Humbrol 78 enamel too dark for a spitfire cockpit?

[Barry]

My new tinlet of Hu 78 is much darker than I remember and much darker that pics of Stipfire interiors on the web. Have they gone from the correct cockpit color to an in correct one, or from incorrect to correct, or am I just imagining it all.


Barry

[lancfan]

Humbrol 78 is meant to represent MAP Grey-Green which was the official interior colour for AM use, Supermarine used their own colour which was much brighter, think of a darker Humbrol 90 and mix your own checking against cockpit photos of surviving spitfires.
If you intend to build a number of spitfires buy a pot of H90 and add green and light grey until it looks right, some people here have their own 'spitfire mix' for this very purpose, myself included.


David.

[mattbacon]

Is it acrylic or enamel, Barry? I find that acrylics can change colour quite noticeably as they dry, so it would be worth painting some onto a card and seeing what it looks like against a colour chip when it's dried, if you haven't done so already...

bestest,
M.

[lancfan]

Matt, the difference between MAP and Supermarine cockpit greens goes way beyond that- the two colours are completely different. A good description of the supermarine colour would be an apple green.

David.

[mattbacon]

I know about the Supermarine apple green colour, but not all Spitfires were painted with it, were they?

This for example:


is the Mk 1 at Cosford, and that looks pretty much what I think MAP grey-green to look like...

bestest,
M.

[mattbacon]

...mind you, if this is what colour it is now:



Then I can see why Barry thinks it's too dark. Why on earth have they reformulated it to this colour? It's like NO "cockpit green" I've ever seen!

bestest,
M.

[lancfan]

Matt, that cockpit picture looks to me like one of a number of modern interpretations of Supermarine cockpit green. MAP Grey Green was somewhat darker, (the Humbrol colour is too green and a bit dark) and it was not generally used on Spitfires, of course a major repair by a squadron or MU may have been painted over with the MAP colour but they would not have been painted in it from new. It may have been that shortages meant that this may have happened but this would have been a case of specific instance(s) and you would need to be modelling an aircraft from that factory and time from documentary evidence. Another thing to remember is that restored aircraft (including spitfires) have interiors finished in a variety of finishes and displayed aircraft may not always be historically correct and all museums have made mistakes in this very big minefield. To get back to Barrys question, he thought Humbrol 78 was too dark for a spitfire and I agree, it is a common kit call out for the Spitfire but it is wrong and many here have their own fixes for this and if Barry had made his post title clearer others would have joined in. To get back to your post if you think that quite pale colour at the top of your picture is MAP Grey Green I am certain that you are wrong however the colour in shadow deep in the cockpit isn't that far out given the glare from the canopy so perhaps we should agree to differ on this as it has nothing to do with the original question asked by Barry.

David.

[Barry]

Thanks for the discussion. I'm using enamel Matt.
Didn't know Spits had a cockpit colour unique and different from the MAP standard. We had a similar situation over here with Grumman and Republic using a darker green than the standard WWII interior green. I was curious to know if H 90 had changed, but I guess my real question was what to use for a spitfire cockpit, so I've edited the thread title

[lancfan]

Barry I hope this helps, this is an RGB on screen approximation of how the colours differ, as for the debate I have enjoyed it- I only hope it has not annoyed Matt at all.


David.

[Barry]

Nah, Matt's too nice a guy. On point: I think the colour I was remembering was actually H90 Beige Green anyway. And that MAP grey green you're showing is way lighter that the current H78. Again, similar situation, over here, the current Model Master U.S. Interior green is a garishly bright hue that ,IMO, looks awful on a model.

[mattbacon]

No, I'm certainly not annoyed!

I think one of the many reasons for the debate is that there may have been two Spitfire cockpit greens -- an earlier brighter green on the first aircraft, thought to be similar to the colour found in the S6b, and a later, greyer version, called grey-green, but not the same as MAP Interior Grey Green, which is a later colour, which matches H78 (kinda, as it USED to be...).

Anyway, Barry, you were right to remember H.90. Edgar Brooks reckons that if you have an older H.90, known as "Beige Green", you have Airfix's specific Spitfire Cockpit colour, though they didn't really know what it was... which is why it was reformulated to match "Sky" more closely in recent times. I still have a Humbrol Chart on which it's described as Beige Green.

If you've got some actual Sky, I'd mix a bit of your new Humbrol 78 into it, and see how that looks. You want a light colour, as David's chips demonstrate.

bestest,
M.

[lancfan]

No, I'm certainly not annoyed!

I think one of the many reasons for the debate is that there may have been two Spitfire cockpit greens -- an earlier brighter green on the first aircraft, thought to be similar to the colour found in the S6b

Correct me if I am wrong but isn't that early bright green the same one that was applied to Stranraer & Walrus aircraft?
Found images of a Walrus being fully (and rather well) restored in Australia and the interior appears to be finished in a colour something like this:



David.

[Chuck E]

I have mixed some that closely matches your RH sample, David. I usually use Xtracolour though. It covers very nicely too. It's one of their Matt Coats.

Some rebuilt aircraft seem to have some rather dark greens inside the cockpit.

I also heard that the Westland built fighters, including some Seafires, had a black cockpit interior. Anyone else heard that ?