Hi Rowan, and gentlemen
I'm a little surprised to see so much of the Prussian blue on the Cl II's? This may be my ignorance, so please stay with me!
My impression was, from reading Dan San Abbotts thoughts, that the blue was not necessarily such a common feature and the the lozenge paint finish was more prevalent? I don't have DSA's mighty tome so I don't have direct access to the sources and might have got the wrong end of the stick...
One question - does anyone know if WNW are going to produce the later III/a variants for the Hannover in kit form? This is the option I'd personally prefer to model, based mainly I suppose on my fondness for the old Airfix kit, but I do prefer the appearance with the later crosses and camo schemes.
Firstly, did you read this bit?
"I crave your indulgence on the camouflage schemes; I have some problems in deciding the nature of all the subjects' camouflage, so a number of these are to a degree speculative. I also have some misgivings about the camouflage schemes put forward with regard to the fuselage undersides; I'm hoping for more information coming to light following the release of the WNW kit, so that I can modify the profiles to match... we'll see. "Now, I liked Dan-San as a man and I had much respect for his efforts in trying to unravel WWI colour conundrums. What I was a little less enamoured of was his propensity for making unequivocal statements on the subject, very often not supported by evidence - or at least evidence which he chose to share. This is an enormous shame and sadly colours my attitude to many of his pronouncements. I have the book he and Rick Duiven wrote on the Schlachtflieger and I have read and re-read what he has written on the subject of Hannover colours (and the other Cl class aircraft) and also what else is in the published domain; so far I cannot find anything that contradicts Wingnut's carefully stated and quite tentative view on the subject in the Hannover instructions.
Many people have recently been prompted by the release of the WNW kit to have another look at the whole question of Hannover camouflage schemes - so far all I have read reveals nothing new, just more supposition and guesswork based on the pre-existing inadequate information. We modellers always seek absolutes on WWI colours and markings and I have to report that from my experience there are only a limited number of certainties which are valid - despite what some would have you believe "from the mountain-top".
So, I remain in the camp which believes that there were areas of colour on the fuselage - applied with care in some instances and more vaguely in others- which bore a colour and tonal relationship to the dyes used in the printed camouflage fabrics and that these areas were very often over-sprayed with dark colour - a dark blue or a dark green with the possible/probable intention of binding the various shades together and rendering them less distinct. I also am of the
opinion that the undersides of the fuselage were probably painted in different colours more in tune with the light underside fabric palette. Were there some aircraft which were not over-sprayed or finished in more regular colour patches? Possibly. Does there exist
explicit or
clear written or photographic evidence for this? - not that I've seen. You will, I hope, notice a distinct lack of emphatic and decisive statements. I know that some may believe this to be in some way lacking in manly virtue; well, if so I shall wear my apparent androgyny with pride!! Testosterone-fuelled ego and WWI colour scheme research are ill-matched colleagues...
As to whether Wingnuts will produce the later Cl.III or IIIa - your guess is as good as any but personally I would err towards thinking it unlikely; the differences between the Cl.II and the later versions seem to have been slight - in terms of the machine's overall appearance, but it appears that the changes were primarily aimed at weight-reduction and involved some more or less subtle modifications which shaved weight off here and there. One of the changes was, apparently, a narrower fuselage. How much narrower I don't know but you can see that incorporating a narrower fuselage in a Cl.III/IIIa kit would involve new fuselage shells, new bulkheads etc etc. It seems also that the wingspan was different - and whilst that may have been simply a change in the aileron tip planform, I actually think it might have been a more extensive re-design of the wing (pilots of the Cl.II reported that it was affected by wing vibration at high speeds and that modifications -presumably to the wing- meant that the Cl.III series was much improved in this regard) though how much the appearance of the wing may have been affected, I don't know but you can see that if the changes were, for the sake of discussion, in the number of ribs, then whole new wings would be needed in the kit.
Cor don't ee go on..... Sorry.
EDIT
Hello Warren,
I've had another good squint at the Airfix kit and I just don't think decals for it would be worth the effort or sell well enough. Also I couldn't use the artwork for the 32nd scale Cl.II markings for the Cl.IIIa from Airfix - although the latter is sufficiently in need of attention with regard to its accuracy that dressing it up as a ClII wouldn't be difficult to do at the same time!
