. Dirt obviously depending on what theatre it operated in. Say the pacific then it was more exposed to sand then in europe, while in europe it would be more exposed to mud. Dirt getting "stuck in the plane lines" would be obvious especially on the under side if they landed on sand or dirt air strips. But how much? How well did they actually clean and take care of their planes? Also how much would it just blow off in flight?
The biggest weather effect on a bare metal skin would be just fading the shineyness of it. Areas where crew walked, pilot climed into cockpit and areas heavily exposed to sand blowing up would be more worn and not as shiney.
Any input on this subject would really help. I have an idea on how to do the different effects on the plane it self I just need to know what effects to apply to it.
Tex