For the "Battle of the Atlantic" campaign I am building the good old venerable Matchbox Halifax.

Looking through the instructions on the camouflage I am a bit puzzled on the camouflage suggestions. According to the instructions the colour scheme is Tan undersides, white sides and sea grey top.

However, I have never heard of the tan undersides before? Seems like this might be a misinterpretation of photos with a shadow on the white underside??

White sides. Yes, that one seems right.

Overall grey top sides seems unlikely. The few photos I have managed to find suggest a camouflaged topside. Is this sea grey and slate grey? Green and brown? Some other combination?

Any help would be very appreciated!

From Aug 1941 - upper surfacces Temperate Sea Scheme - Extra Dark Sea Grey and Dark Slate Grey. Sides Matt White, under surfaces gloss White. In early 1943 Temperate Sea Scheme replaced by single colour Extra Dark Sea Grey.

So in other words the Matchbox single colour dark grey top is correct?

The tan at the bottom should be changed to gloss white.

If it's latter than 1942, yes. Never come across tan or anything like being used underneath.

Hi Jesper,
I've got this kit myself (same boxing) and I dug it out to have a look at the colour code. I was interested to know if Matchbox had made another mistake with the colours. I once did their Hellcat in the included FAA colours. While they got the topsideright, they suggested silver undersides on the plan. Not knowing much at the time I went ahead and used silver. I now know I should have used sky! However, he Halifax seems to right to me.
I am wondering, did you read the underside code as letter d or p?
In the kits colour chart d is gloss white and p is khaki. Depending on which way you hold the sheet, it looks like a d or a p. This is because of how the text is orientated with the horizontal of each plan view. Maybe Matchbox should have used capitol letters on the plan or even just used the same orientation for all letters. A confusing sheet.
As Antoni says, a gloss white bottom is the way to go.



Hope this helps.
Stephen

I did! Shame on me. Matchbox is actually correct. Also the color scheme is for a 1943 aircraft, so all should be in order.

I will crawl back to my working table in shame

Thanks for the help, guys. At least I got this sorted out before I started the build.

No worries, the idea came to me as I was looking at it.
Best to ask these things.

Glad to help