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Mosquito FB VI with SEAC in India: Azure blue undersides? (Xtradecals


nmayhew

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The dark green / dark earth over azure blue camo looks great and I was all set to finish my Airfix 1/24th Mossie in those colours when I stared making it many moons ago. Maybe it's a good thing the project got put aside for a while, although I'm still tempted to finish it in those colours. Maybe I'll just replace the azure blue with medium sea grey, not as appealing but, hopefully more accurate. And who knows; maybe a colour pic showing a Mossie in dark green /dark earth over azure blue will emerge before I finally commit to paint........

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It's the Azure Blue underside that is more flakey ie. much more unlikely than the Med Sea Grey in my opinion. It all comes back to SEAC's interprepation of what role the Mosquito FBVI fitted into. If it was classed as a fighter ( which in my mind it was) then the underside colour from 4th April 1944 would certainly be Med Sea Grey. It must be remembered that the Mosquito FBVI replaced the Beaufighter in most Far East Squadrons and nobody questions the Med Sea Grey on the undersides of Beaufighters in SEAC, and the Beaufighter was a heavy fighter. If it was classed as a bomber then no colour is actually specified but it is highly unlikely to be Azure. In most black and white photos Azure Blue appears quite dark, ( I suggest you look at photos of desert camoflaged aircraft to see this) much darker than the lightish blue in the centre of SEAC roundles (which by the way would be slightly different from aircraft to aircraft). Once again it's worth studying photos as one published photo shows HR493 UX-C of 82 Sqn shows the upper surfaces in Dk Green / Dk Earth, the underside colour is slightly lighter than the light blue in the roundel, Med Sea grey I think.

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dave,

 

have you seen the footage / pictures mentioned in this old Britmodeller thread?

 

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234938938-627-sqn-mosquitos-strange-colours/

 

supposedly AZ-B...

 

vlcsnap-2013-04-28-17h23m28s161_zpsb38e0

 

and supposedly azure blue?

 

having said that, as a follower of a German armour all i can say is 'Afrika Tigers' to indicate how people can see wildly different things in the same pics, and also how what was Gospel for many years can be overturned so easily (hope you didn't paint those Tigers green, or even in a single colour - they had two tone camo!)

 

cheers

 

Nick

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In seriousness, it did not really occur to me that the azure color was wrong until far too late.... :) 

 

I'm assuming this would also apply to Spitfire VIIIs?   My Barracuda decals have similar painting instructions, IIRC.

 

Cheers to all,

 

Tim W.

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