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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 27, 2017 17:52:07 GMT 12
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Post by johnnyfalcon on Dec 27, 2017 20:41:02 GMT 12
That's pretty impressive Dave
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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 28, 2017 1:08:16 GMT 12
Thanks.
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Post by kiwi285 on Dec 28, 2017 8:46:01 GMT 12
Very clever Dave - I gather that you have done more of these. Where would I find them ?
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Post by davidd on Dec 28, 2017 9:01:01 GMT 12
Very impressive Dave. However I have one suggestion to make re colours. The wooden propellers of British aircraft by this time (and probably since the end of WW1, if not earlier) were invariable finished with a fabric covering, and then sprayed with protective dope or special paint, with later ones having a type of tough plastic finish. Thin brass sheet was used for reinforcing leading edges of course, secured by counter-sunk brass screws. Clear varnished wooden props on British aircraft, in my opinion, were probably quite rare, although I must admit that I have not made much of a study of civilian aircraft of the inter-war period. Actual colouring of the fabric covered props for service aircraft was frequently semi-gloss black (thinking here of Tiger Moths, Oxfords, Vincents, Walrus, early Spitfires and Hurricanes), but other, lighter colours MAY have been used. However clear coats of varnish attempting to protect the integrity of the props and revealing the wooden laminates is a thing more often seen these days on vintage aircraft. I think this clear-finishing using various materials was also a feature of some very early propellers too. As usual, further comments from the really knowledgeable are very welcome. David D
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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 28, 2017 10:46:14 GMT 12
Thanks Mike, I have done others, and many of them are spread around the forum.
Thanks David, that's really interesting, I have seen several, at least five, Vincent/Vildebeest props in collections and all of them are varnished timber, without the covering. I just assumed that is how they were.
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Post by davidd on Dec 28, 2017 11:38:18 GMT 12
I think that the outer protective fabric covering on many older British wooden propellers which survived the war and ended up in public or private collections, after deteriorating over the years, have been stripped back to the wood and brass, and then re-varnished. They definitely look good, but is it authentic? Look for photographs of all the early wooden props on prewar (and wartime) RAF (and Commonwealth air forces) aircraft and try to find one with a varnished finish revealing the laminations, and not black! Include prop blades on wartime aircraft which had proprietary wooden blades (on metal hub, such as Rotol), as fitted on Hurricane, Spitfire, Halifax, Wellington, etc. Pretty well without exception, these will be black, with mandatory yellow tips. Sometimes company-owned prototypes of military aircraft retained for trials could be fitted with non-standard civil finishes, such as light grey or silver. World War one aircraft had varied finishes (I have only seen a few of these), so I will that particular subject to the experts! Incidentally, also shown well in the Vincent photograph is the high-gloss finish of the metal parts, and particularly the spats. Seems incongruous for military aircraft, but there it is. IN fact these were not painted items, it was the patented anodisation process (ant-corrosion) employed by Vickers on these aircraft. Of course the original Harvard IIs delivered to the RNZAF in 1941 had an overall glossy finish too, but that was simply paint. Probably chosen on premise that as these were only training aircraft on the other side of the world from hostilities, then gloss was better for many reasons, mostly durability. David D
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Post by alanw on Dec 28, 2017 13:28:50 GMT 12
Hi Dave,
Merry Christmas (belatedly) to you and fellow Forum members.
That is one very cool colourisation, brings it to life.
Couple of questions
Foremost aircraft "4", that ground crewmen must be standing on some step just above the exhaust pipe surely?
Third aircraft in with the motif on the spats? Squadron Leader type pennant/ID?
Be interested to know, Read the Geoffrey Ellis book "Tool Box on the Wing" this year, and the history of our young Air Force (then) is so fascinating.
Thanks for sharing with us.
Regards
Alan
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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 28, 2017 15:55:14 GMT 12
Hi Dave, Merry Christmas (belatedly) to you and fellow Forum members. Thanks Alan, same to you. Cheers! Yes there were two tiny steps on the exhaust pipe for the Erks to stand on. I am not certain of the origin but the pre-WWII RNZAF Vildebeests at Wigram had the spat markings in the blue Flight colours, denoting B Flight of the Flying Training School. These Vincents came to the Auckland Squadron directly from the RAF so I assume they were added in RAF service and possibly for the same reason. I am sure David D will have more to add.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 28, 2017 16:14:42 GMT 12
Here are a couple of others I have done in the past couple of days. The first has two versions, one the sunny day version as the original photo indicated but it doesn't look quite right so I did another version with a more dramatic sky. I also altered the navy colours after Lee Howard of the Fleet Air Arm told me it was too dark for No. 810 Squadron's colours, and I changed the trees in the background. Blackburn Baffin S1573 (later NZ155) immediately before its first test flight at RNZAF Station Hobsonville, 1st of February 1938 a NZ National Library photo colourised by me Vickers Vildebeests from RNZAF Station Hobsonville fly in close formation over Auckland Harbour with Auckland city below in 1937. From a New Zealand National Library photo, colourised by me.
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Post by Peter Lewis on Dec 28, 2017 22:16:55 GMT 12
Dave, might be an idea to put a tag on those photos indicating that they have been 'digitally colourized' and the date. Otherwise I can foresee that someone is going to produce them in 10/50/100 years time as firm evidence of originality.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 29, 2017 9:04:16 GMT 12
If people cannot work out they are not original colour, they need to go to Specsavers.
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Post by kiwithrottlejockey on Dec 29, 2017 11:45:23 GMT 12
On the topic of colourised images, I have often wondered about this photograph.... ....which appears on page 378 of the book “ PAN AMERICAN'S PACIFIC PIONEERS, THE REST OF THE STORY — A Pictorial History of Pan Am's Pacific First Flights 1935-1946” by Jon E. Krupnick, published in 2000 as a considerably enlarged and revised edition of his original 1997 book with a similar name (without THE REST OF THE STORY in the title). The photograph, according to the caption, was taken on July 18th, 1940 following the arrival at Auckland of Pan American's first scheduled mail flight to New Zealand, utilising the Boeing 314 flying-boat NC-18606 “ American Clipper”. However, the caption gives no accreditation to the photograph. I purchased a copy of the book directly from Jon Krupnick in 2000 when it was published (I already had a copy of his 1997 earlier edition) and was so intrigued with the photograph that I contacted the author (his fax number was provided in the book) to ask where he had obtained the photograph from. He replied by fax and explained that he had acquired the photograph in a box of first day covers and photographs he had purchased at a swap meet for collectors of flight covers many years before and that he didn't know the source of the picture. I suspect it may be a Whites Aviation image, but as to whether it was originally a colour photograph, or was colourised by somebody, I don't know. I do know that Whites Aviation employed artists to colourise their images by hand, so who knows? Another (black & white) photograph on page 377 of the same book was taken from the shore on the same date and shows “ American Clipper” tied up at Pan Am's jetty with ZK-AMA “ Aotearoa” berthed in the braby pontoon and ZK-AMC “ Awarua” moored out in the bay and I vaguely recall seeing that photograph somewhere else and accredited to Whites Aviation. As a matter of interest, the photograph shown above appeared in a thread somewhere in this group several years ago after somebody else presumably scanned it from the same book and uploaded it (to Photobucket?) then posted it to the group, but I cannot recall which thread it was in.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 29, 2017 12:02:36 GMT 12
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Post by agalbraith on Dec 29, 2017 13:25:56 GMT 12
If people cannot work out they are not original colour, they need to go to Specsavers. LOL, dont think they will help them much either! Nice work Dave
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Post by shorty on Dec 29, 2017 15:14:17 GMT 12
If people cannot work out they are not original colour, they need to go to Specsavers. Why is that Dave? It may be apparent to current readers of the forum but in 10 or 15 years time it could be a different ball game altogether. It may not be at all obvious to people then, after all there are genuine colour images of Vildebeestes around (NZ 104 at Wigram for example) so if historical records are being tampered with there is a moral obligation to inform future historians of the fact.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 29, 2017 18:58:07 GMT 12
I would have thought it is pretty obvious that these are digital colourisations just examining them, and do not look in any way like original coloured photos. These are digital art rather than 'tampered history'. I'm not keen to add a disclaimer to them, if people really get fooled they are probably none too bright to start with.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 29, 2017 20:19:52 GMT 12
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Post by davidd on Dec 30, 2017 8:15:41 GMT 12
Harking back to the question of propeller colouration, decided to do a quick survey of photographs of RAF aircraft of the 1920s and 30s, and would you believe it, I will now have to try and explain that my general conclusions in previous posts will need some serious rectification! The black propeller fetish indulged in by the RAF from about 1937 onwards really did happen, but prior to that it seems that the policy (if there was one) was somewhat more complex. Again I will not touch on the situation in WW1, but certainly in the 1920s and 30s, black was NOT the predominant colour for propellers at all; rather it looks as though something like light grey was the thing in most cases, but with the rear face sprayed with black paint (presumably to reduce reflection from a following sun annoying the pilot). Our original Vildebeests were almost certainly equipped with propellers with this type of finish. Also found a photo of a (RAF) Singapore III which seemed to have WHITE finished props, although this did not seem typical for this type of aircraft and may have been a one-off for some special occasion. The all-metal Fairey-Reed propeller was quite widely used on RAF aircraft from the early 30s onwards, particularly on Gordons and other Fairey aircraft (no surprises there), and also on a lot of seaplanes, and these were usually left in their natural bare glory apart from having black-painted rear faces. Some aircraft had wooden propellers with a dark painted hub portion but with lighter coloured blades, and a few had all-dark coloured blades, so there seems to have been a somewhat complex policy for prop colouring, or perhaps no policy at all, but with the propeller manufacturers patenting their own finish specifications and having the Air Ministry approve them for service and/or civil use. However I could find no obvious evidence that clear varnished wooden props were ever used by the RAF, but this does not prove that there were not any in use. For instance, how were the props on Hawker Tomtits finished on delivery to the RAF, or the NZPAF for that matter? A propeller finishing policy would have to include special provision for those fitted to marine aircraft, and another for those for aircraft operated in extremely hot climates. Wooden items were of course very vulnerable to the effects of higher temperatures, and even spares kept in covered accommodation were prone to warping, which would render them unusable. David D
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Post by Dave Homewood on Dec 30, 2017 11:03:35 GMT 12
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