Spifire Instrument colours

I own (and sell!) a lot of instruments – probably 15 – 20,000 of them!

😉 You might have some trade coming, I’ll PM you a list if I may…:)

By all means; although they are predominantly postwar.

Bruce

Sorry James, I knew that, but my nogging sometimes plays little pranks on me… 😉

I own (and sell!) a lot of instruments – probably 15 – 20,000 of them!

😉 You might have some trade coming, I’ll PM you a list if I may…:)

Boost is the Plumb Red colour as are the Oil Gauges, Rad Temp early are also the plumb red

Just to make it easier to get the right thing, when writing them, you mean the colour ‘plum’ named after the fruit, not plumb which is most often seen in ‘plumb-line’ and ‘plumb centre’. Different things.

Very often, the yellow and blue bezels were overpainted with black postwar.

The red boost gauge bezels are also often overpainted in black.

I own (and sell!) a lot of instruments – probably 15 – 20,000 of them!

Bruce

I repaired instruments, from 1985, and some of them were pretty old. I seem to remember that blue, and yellow, bezels were painted over original black, while red were already moulded in a fairly dark colour (maybe a material similar to Spitfire seats?)
Edgar

Thanks Bruce, when you say you have gauges, do you think you could post some photos of differing colours and year please, sort of a makeshift colour base… 😉

and here is an oil temp gauge:

I dont have a colour reference, but I do have gauges! Original, WW2 manufacture.

Bruce

Nail on head…

Mr. Bluesky has hit the nail on the head. I can’t find any sort of guidance on this. Also, WW2 colour photos show inconsistent use of colour for these instruments. There has to be a some sort of order a directive from the Air Ministry to cover this.
If it was a Bf109 or FW190 I’d probably have the documentation in German and English and I’d know the exact colours, the manufacturer of the paint and the shoe size of the mechanic who installed it. It seems strange that when you consider how many Spits are out there now that there seems to be comparitively little information. I have a complete set of stencils and data plates for our Zero, but am having a rough time getting the same info for a Spitfire. Or, am I just looking in the wrong places?

I dont honestly know – these were electrical instruments – I suspect the Whirlwind had capillary instruments.

Bruce

Boost is the Plumb Red colour as are the Oil Gauges, Rad Temp early are also the plumb red but the later Bakelite have a blue bezel, this is one we can’t find a good colour reference for, anyone help? Oil pressure either Yellow or Brown, although the Whirly images we have only show the Brown versions again it would be nice to see a good colour reference for the Yellow…

Here’s an example of our Boost Gauge for the 3D cockpit, recently made by a very talented chap whose helping us get our project finished…

Oop’s, sorry for the Hi-Jacking…

I dont honestly know – these were electrical instruments – I suspect the Whirlwind had capillary instruments.

Bruce

Hmmm… Would that be the same throughout the War? Does anyone have the picture of the colours used, I for one would like to see the variants…

Stuart…

Oil temp – Yellow

Rad temp – Blue

Postwar these were often overpainted black.

Bruce