ndicki
Charter Member 2016
Are MEANT to be like that.
This has been mentioned at least twice, so I thought it might be worth setting things straight.
There is nothing wrong with the model or the skin, and the skin is (as always with John's work) historically perfectly accurate.
From another thread where this came up:
Greg, to complainer:
I suggest you read up on early WW2 British fighters. You might find you don't have a problem at all.
Ted, to complainer:
I know that the Germans used this same technique to signal searchlight and AA crews to alert them not to fire planes marked this way. There were several patterns used similar in approach to the one you see on the Defiant. Not sure why the British did this but it was not a mistake and was a purposeful tactic.
Me to complainer:
Black and white (or whitish) undersides were used on RAF day fighters from 1938 until June 1940 as an aid to identification by Observer Corps personnel on the ground. The Chain Home system could tell of enemy formations coming towards the English Coast, but could not track them once they were past, inland, That was the job of the Observer Corps, with binoculars and so on, as you'll have seen in many documentaries.
It was however not much use as camouflage, and from mid-June 1940, the undersides were ordered to be painted with Sky (or nearest offer - a bit complicated in fact), with or without roundels depending on the date and employment of the aircraft.
In November 1940, the black port wing (only - not the entire port side of the aircraft as before) was reintroduced, again for recognition purposes. This lasted until the spring of 1941.
I do have the dates of the various AMOs somewhere if you want to nit-pick, but to put it briefly, the Defiant is correctly painted. Check out some of my Spitfire skins - you'll see what I mean. The undersides of RAF fighters changed a great deal and relatively frequently between 1938 and the introduction of the Day Fighter Scheme (grey and green) in August 1941.
OK? Getting there?
This has been mentioned at least twice, so I thought it might be worth setting things straight.
There is nothing wrong with the model or the skin, and the skin is (as always with John's work) historically perfectly accurate.
From another thread where this came up:
Greg, to complainer:
I suggest you read up on early WW2 British fighters. You might find you don't have a problem at all.
Ted, to complainer:
I know that the Germans used this same technique to signal searchlight and AA crews to alert them not to fire planes marked this way. There were several patterns used similar in approach to the one you see on the Defiant. Not sure why the British did this but it was not a mistake and was a purposeful tactic.
Me to complainer:
Black and white (or whitish) undersides were used on RAF day fighters from 1938 until June 1940 as an aid to identification by Observer Corps personnel on the ground. The Chain Home system could tell of enemy formations coming towards the English Coast, but could not track them once they were past, inland, That was the job of the Observer Corps, with binoculars and so on, as you'll have seen in many documentaries.
It was however not much use as camouflage, and from mid-June 1940, the undersides were ordered to be painted with Sky (or nearest offer - a bit complicated in fact), with or without roundels depending on the date and employment of the aircraft.
In November 1940, the black port wing (only - not the entire port side of the aircraft as before) was reintroduced, again for recognition purposes. This lasted until the spring of 1941.
I do have the dates of the various AMOs somewhere if you want to nit-pick, but to put it briefly, the Defiant is correctly painted. Check out some of my Spitfire skins - you'll see what I mean. The undersides of RAF fighters changed a great deal and relatively frequently between 1938 and the introduction of the Day Fighter Scheme (grey and green) in August 1941.
OK? Getting there?
