Doing a P51MKIII (Brit/Polish P-51B) for the D-day group build at Finescale. I've been researching invasion stripes and have run into thread that contended RAF P51s used olive drab instead of black for initial invasion stripes. I've found two color paintings so done. I guess everything was done in quite a hurry and that would have been a paint they had because RAF Mustangs were painted in the US so they were OD/Gray/Gray. Most sources say black for stripes. Anyone master of this particular factoid? I'd like to do it right and it would change the look of the kit quite a bit.
Eric

While I'm not an expert I do wonder why RAF units would have OD on hand since it wasn't a standard RAF colour?

Point well taken: wouldn't be the first mistake that got onto a post. This is a good board for RAF matters (others too of course) and I thought I'd see. The RAF P51s received their paint job at the factory - hence the OD and US grays that were close enough to RAF. Possible that some extra paint came with them. Probably more likely that they'd repaint with RAF camo - there are some late war line drawings that show it as green.

The photos I look at the more I think it at least possible that some of the RAF aircraft were given dark gray stripes - it's hard to tell on bw photos, but many look pretty light. And the whole thing was done on the fly initially.

I guess that another question would be why just Mustangs, or maybe why just British Mustangs? You don't see USAAF Thunderbolt groups saying "you know, OD is close enough to black so let's just paint huge white stripes". Why not Dakotas as well? For me unless someone shows me a colour photo of an RAF Mustang III with something other than black and white invasion stripes I'm going to paint mine black and white.

The invasion stripes of course were a recognition feature. For that alone you wanted uniformity. These instructions came from SHAEF. There had already been problems with Mustangs being mistaken for ME 109s, I would wonder about someone deciding to take a chance with a non-regulation colour.

No additional information, per se. But there are photos of Curtis painting P-40's in RAF colors. They even had large masks that they placed over the planes to paint the camo. So I would be somewhat surprised if North American didn't do the same for their RAF Mustangs. Modern US aircraft are painted in the receiving nation's preferred paints during assembly or just before delivery.

I have seen a photo of an aircrew using brushes and rollers to get the paint on the planes in a hurry. I just don't recall if they were USAAF or RAF

There are several photos like this if you poke around:



There's a nice hour-long documentary about flying the Tempest on YouTube and one of the pilots talked about the stripes painted the evening before operations (rainy): he said the camo was applied with a "kind of glop that wasn't really paint." If you can see the container being used, it almost looks like some kind of white wash. The whole thing, like everything dealing with D-Day, was very "hush hush" and who knows where the supply folk dug up what was used. I am going to assume that the white was white and not the off-white used by the RAF and USAAF.

Wish I had my Archer book about USAAF WWII Colors - he goes at length (he's got 400+ pages to do it) on how the US handled camo on Lend Lease aircraft - a policy which went both ways between the US and RAF. The book's expensive and comes with some very high quality color samples. Be of interest because the RAF 51s were one of the few planes actually delivered that carried the last USAAF OD formula (early 43)which was lighter than the 1940 vintage of USAAF color and closer to the OD used by ground vehicles. According to Archer US factories were told to go through their supplies before making the switch and by the time most of them did, the USAAF decided on NMF in September 43. But the RAF order was a special allocation and painted at factory with colors that resembled standard RAF garb, so the new paint was used. It was my recollection that Tamiya OD matched it pretty well - but now it looks a little dark to me and also maybe a little too much green. No going back there.

Thanks for the advice.
Eric

The invasion stripes were painted with distemper, not normal paint. All squadrons were supplied with stocks of black and white distemper- although the orders to apply them were last-minute, the markings had been planned and preparations made. I think olive paint in place of the black very unlikely- maybe this idea comes from photos of aircraft later in the campaign when pilots felt vulnerable in the conspicuous markings and partially removed them (distemper only required hot water and scrubbing to reveal the original paint underneath), or where they were naturally weathered back to the paint.

The distinctive markings which were to be applied for 'Operation Neptune' aka D-Day were laid down in SHAEF Operational Memorandum No 23, 'Distinctive Marking - Aircraft', which was issued on 18th April 1944. This stated object of this Memorandum was to prescribe the distinctive markings which were to be applied to American and British aircraft in order to make them more readily identifiable as being 'friendly" by Allied ground, sea and air forces.

The instructions given in the memo were to become effective on the day of the assault and there afterwards until such time as it was deemed advisable to change. Aircraft were to be given their distinctive markings as shortly before the day of the assault as was possible in order to protect the effectiveness of their use. The memorandum listed the various types of aircraft the markings were to be applied to and explained in detail the size and where they were to be placed.

Much the same information was passed to units operating in the Middle East by HQ Mediterranean Allied Air Forces Office of the Director of Operations Operation Memorandum 43. Dated 26th May 1944.

The materials with which the distinctive markings were to be applied were detailed in 11 Groups Administrative Instructions for Operation Overlord which were issued on 27th May 1944. Appendix 'C' of this document dealt with Equipment whilst Paragraph B of Appendix 'C' was entitled 'Distemper' and stated the following, 'All servicing echelons and Wing Headquarters of 2 TAF and No 85 Group should hold sixteen distemper brushes per Day Squadron served. Air Sea Rescue Squadrons should hold one brush per IE aircraft. Equipment sections of Stations and 2 TAF and No 85 Group Wings should hold distemper ready for immediate issue on the basis of two and a half gallons of Night Distemper and three and a half gallons of White Distemper for each Day fighter type aircraft and three and
a half gallons of Night Distemper and five gallons of White Distemper for each Walrus or Warwick Air Sea Rescue aircraft. Note: A proportion of the issue will be an oil based distemper which will require a longer period to dry but must nevertheless be used wherever practicable. Issue of the necessary distemper for all units is being arranged'.

The Material Specification for water-based Matt Finish Distemper, DTD 441, was issued in August 1940. The material was to consist of a smooth distemper suitable for application to doped fabric or painted metal surfaces by brush or spray, or it could be supplied in the form
of a paste or powder which, when mixed with water in amounts to be stated by the supplier would produce a distemper. One coat of the distemper when applied to fabric or metal surfaces was to match the standard in colour, finish and opacity and be 'hard' dry in an hour.
After being allowed to dry at room temperature for two weeks, the distemper was to be capable of being removed by the application of hot water leaving the original painted or doped surface undamaged. Its main purpose was for the application of temporary markings during exercises or operations. A material specification for an oil based distemper of some kind is unknown. Oil based distemper is a type of early or primitive emulsion paint manufactured by combining water and oil with a solution of soap or a caustic alkali which saponified the oil, and then agitating the mixture until the oil brakes down into tiny globules which remain in suspension as an emulsion. They can also be made by forcing oil through tiny holes to form tiny drop, the same way that homogenised milk is made. Casein may also be added to act as a temporary binder during the drying of the oil.


As for Mustangs, the majority of those for British orders were painted at the factory in the Land Temperate scheme of Dark Earth and Dark Green and looked like this:-



(American markings were temporally applied to British Mustangs for test flying as American law required this.) Later they would be repainted in the Day Fighter scheme of Ocean Grey and dark Green, either in the USA or on arrival in the UK when being fitted out with British equipment.

The Temperate Land scheme was applied to all Mustang Mk I, Ia, II, and III built for the British at Inglewood. The Day Fighter scheme was only introduced at the second production plant at Dallas during the manufacture of Mk III aircraft with serial numbers in the HB range. The KH range as well as the later Mk IVs were all finished in the Day Fighter scheme.

Paint matched to the British standards was available but by July I942, the Joint Aircraft Committee had was reached agreement on the standardisation of a range of camouflage colours which would ultimately be issued as Army-Navy Aeronautical (ANA) 157. Mustangs in the Day Fighter scheme were painted with ANA 613 (Dark) Olive Drab, ANA 603 Sea Grey and ANA 602 Light Grey. Sea Grey was an equivalent to Extra Dark Sea Grey, not Ocean Grey, and it has been suggested that the lower contrast between the grey and green was not liked by the British and that the grey at least was routinely painted over on delivery. It is not clear if the whole airframe was repainted or just the grey.

So, clear instructions were given in advance as to what materials were to be used and even the quantities required. They were also informed that the markings were to be easily removable when that was deemed necessary. It would then seem rather far fetched that they would then go and use Olive Drab instead, especially as that would be extremely difficult to remove.

Where did this Olive Drab come from? It was not part of the Air Ministry/RAF inventory. There was a colour simply called Green that appears to match ANA 613 Olive Drab. This colour seems to have been in use by the British military in general as it was incorporated into BS 987C War Emergency Colours as Standard Camouflage Colour No14. As far as fighter aircraft are concerned it may have been used for anti-glare panels on bare metal Mustangs. Britain had agreed to accept some aircraft types in the US Olive Drab/Neutral Gray so maybe 'Green' was used for types. RAF Mustangs wore the Day Fighter scheme so there is little reason to believe that either Olive Drab or Green was stocked at the unit level. In that case not only would the squadrons have chosen to contravene their orders but also to have obtained supplies of Olive Drab or similar in advance in order to do so.

This is now taking on all the characteristics of a a conspiracy theory. What is the origin of the story that Olive Drab was used? Is it anecdotal? Is there any other evidence. I've never seen a photograph which makes me thinks that the stripes are not black. Distemper has a chalky appearance even when newly applied. The paintings of the French impressionist Edouard Vuillards look chalky because he preferred to use distemper rather than oil paints. After exposure to the elements it should not be a surprise that the black fades to a dark grey. Stronger evidence than that is need. As my teachers would say. “Examples boy, you must provide examples”. So where are they?

I ran into the OD info a couple of places. This is from a review of the Tamiya kit done by Tom Cleaver on Modelling Madness.

"Another thing is that there is now new information about the correct colors of the camouflage paint on Mustang IIIs. They were not painted in the standard RAF day fighter colors of Ocean Grey, Dark Green and Sea Grey Medium, but rather used U.S. "equivalent colors" when they were so painted at the North American factory. These colors are Sea Grey (equivalent of British Dark Sea Grey) in place of Ocean Grey, Olive Drab (not the Shade 41 aviation color but the earlier, more greenish, standard Army Olive Drab found on ground vehicles) for Dark Green, and Sky Grey (a light grey) in place of Sea Grey Medium. Once in England, they were given the Sky fuselage band and the white spinner and nose band."

The book I don't have here is Robert & Victor Archer "USAAF Markings and Camouflage 1940-1947." (Schiffer 1997) This is a father/son team. Robert Archer worked with paints for the RAF during WWII before emigrating here and working with paints for the Americans. Archer does go into some length about the whole OD issue - but I think that Cleaver has it mixed up. After cross-checking Archer's work with Steve Zalogda's long chapter on USGF OD in his Osprey Master Class book on modelling US AFV, I'm quite sure that the "light" OD was the same as GF OD but was used by the USAAF for only a few months. The 1940 USAAF OD is darker and a little more like "pig dung." I do remember that Archer said that he recalled seeing some B-17s coming in with the 1943 OD and remarking that the difference on a large plane was quite noticeable. (There's a photo in the book, but it's hard see the differences clearly especially as flat OD faded quickly.)

So, is Cleaver wrong altogether? Perhaps, but I can only go with sources on hand. I certainly believe he was passing on information he thought to be correct and as "paint wars" seem to be common, I accepted it. There is other info if one is willing to look hard on a long thread concerning RAF Lend Lease colors on Britmodeller: http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/25934-wwii-us-ana-equivalents-for-raf-interior-colours/
In one post Nick Millman - color guru of the highest level - aviation author and creator of AviationOfJapan.com - a really sweet site for all things concerning the Pacific and Korean Wars - notes concerning Lend Lease Hudsons painted at US factory according to "RAF Equivalents": "Only the first RB-34's were delivered in US substitute Dark Earth, Dark Green (actually OD) and Sky. Some may have been in OD over Neutral Gray. They all appear to have been re-painted locally, so it is unlikely, even if this example had not been restored, that we are looking at a US Sky substitute." As I understand this thread the US Lend Lease aircraft made exclusively for the RAF kept as close as possible to RAF colors and were sometimes repainted. The P51 MKIII order was a "limited run" because the USAAF had found a winner and insisted that all P-51s go to 8th AF. The MKIIIs were a kind of gift to the RAF for helping develop the Mustang - and at maximum only two groups employed them. (Probably not such a bad deal as the RAF got airbases on Europe shortly after D-Day which greatly helped their shorter legged aircraft. But there were no requests from 8th AF for any of the late model Spitfires either.) Anyway, between Cleaver and Millman (and not having my reference library at all) I think it very plausible that 51MKIIIs were painted OD.

BTW: at some time in future I'll be back here trying to figure out one of Archer's key findings. He claims that because early source works employed by model making firms for WWII colors had used the wrong ANA samples, that the "vast majority" of USN aircraft have been given the wrong hues. It's not my idea, but considering the squabbles colors have caused before, I don't doubt it. I've written military history and some of the hardest information deals with the obvious. When you're in the midst of events everybody simply "knows" what color airplanes or tanks are. You don't write down what everybody knows. And when people forget .... you've got trouble. (And I still don't buy the Jentz argument that every German AFV in France was painted gray/brown - one of the nastiest color wars.)

Eric

Eric, the story of US equivalents is never-ending, but has no relevance to how you started the thread. Like Antoni, I'd like to see evidence for white and olive invasion stripes.

I wasn't arguing that invasion stripes were OD/white. I posted the msg because I had read some information - perhaps inaccurately - that "black/white" was not as clear as black and white. I made the post because I didn't know. Surely that's one genuine purpose of a well-informed board: clarify issues of detail, such as color, that go beyond the kit instructions.

I think the original question has been solved - invasion stripes were black and white. And so they will appear on my model - although hand painted.

I'm sorry that the thread drifted off onto subjects such as what colors belong on what airplanes. Boards like this one, regardless how good, cannot (and I think should not) answer all questions concerning the relationship between the model and the real object. Perhaps, however, well informed modelers can add their opinions and prevent error. If so, the board is of great value.
Eric