Warbird Information Exchange

Hi all, as many of you know, we are in the process of restoring our 1944 Beechcraft UC-43 Staggerwing. We are trying to find the accurate paint scheme that she wore with the Royal Navy during WWII. Many schemes have been found in our research, but we don't know which one is the right one. Most recently, we received the following information about our UC-43 from an expert on it.

F478

One of a batch of 75 GB-2 aircraft supplied to the Royal Navy under contract AC-31386 Lend Lease Requisition BSC41097. Due to a confused contract situation some aircraft were delivered with a dual USAF/BuAER number.

Beech c/no 6704, 44-67727 (BuAER 23692 alloted ut not taken up).

Delivered 4/03/1944 to Fort Dix, New Jersey, for packing; shipped via Newark to UK 14.04.1944.

Known Royal Navy Use

781 Sqn Lee-on-Solent 1/44 to 1/45

701 Sqn Heston 6/45 to 9/45

As it was a naval aircraft it was returned to the US Navy (probably NAS Norfolk) when it was issued with BuAER 32876 (a paperwork exercise).

Sold on to civil market, initially as N1183V.

With that said, we are looking for information on the 781 Squadron at "Lee on Solent Aerodrome" from 1/44-1/45. Any help would be greatly appreciated, thank you!

- Austin Hancock
Volunteer, 1941 Historical Aircraft Group

_________________
Austin Hancock
Pennington P-51 Memorial
www.lp-51.com

Hi Austin,

Could you give the British serial number for this aircraft? "F478" is a letter short of a full serial, could it perhaps be FT478?

Yes, FT478 ties in with the USAAF/BuAer Numbers quoted by Austin. The Air-Britain book Fleet Air Arm Aircraft 1939 to 1945 only mentions that it was with 701 Sqn at Heston 7.45 - 9.45. The book has a photo of sister ship FT477! I am no expert on these things but I believe it would have been camouflaged in two shades of gray on the upper surfaces and struts, with yellow undersides. This was known as "trainer yellow" and was a darker shade than the Staggerwing pics on the HAG website. FT477 has what looks like a black anti-dazzle patch ahead of the windscreen.

781 Sqn formed at Lee-on-Solent on March 20 1940 as a communications unit but also gave training and refresher flying. The sqn disbanded on July 31, 1945. Austin, you can find the airfield on Google Earth - it's just north of the town of Lee OS.

I assume you have already done the obvious first step and contacted the RN Fleet Air Arm Museum at Yeovilton...??

http://www.fleetairarm.com/en-GB/contact.aspx

We have already done that, we're just seeing if any one else has info as well.

Austin Hancock
1941 Historical Aircraft Group Volunteer

_________________
Austin Hancock
Pennington P-51 Memorial
www.lp-51.com

This is your most likely scheme

I have a teency photo of it in my 1979 book Staggerwing! when it was 1183V. Its near the binding side so it may not turn out great for a scan.
Howards was FT527. C/N 6897

This is awesome! Thank you so much

Austin Hancock
Volunteer, 1941 Historical Aircraft Group

_________________
Austin Hancock
Pennington P-51 Memorial
www.lp-51.com

I agree with L2driver that it was most likely the tri-tone USN scheme. His photo is great, however I recommend not relying on the color profile which contains some bizarre/unlikely interpretations. Here is another photo.



Note in both photos that the interplane struts are dark blue but with a little edge of intermediate blue at the base. In this photo note the upper wing roundels, small and positioned near the tips. Underwing roundels, shown in L2driver's shot, are larger. Vertical fin is intermediate blue; dark sea blue fuselage top comes down to the level of the horizontal stab, with the demarcation shown clearly in L2driver's photo. Note also that the dark blue wraps around the leading edges of both wings. This would be a dynamite scheme if you decide to go with it.

There's also some possibility that your bird was later doped overall silver, especially while serving postwar with 701 where it likely was a VIP transport. Almost certainly it was delivered in USN blue however.

August

I seriously doubt what you are seeing is a tri-tone blue USN scheme it will be standard FAA temperate scheme of the period, of Extra Dark Sea Grey, Dark Slate Grey over Sky undersides, and therefore similar to what that colour profile is, although, those shades in the profile look a little on the light side.
I don't believe any FAA aircraft were ever in USN tri-tone blue schemes, and certainley not on a UK/ETO FAA aircraft.
Only blue scheme used (on Corsair's, Hellcats, Skyraiders & Avengers) was all over dark blue from what I recall.

Determining colours from old b&w photos is extremely difficult.

Using "British Aviation Colours of WW2" as reference, colours varied by end-use for naval aircraft. For biplanes and amphibians, this reference lists the following:

When operating from ships:
Upper surfaces:
a. Top planes: extra dark sea grey and dark slate grey camo
b. Bottom planes: dark sea grey and light sea grey camo
Under surfaces: sky

When operating from shore:
Upper surfaces:
a. Top planes: dark green and dark earth camo
b. Bottom planes: light green and light earth camo
Under surfaces: sky

The above would seem to suggest Travelers would be carrying the green/brown livery while photos show a high probability of these aircraft wearing the former scheme (temperate sea scheme).

Guys, I think I'm right on this one. Both L2driver's photo and the one I posted look like USN tri-color to me. The photo below, which probably was the one on which the goofy color profile in L2driver's post was based, also (if you look at a good print) appears to be USN dark sea blue / intermediate blue / white.



For what it's worth (which I concede isn't much), the folks who researched this AZModel kit decal sheet agree with me.



This would not be unprecedented. Nine Dauntlesses were also supplied to the RN for evaluation and appeared in this scheme. You also have to consider that the Travelers were built for the USN and diverted to Britain, not built for Britain and that, as a non-operational type, repainting may not have been a priority.

I'm not interested in persuading anybody and won't argue the point beyond this post, but I think the assumption of British camouflage is leading the OP astray. I'm not aware of any photo of a Royal Navy Traveler that clearly indicates British camo.

August

P.S., if we do assume a Brit camo scheme, I agree that it would most likely be Temperate Sea, although because this is a non-operational type, one would expect the undersides to be yellow. In other words the same scheme as applied to the Stinson Reliants that saw similar duty with the RN. However, the photo in L2driver's post, which was on orthochromatic film that makes yellow appear dark (see roundel), shows that the underside was not yellow.

That's because the above was early war regs......by mid war to the end of the war the green/earth scheme's had disappeared from all but the upper surfaces of the RAF's Bomber Command 'heavies'. Repaint's weren't on the menu as a/c were more regualrily rotated between ship/shore/as well as in-out of MU's and works for BDR etc. It was easier to just keep the temperate scheme as a default.

The above is from the October 1944 amendment to AP2556A so green/brown was on the menu for the duration although, as you note, the likelihood of putting the aircraft aboard ship very likely saw them in the sea scheme

Austin: You should check with Alan Moore. He and I traded a considerable amount of info on Traveler use/colour schemes, a few years ago.

Just to circle back to the three-tone USN schemes, here's a flight GB-2's in USN livery. If you look at the scheme, you'll see it doesn't match up to the RN FAA example in my first post. The following via the NMUSAF

Could you please be more specific about how that doesn't match up, because from what I can see, both upper and lower camo demarcation lines match up almost perfectly.

August