MkI Spitfire: Aluminium Underside

[Guest]

My 1/48 Airfix MkI Spitfire has been primed and is ready for the underside to be painted. The manual says to paint it aluminium. (I guess that means that the underside of the original was unpainted and therefore, when new, quite shiny). I'm not planning to weather it.

== What would be most authentic/nice looking? Should I use Alclad Aluminium, or Vallejo Aluminium paint?

== If Alclad, I have already primed the lower surface of the model with one coat of Vallejo Grey Surface Primer. Could I simply apply the Alclad black undercoat on top, or should I remove the Surface Primer on the lower surface?

== Which Alclad product would be best: Airframe Aluminium High Shine Finish; or Aluminium Regular Finish, or other?

== With non-aluminium models I normally airbrush with colour the lower side first, going into part of the upper side, than mask off the lower side and airbrush the upper side with camo. Should I use the same order of painting with Alclad, or the reverse?

Thanks.

[Guest]

Steve as you hve Vallejo primer in place why not try the Vallejo Aluminuim & if happy leave if not then go for the Alclad. Nothing lost but a few drops of aluminuim.

I have used the Vallejo in small amounts. Be interested Steve if you do use it to hear form you if it airbrushes well & the finish achieved. Thanks in advance.

Laurie

[Guest]

Dear Steve,

As a lifelong Spitfire devotee I'm rather surprised to hear that the manual for your kit suggests pure alluminium for the underside of a Mk 1... In service the Mk 1's were initially painted the slightly odd 'one side white, one side black' scheme from 1938-early 1940, and then at the start of 1940 the switch was made to a rather neutral slightly cream colour, which certainly isn't shiny alluminium... I've just attached photos of two of the few surviving Mk 1's around in which you can see the underside colour schemes I mean...

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I've only ever seen two spitfires with shiny alluminium finish - one is a late war photo recon example flown by the BBMF, and the other is the origional prototype which RJ Mitchell designed and oversaw in construction.

However, if you decide to use alluminium - best of luck and please do post pictures, I'd be interested to see the effect.

Best,

Justin

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[Dave W]

When I built the 1/48 Airfix spitfire mk1 recently the painting guide said to paint the underside 'Sky'.I built an early mk1 which equipped the first squadron to use the spitfire, number 19 at Duxford.My research revealed this squadrons spitfires had aluminium undersides in 1938.Best to research the one you are doing as underside colours varied depending on squadron and dates.

[Guest]

OK. Sky it is. I will be using Alclad Chrome for my Rolls Royce Phantom which is waiting impatiently on the shelf.

[flyjoe180]

Steve, and anyone else interested. This diagram covers the various underside schemes for early Spitfires. Note the two example on the left side of the diagram which have aluminium underside finishes, or a combination of aluminium with black. Cheers.

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[stona]

Yes. Supermarine were slow off the mark with the half White, half Night scheme which was initially trialled on Hurricanes. The result was post production application of the scheme with the usual confusion and interpretation. Amongst the variations was Night/White with either the lower surface of the entire fuselage or the rear fuselage boom and empennage left in Aluminium. Ailerons were also often left unpainted until they could be changed for painted and balanced spares. There was an order to paint spare ailerons correctly.

Cheers

Steve

[Guest]

Really helpful, thanks.

Joe and Steve: Do you know why they used the bizarre "White and Night" scheme? The Spit was a day fighter (I believe) so trying to appear camouflaged during both the day and night-time seems very odd. Or perhaps it made it look half a Spit, appearing to have lost its starboard wing during the day and its port wing during the night, so confusing the Luftwaffe!

[Adrian "Marvel" Reynolds]

As far as I recall from when I built my Hurricane in the black and white scheme it wasnt so much for camouflage it was to help identification by the observer corp? My understanding is this was the same case with the Typhoon having the 5 stripe black and white to save it been confused with the FW190 as the profile was very similar.

Adrian

[stona]

It was essentially an IFF marking. It was as Ade says to make identification by the Observer Corps and friendly aircraft more reliable. Once electronic IFF systems arrived it was abandoned. It was none other than Dowding who was keen for the adoption of the scheme and pushed hard at the Air Ministry to this end. On March 3rd 1938 the Air Ministry informed Fighter Command that Hurricanes with the serial numbers L1596-L1625 were ear marked for the scheme and would be delivered by the end of the month. They started to enter service at the beginning of April 1938. Supermarine didn't start applying the scheme in their factory until some time later. I can't give you a date as I'm not at home to look it up and I can't remember

The Sky underside was for camouflage. It was the same colour as the earlier "camotint" developed by Cotton and his experimental outfit at Heston.

Cheers

Steve

[Ian M]

Am I right in saying that the Aluminium was not bare metal but a silver coloured paint. A sort of alu coloured dope.

Ian M

[flyjoe180]

I believe it was an aluminium dope.