Thunder city colours

RE: Lightnings

>For a start, aint these passwords annoying?

what when you log in here ? – IMHO its useful cos i use a school network often to get on here , and its therefore more secure – if you don’t like it can’t you get it to remember you by cookies ?

rabie :9

RE: Lightnings

For a start, aint these passwords annoying?

Second, while its great to see a lightning flying I wasnt picking at the owners option, I was enquring about it!

RE: Lightnings

Well it wouldn’t bother me if it had a Nike stripe down them in any way. If it means that they can stay in the air with sponsorship then so be it – I am sure the Vulcan guys at Bruntingthorpe are considering all means of sponsorship and I believe that it’s the only way to keep something like it in the air – airshow enthusiast’s certainly arn’t going to pay to keep them up in the air.

RE: Lightnings

Shell provide the fluids etc for the lightnings so you know.
But jeez lads! Whats next a bloody nike swoosh replacing the roundels!
And looking at the T.5s the civvie reg has been toned down and is quite small but on the F.6 thats just uncalled for! It looks like it was just thrown into place!
Cummon lads, it’s great that their flying but please please sort the paint jobs!

RE: Lightnings

In addition to the Shell logos mentioned they also have other advertising on the fuselages of the aircraft.
To mention two firstly there is the ‘NTPS’ text , advertising the California-based National Test Pilots School that Thunder City are involved with, and the second is a bit of self-promotion, their web-site address 🙂

Best wishes

Mark

RE: Lightnings

It might seem strange but I am sure the Shell logo on the side of the Lightning’s is a means of acknowledging the sponsorship of these machine’s by that company . Whether you agree with sponsorship or not
FlyPast has sponsored ‘Sally B’ this year and in plain and simple terms this gives FlyPast good publicity and also benefits B-17 Ltd
in terms that they can use the money to keep her up where she belongs.
Regards the registration this could well be connected to the SA CAA wanting them to wear a registration in a similar way to a Cessna 150 or a Boeing 747. This is a legal requirement and I should think in this day and age not many people are going to object to ex-military aircraft being clearly identified as civil , after all it’s not that long ago that a Strikemaster was a very front line machine in parts of Africa .

Lightnings

How about get rid of those bloody awful civve registrations and paint the Lightnings in proper colours not some business brand cr*p! They should look like they once did. Polished metal, yes looks nice but does not wear very well, and no one wants to see silver paint like some Lightnings. Dark sea grey all round!! Either that or some nice squadron paint jobs e.g 56 Firebirds checkerboard scheme
Flame away lads!

RE: Mick’s Spit

Sounds rather nice to me !! I remember seeing TR.IX PT462 at West Malling (Great Warbirds) and hearing the comments of various ‘enthusiasts’ on her camouflage scheme which included a rather fetching shade of blue.It sounds good fun to me – if you can afford to put one back in the air who cares what colour she is!!!

RE: Thunder city colours

A collective sigh of relief resounded throughout the warbird world………….
😉

RE: Thunder city colours

If there’s apparent problems (from some people) about what colours someone paints there own personal property, then just wait untill i get my hands on my Spitfire !

Anyone remember the Revell 1/32 scale Spitfire Mk I, 610 Sqn DW-K ?

Well I had one of those kits for Christmas when I was seven, and while I would not say I was terrible at model making at that age, you can appreciate what it looked like after I stuck it all together AND painted it in gloss green, brown and blue paint, AND stuck the transfers on, sort of, all before tea time !!!!!!!!!!!!
And I still remember the look of despair that my parents gave me when I brought it down from my bedroom to show them !

I’ve always wanted to paint a Spitfire, if only for a week, exactly as I painted my very first Spitfire model………that should make certain faces go rather blue with rage (or green with nausea)when I lob into Duxford for Flying Legends !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Don’t believe I would dare do that ?
Indiana Tony knows I’m mad enough ?
Watch this space……..or rather the pages of Flypast !

MICK

Ps – Since that time my model making skills have improved massively, you will be relieved to hear I’m sure !

RE: Thunder city colours

So far as I know,the Thunder City fleet are all registered in South Africa,with the ‘ZU-‘ prefix eg ZU-BBD.
The only exception is a Hunter GA.11 which arrived from the UK not long ago and hasn’t yet taken up it’s South African reg.

RE: Thunder city colours

maybe it would not be cost efficient to replicate full RAF type schemes and finishes, which require special exemption from the CAA, and since these aircraft are registered in zimbabwe they may not even have the ability to replicate fully authentic finishes, because that version of the CAA may not allow it.

coanda

RE: Thunder city colours

Black is the ‘corporate’ colour for Thunder Cities fleet of aircraft. I did read some time ago that one Lightning F.6 and one T.5 would be kept in natural metal finish to reflect the history of the Lightning. I have to say that that would be fine, but as you say one of the T.5’s has the incorrect pale blue/pink small roundals rather than the early large red/white/blue pattern (type D?). I have to say that I wasn’t keen on seeing a Lightning in O/A gloss black, but I have to admitt that when you see a photo of the the T.5’s parked next to each other, the gloss black (ex-XS452), does look rather fetching, and more pristine. I think Mike Beachyhead should paint all 4 of them gloss black now. Although, perhaps, the ex-XR773 could be put back in her 74 Sqn colours when in the far east circa 68-71. Polished natural metal with a black spine fin, with correct Sqn. markings, at least that is a compromise between the 2 finishes……

RE: Thunder city colours

I’d say they paint them black to make them more visible as they are such high speed aircraft.

RE: Thunder city colours

Probably because the machines are not flown as military machines anymore rather as private owner machines and I suppose after the amount of money they have invested in them they feel that they can paint them any colour they like which is fair enough !