spitfire vb

(wasn’t the photographer of the 222 Sqn pics CEB, VoyTech?)

Haven’t we had that in another thread, long time ago? RAF Museum Hendon has the copyrights for all CEB photos. Their CEB collection includes a sequence of 222 Sqn Mk VB photos.
Other photos (which may well have been taken during the same session) are held at the IWM. IIRC they are from “an unknown photographer”.

The ‘Camera above the Clouds’ series on the work of Charles E Brown published by Airlife (now out of print – try e-bay or www.abebooks.com) have a range of near subject shots too, including some of the above (wasn’t the photographer of the 222 Sqn pics CEB, VoyTech?)

If you aren’t too fussed of being absolutely sure of your ground, there’s a lot of shots of Mk.IX, Hurricane etc which will give you a feel for the look. But do wwatch out for modern photos misleading!@

Yes, to get back on topic:
Both IWM and RAF Museum Hendon archives have a nice selection of WW2 colour photographs. Some of these have been published ebfore, some have not. I do recall a sequence of 222 Sqn Mk V photos (some of these are at Hendon, some at the IWM).
I seem to recall that Mark12 had some stills from WW2 era colour film footage of Spitfire VIIIs and IXs. I am quite sure some of these were in pretty dismantled condition, with the engine cowlings removed. I don’t recall any cockpit shots, but there were certainly scenes with armourers at work.
Regarding WW2 Spitfire cockpits in colour, we had a thread on that some months ago. It shouldn’t be impossible to locate it.

A short list of books that might prove useful:

The Royal Air Force of World War Two in Colour, by Roger Freeman (Arms and Armour 1993)
It has numerous photos of Spitfires with engine cowls removed, though mainly Mk VIII and IX’s, in Europe and the Middle East; also gun bay mounts of Typhoons (can it be assumed that Spitfire would be of similar internal colours?).

Camera at Sea 1939-1945, (Bay Books, Sydney 1978)
Several colour shots of RN-FAA Hellcats and Barracudas and a close up of a Seafire (good details of undercarriage).

Unsung Heroines, by Vera Lynn (Sidgwick & Jackson, London 1990)
Colour photo of RN Hurricane being re-armed by Wrens. Aircraft viewed from the rear, good details of internal machine gun bay colours.

Send us a message with a e-m address if you want a scan of some of these. I’ll post one or two on this thread in a few days time if anyone else is interested.

…geoff

Just to annoy you:
Why should anybody care about the colour if it is not a real Spitfire?

I would :p

I was going to paint it flourescent orange just to annoy you! 😉

Just to annoy you:
Why should anybody care about the colour if it is not a real Spitfire?

I don’t mind if it’s purple, Daz, just bear in mind the *stick* (hem hem) you’ll get from the others if it’s wrong… 😀

Note to Daz – make sure your crowbar is the right colour eh? 😉

I was going to paint it flourescent orange just to annoy you! 😉

A couple more pics.

Bits of Shuttleworth’s AR501 and the TFC machine under some maintainance.

This is the sort of stuff we have in the book I mentioned, yours for only 9.99 (yeah, it’s an advert) because the author had done a lot of work to provide the kind of answers you need. (Don’t listen to me, see what the reviewers have thought of it here.

Here’s a free lick of the lolly. 😀 Regarding the cockpit door Wojtek says:

“In surviving Spitfires the note is applied in various styles, but seldom (if ever) following the authentic stencils. To confuse matters further, the lettering is nowadays usually in black, while the crowbar is invariably finished in red (to indicate its emergency rescue role?) which effectively misleads most restorers and modellers alike.”

In the book there are some photos of wartime doors, showing the variant setups, and a couple are in colour.

Wojtek goes on to say: “…Regardless of the style, the note was invariably in red, unlike the crowbar which was either left in natural metal, or painted the same colour as the inside of the cockpit door.”

So Shuttleworth’s lovely Spitfire’s door has the wrong lettering in the wrong place in the wrong colour. The crowbar is also the wrong colour, and is rotated in a position that is differet to the five wartimes shots (the bend at the end is under the corner web on the door.) How misleading is that!

Note to Daz – make sure your crowbar is the right colour eh? 😉

Should you buy the book? Well, if you do, we can produce more. If you don’t, the law of deminishing returns operate. Neither the author nor the publisher are getting rich from this, we do it because we like to.

Enjoy.

That would be great, in the words of a supermarket, every little helps.

Looking for something else…

Found this! Here’s a not-brilliant pic of the cockpit of Shuttleworth’s Mk.V AR501.

I think I can find some engine shots too.

I need them for making a scale model, from a kit, not sure on the scale yet, depends on how much detail i can get, the more the merrier. I can get detail sets for cockpits and engines but they don’t have little details like which bit is what colour.

Never managed to sell faith VT. I leave that to the god botherers. Last time I looked the Maltese had ‘Faith’…

I’ve not seen one yet. As you’ve written a book about the Spitfire V without any colour pics in of these bays, have you seen any wartime colour of this area?

In English we say ‘jam tomorrow’… 😉

I’ll see if I can find some shots of Shuttleworth’s Mk.V engine and cockpit, tomorrow, QQ. I’ll leave it to VT to tell you how it varies from wartime examples.

I’m making a modle with the cockpit, engin and gun bays opened up

Bear in mind that both the cockpit and the power plant of an airworthy Spitfire will never be exactly like the wartime one. They didn’t fall under the civil aviation authorities, and their operators didn’t care that much about operating costs, service life, etc. back then, you know.

wartime colour for what you specifically want does not exist, AFAIK.

You’ve got to have more faith, JDK!
About a dozen years ago a well known Spitfire author has taught me a rule which proved true to me many times since: ‘If you can imagine an old photo you would like to see, it certainly exists somewhere out there, you just have to find it’. So, don’t say it doesn’t exist. Say that you have not seen it. Yet.

Cor, this is like 20 questions… 😉

Scale? Kit, scratchbuilt?

What do you know, what do you want to know?

I’m making a modle with the cockpit, engin and gun bays opened up

If you say what you want them for you may find you’ll get a bit more help here. There’s quite a few posters here who have an encyclopaedic knowledge of the Mk.V innards…

Thanks very much, those are going to be a great help.

Sussed it. The two squashed ones were portrait images and were squeezed into a landscape frame.

Brian

As promised, Spit MkV engine without cowlings. Before and after. Hope these are of use.

Brian

PS No idea why two of the are squashed.