WWII color schemes

Easy! Note that early (1941-1942) was all about flashy patriotic colors and fervor. We quickly replaced them with more functional colors as we knew the West Coast was next. Late (1943-1944) saw the use of more functional colors, camouflage and the like. This could be considered our getting seriours phase or if you will the honeymoon was over. After superiority had been achieved (1944-1945) NMF became the trend as we were no longer concerned with hiding in the air. We had learned not to dogfight the Japanese but to gun him down or outrun, outdive, roll around and take another pass at him. I'd love to go into this. But I dont think in the world of modeling there are enough people who are serious history buffs. If they cant play with it they're not interested in it. Sadly enough.

QUOTE: Originally posted by Stewman I'd love to go into this. But I dont think in the world of modeling there are enough people who are serious history buffs. If they cant play with it they're not interested in it. Sadly enough.

Hey stewman,
What do ya mean by that comment??? My dad got me into this awesome hobby when I was just a youngster.
As I got more involved w/ the hobby, I actually started to go more into the history of the a/c, sqdrns, fighter groups and the like.
In my family almost everybody was in the service from ground pounders, mechanics and fly boys, so all the more I got into the history.
You'd be surprised that there are a lot of us who are history buffs in one way or other.
I do agree though that the younger generations(some do understand) dont give to hoots about the history of our country or how we got to where we are today.
Thats why we have to keep our history alive and well so our future generations can pass it on as well PHEW...!!!
Flaps up., Mike

QUOTE: Originally posted by Stewman But I dont think in the world of modeling there are enough people who are serious history buffs. If they cant play with it they're not interested in it. Sadly enough.

Part of me agrees, and part of me takes GREAT exception to that remark!!! LOL

By the way, NMF was the route the USAAF went late in the war, not the USN.

On the whole, the USN has never operated bare-metal birds in combat; and the reason is simple. If it's a USN aircraft that's in the fight, it's most likely operating from a carrier and/or over saltwater. So the paint serves not only as concealment, but as protection from the salt in the air as well.

As to the evolution of camouflage paint within NAVAIR, it's been just that; an evolution. They tried many a paint scheme and whatever worked they stuck with. Whatever didn't work, they changed.

Some excellent reference for this subject would be Squadron's NAVY AIR COLORS vols 1 & 2 by Tom Doll, Berkely Jackson and William Riley. For WWII, vol 1 will cover things, but if you're curious as to how Navy paintjobs evolved past the last good war and into the 1980's, then vol 2 is good reading.

There are also a couple good books from Monogram Aviation Publications, but I can't recall their titles at the moment.

I'll see if I can make a short and sweet, yet somewhat comprehensive summary for you on WWII USN camo.


Fade to Black...

The purpose of camo is disguise an object with color and by disrupting it's shillouette (sp?) There few right angles and straight lines in nature so different colors applied in a wavy or curved "pattern" effectively breaks up the shape of an object.
The Navy used blues an greys to blend in with sea and sky. At the beginning of the war we had no experiance in the S. Pacific so the colors were a WAG. As we gained experiance and experimented the colors and patterns evolved to replace previous colors and patterns. The dark blue/light grey scheme provided an excellent shillouette (from the side) against the sky so med. blue was add to help blend the colors and break up the shillouette. The scheme in the S.Pac. was the same as the N. Atlanic, the colors were change to reflect the different natural conditions.

Stewman,

Welcome to FSM, Glad to have you with us and look foreward to sharing. Take look at some of these builds http://rongeorge.com/modules/Gallery/models
We don't all play with our models

P.S. Hope this helped