This is the first aircraft model I've started in years and need a little help. Hasegawa Typhoon 1B - the painting instructions say to paint the landing gear bays and door interiors silver. I would have thought they would be in the same green color of the cockpit interior. Squadron book doesn't help, and other modelers have painted these parts a variety of colors. Is there a general concensus on what their color really was?

Hawker aircraft often had their landing gear and bays painted aluminium. They were sometimes overpainted with the underside colour in the field but were not often painted interior green at all. If you're doing a particular aircraft you can try and find pictures of it. Otherwise you shouldn't go wrong following the instructions.

Typhoon wheel wells and door interiors were painted silver. Tempest wells were green, but doors remained silver.
Edgar

The cockpit interior may not have been green either.

The area behind the cockpit on a car-door Typhoon would be painted as a continuation of the camouflage from the upper surfaces. The same area (and head-rest/armour) would be black on a bubble-top. Another interesting fact I picked up from Chris Thomas (along with all this other information) is that the lower part of the aerial mask that came through the car-door canopy was bare wood. The upper part of the mast would be in camouflage colours, like the exterior canopy framework, I presume.

The actual colour of the interior itself could be all green (early car-doors were probably all like this), green side walls from the top of the tubular framework downwards, and black above, or all black. The framework could be aluminium/silver paint, or green, or black. The seat is normally aluminium/silver painted, I believe. The padding of the seat back was quite thin (some aftermarket resin seats make it look like a plump leather chair)- and was fabric covered, not leather. An original seat back I've seen in a photo was quite pale tan-like colour, but this may have faded over the 60+ years.

The other area you may be tempted to paint green is the area in front of the radiator- this in fact had the camouflage colours wrap all the way around inside right to the front of the radiator.

"Aha! I see", said the blind man. This gives me a few painting options. I don't know what the outcome will be, but at least the colours will be right . I found it intersting that the fuselage and wing assemblies were camo painted before final factory assembly. Must have been quite the B-otch to match up the pattern on the parts. I think I'll just paint after assembly

Would using Bare Metal foil be a good idea on the landing gear struts and interiors? I haven't tried this product yet and am itching to do so.

I don't think you will get the foil to conform to the ridges in the wheel wells, not the detail on the legs.

Asthetically, the foil is good for representing what it is: bare aluminium, whereas the Typhoon's undercarriage was painted with aluminium paint.

Bare Metal Foil works best on wide flat surfaces and gentle curves. A Tiffie's wheel well has none of those attributes so you'd find it very difficult to work with.

OK. So paint it is. Thanks.

On the Typhoon lB with car door was there some kind of strut or support to keep the roof section of the canopy open when entering or exiting the cockpit? My only reference is Squadron and Google and I can't find evidence of what I want in either.