Dandiego Posted November 11, 2022 Share Posted November 11, 2022 A question about the yellow painted stripes on US Vietnam era bombs. Some weapons have one yellow stripe while others have two. Why is that? Is it significant? Or random? Getting ready to paint bombs for my Vigilante and was hoping for some clarity. Dan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LSP_Ron Posted November 11, 2022 Share Posted November 11, 2022 Interesting question. I know the yellow means high explosive but the one, two or three strips, no idea. Dandiego 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pvanroy Posted November 11, 2022 Share Posted November 11, 2022 The yellow color conveys the presence of high explosives. A single band indicates a simple high explosive bomb, whereas a double band indicates a thermally insulated munition. More about color-coding of U.S. munitions (including aviation bombs) here: U.S. ammo markings Dandiego, Isar 30/07, D.B. Andrus and 2 others 3 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John1 Posted November 12, 2022 Share Posted November 12, 2022 The thermally coated MK series were introduced after a couple of horrific fires on carriers during the Vietnam War. The Navy found out the hard way that those bombs would cook off after being exposed to fire. They have two bands, also have a very rough exterior coating. Isar 30/07, Dandiego and MikeMaben 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LSP_Ron Posted November 12, 2022 Share Posted November 12, 2022 Interesting, so what does three yellow bands mean? Dandiego 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Finn Posted November 12, 2022 Share Posted November 12, 2022 To further add to the 2 stripes question, the first thermal protection was a rubber coating on the inside of the bomb so there was no rough coating on bombs until after Vietnam. You can see some Mk-82's with 2 stripes being loading in this video: as for 3 stripes, i think that was for a less sensitive explosive filler in the more modern era. To further confuse things some early older bombs had 3 stripes as well, that designated what type of explosive filler the bomb had, some old fat bombs being loaded on an A-6A can be seen here: https://catalog.archives.gov/id/85180 Jari Dandiego 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pvanroy Posted November 12, 2022 Share Posted November 12, 2022 27 minutes ago, LSP_Ron said: Interesting, so what does three yellow bands mean? Three yellow bands are used by the Navy to indicate a thermally insulated high explosive bomb filled with PBXN-109 explosive (a less sensitive polymer bonded explosive with RDX as its main component). Martinnfb and Dandiego 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Finn Posted November 12, 2022 Share Posted November 12, 2022 3 hours ago, Dandiego said: A question about the yellow painted stripes on US Vietnam era bombs. Some weapons have one yellow stripe while others have two. Why is that? Is it significant? Or random? Getting ready to paint bombs for my Vigilante and was hoping for some clarity. Dan Since you mentioned Vigilante, i think they were just recon only during the war, early A-5s could carry bombs which would have only 1 stripe on them. Also for reference for others, it took time for 2 stripes bombs to come thru the supply lines so a mix of 1 and 2 stripes bombs were common: Jari Dandiego and John1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jean-Michel Posted November 12, 2022 Share Posted November 12, 2022 maybe some infos here : U.S. Military Ammunition Markings (alternatewars.com) Dandiego 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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