PT 117 - question about painting scheme

You might also want to contact PT Boats Inc.  They have a large number of photos that you can buy.  You can be specific with what you are looking for and they'll help.  I've purchased a few from them that I hadn't seen anywhere else.

Dave

I can't add much to what you already have gotten here.  Other than my WWII USN kapok is a bluish grey somewhere betweem pure Paynes' Grey and MM Panzer grey (straps a "flatter," less blue, color than the rest).  My kapok is also near unused, too, I've seen them faded to about Ghost grey, and oddly enough, almost like fresh Sky Type S (which will sound slightly oxy-moronic, describing something faded to match a new color--but, hey, there it is).

Now, the period fire extinguishers I've seen are brass or a bronze color with a brass contrasting label plate/log on them.  I want to remember that ont of my old damage-control manuals said that only CO2 extinguishers were to be painets red, but, it's been decades since I've had hold of one that was close to contemporary, and I may be misremembering.

Don't forget that drills like MOB, were something that occurred often, and it was not uncommon for a "left" life ring to wind up on a "right" bracket ot the like.  Or for the "inside" face to be "out".  So, that could be used to add some "visual interest."  The hanger would be in the camo color, but the ring could be in a base color (amybe even with a hint of a "negative" spot behind it, darker or lighter, depending on the weathering.

Hippy-Ed, I opened a new thread, thinking that this question could be of general interest not only for the members of the GB.  I am still there, busy with my model, but I need to collect some more informations.  The only pictures of PT117 I could find are pictures of these trials.  Now, I know how I'll build and paint my model.

Ed and Dave, thank you, your answers were very helpful.

Thank you,

Michel

weebles wrote:

In this photo the hull is light gray and the deck and upper features were dark gray.  As Ed states the colors changed once deployed. Dave

Yep, that two-tone gray scheme was a variant on Measure 1 camouflage, and used the prewar #5 Standard Navy Gray on the hull, and everything else--including the deck--was 5-D Dark Gray. Both colors available in  Colourcoats enamels.

In this photo the hull is light gray and the deck and upper features were dark gray.  As Ed states the colors changed once deployed.

Dave

No on the deck being green.

Note the ELCO flag at the masthead in the photo.  This is a trials record photograph.  There is another excellent photo of some boats being delivered at the ELCO dock.  It is on the back of Polmars book on PT boats at War.   Deck gray is obvious.

On their delivery from the ELCO plant,  the boats were painted in gray hull with their hulls being painted dark gray.   Once the boats were accepted and transferred to their operational theatre the received the appropriate colors.

Operationally the life rings would be painted to correspond to the surface on which they were mounted,  gray, green, brown, black or Mountbatten Pink.  There were no lifebelts.  The crew's kapok life vests were typically gray.