Hi all, I'm in the process of building two Hawker Typhoons. The instructions call out for a sky spinner on one and a duck egg green on the other. According to the instructions these are two different colours. I have a sky colour (WEM or Tamiya). What is a good duck egg green colour ??
I've seen in a few colour charts that Sky and duck egg green are the same colour. Is this true ?? If it is the same colour why the different name ??
Thanks
C[ ]

mossieramm as far as I have ever heard or found out Sky and Duck Egg Green are the same color.

Are the two kits you're build from the same manufacturer, it may just be a different way to describe the one color.

Cheers

Thanks Darren

This is a minefield
Without writing a book on the subject the colour sky and duck egg green are in fact different colours. To throw several more spanners into the works sky has been interpreted as duck egg blue and sky grey. This all came about when the term "Sky" was first used and before stocks were readily available. In some quarters Sky and duck egg green and or blue are considered the same, but are not.
If you have WEM "sky" that is the colour to use (see my Typhoon in features "Storm Warning")
Mal

Seems like every colour is a minfield these days.
Mal, if Duck Egg Green and Sky are different colours, what is a good Duck egg green colour ?? Or are u sugesting that I use WEM Sky which I have.
Do you know of a colour chart that shows the various colous ??
C[ ]

Use WEM Sky and you can't go wrong.
On the Typhoon and other late war RAF aircraft "Sky" was used for the codes and as recognition elements, consisting of a band on the rear fuselage and the spinner.
"Sky" was introduced in 1940 (?) as an underside camo colour. Before it was readily available other colours were used as a substitute. The full explanation of why there is so much confusion is probably impossible to confirm. However it probably stems, somewhat from the name "Sky" and the description of the colour (possably given as "Duck egg Green, as it is a greenish colour). "Sky" seems to have been interpreted as "Sky Blue" (which may have been described as Duck egg Blue ?) and "Sky Grey". Eau-de-nil (spelling?) was used as an approximation of "Sky" by some units. This may have been where "Duck egg Green came from.
These are my recolections of, or how I have remembered, my understanding of this subject. The best explanation can be found in "Camouflage and Marking No2. The Battle for Britain - RAF May to December 1940" by Paul Lucas, SAM Monographs.
That may have cleared a small path through part of the minefield, I hope
Mal

This post is many years old but it helps as i am building a late griffon powered spitfire. Again this trouble with Academy instructions "Sky" for spinner and Gunze Mr Color Duck Egg Green.

There was no such colour as Duck Egg Green, neither was there a Duck Egg Blue.
Originally, there was a pale green, which was registered, by its inventor, Sidney Cotton, as "Camotint." He'd noticed that a pale green aircraft had disappeared from sight, shortly after take-off, and went from there.
Possibly because he'd patented it, when he was unceremoniously pushed out of the Photographical Development Unit (later P.R.U.,) by the RAF, they decided to call it Sky type "S" (for Smooth,) and that's when the fun started.
First, it was used on Cotton's P.R. Blenheims, then, later, on some Spitfires which he cajoled out of Dowding. It's possible that some Sky-painted aircraft found their way into France, since there's a signal, warning about some blue-painted aircraft arriving there (see, I told you it was fun.)
When the Battle of France was over, it was decided to do away with the black/white undersides to fighters (due to the Germans, reportedly, copying it, and so as to be less vulnerable to A.A. fire,) and use Sky, and, probably due to "What is Sky?" signals coming back from airfields, the Air Ministry, in their wisdom, decided to call it a "Duck Egg Bluish Green."
The order was made in early June 1940, then cancelled, due to lack of paint, then re-instigated, but it appears that some units decided to go ahead, anyway, and some made up their own concoctions, while others apparently used Sky Blue, a totally different colour used on radio-controlled drones.
When the Air Ministry finally (sort of) got their act together, they decided to call it duck-egg blue (Sky Type "S",) which didn't help much, and it was 1941 before they dropped the "duck egg blue" (which, being in lower case, I'm convinced was a description, and never intended as a name,) and just used Sky, with the "Type S" also being dropped because they couldn't get a proper smooth finish cellulose paint; this came in August 1942, when Supermarine went over to synthetic paint, which could get a smooth finish, but that's another story.
Forget Duck Egg anything, there was only Sky, and, if it's been properly matched to the wartime colour samples (issued by Farnborough, not British Standards,) it should be O.K. to use.

So when they say Sky for the underside say of a Spit IA and duck egg blue for the spinner its likely the same color? Or am I just thoroughly confused?

Yes, except, of course, there were no Sky spinners, or tail bands, during the Battle of Britain. Spinners and propellers were painted black so that they were more difficult to see from the air; this is something that is always being lost sight of, that camouflage was designed for when the aircraft were on the ground, not in the air.
When Fighter Command started "leaning into Europe," in 1941, Sky spinners, tail bands and code letters were a necessary compromise for easy, and quick, recognition when in the air.
Edgar