Sunday 13 May 2012

The Great Hawker Named-After-A-Weather-Event Aircraft Group Build Day 13

Good evening,

Thinking further about my Hurricane, and, more particularly, what colours to paint it, I came across this very interesting discussion about Hurricanes in Malta 1941-42.

Note specifically these photos from the above discussion regarding how hard it is to figure out what colours are what from black and white photos.



Now, compare these last two photos to this...

ROYAL AIR FORCE OPERATIONS OVER ALBANIA AND GREECE, 1940-1941: Pilots of No. 80 Squadron RAF relax in front of Hawker Hurricane Mark I, V7599 'YK-Q', at Eleusis, Greece

...and you can understand why I've decided to essentially paint my Hurricane as the box...


...but with a black spinner and a few changes in the decals.

Which means I can stick with the paints I've already got.

Sweet!

And just to prove that I have been doing something with the Typhoon...


I cut down the tail wheel from the kit and glued it in it's flying position.


And onto the first coat of top coat. Or bottom coat, as the case may be.



I even did a little on the Hurri itself.


Nick

10 comments:

  1. its an interesting comparison, either would look good.

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    1. Hi Dan, it's actually been an exercise in sticking with the paint colours I bought with the kit!

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  2. Hi Nick good progress on both kits.

    My stumbling s about 80 Sqn RAF Hurricanes denote that the desert scheme for the Unit which was first based in the Middle East (1939 Euro) changed in 1940 and 41. Three schemes in three years.

    School down a tad on this link. http://wp.scn.ru/en/ww2/f/79/9/2

    Hope that helps.

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    1. Thanks Paul. Great link. (How did you find it?!)

      Sooo...that picky above, the one of 80 Sqn pilots...which scheme do you think that machine is in then?

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    2. At a guess I'd say it's the second one. The contrasts seem to match up about right to my eye. Not the best measure I know, but it's something.

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    3. Thanks Arquinsiel, yeah, that's what I was thinking. Cheers.

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  3. That photo is early 41, so I would assume it was in the 40 scheme.

    My reasonings are this.

    Conditions in Greece were as if they were in the field, thus refurbishments such as painting would have to be carried out at a MU org most likely in North Africa.

    Once reformed and re equipped after the fall of Greece and Crete newer aircraft would have been supplied with the new scheme.

    As for the photo search I just added some keywords into the search engine filter.

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    Replies
    1. Cool. (Though I'm not sure which one is the 1940 scheme of which you speak - the desert one, or the European/Battle of Britain one). Thanks to your excellent link, and some time I took to play rather than work, I found this of a 33 Squadron machine operating out of Larisa airfield, Greece, in April 1941, which also supports my initial premise above. That should also cover Crete...

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    2. Sweet. Myself I would use that scheme (Darker Euro) anyway as you can use it for more gametime over a greater period of play.

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    3. Yep, that had also crossed my mind. Great minds and all that, eh?! :-)

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