Fairey Gordon (& other) exhaust pipe coating?

[hbpencil]

Hi all,

While looking at this photo of NZ616 on the museum website (link) I noticed that the exhaust pipe appears to have a light coloured coating, and I'm wondering if anyone knows the purpose and colour of this coating?

For what it's worth I also looked at photos of other Gordons, Baffins and Vildebeests (both RNZAF and RAF) and so as I could tell that coating was often absent and when it was used it was only on the pipes and not the exhaust collector ring.

Cheers,

[shorty]

My guess is that the steel portion of the pipes are wrapped in asbestos cord and then have asbestos "slurry" coating applied over it, same sort of system as used for steam pipes,