Me262 - agony of choice - what colour scheme??

[munkster]

Am just putting together the Revell 1/72 Me262 A-1a (and what a joy of a little kit it is!!) and am somewhat bewildered by the choice of colour schemes. Being a beginner with the airbrush I am a little daunted by the mottled paint scheme - anyone got any suggestions for what colour scheme to go for for best results and least likelihood of swearing? Also, whatever scheme I do end up doing what paints do people recommend? Tamiya acrylics seem to be less convenient for painting German WW2 planes unless I'm mistaken: would "Model Air" be a better choice?

Also, the kit comes with fitments at the front underneath (drop tanks or rockets I think?) but various sources seem to suggest that these weren't present on this particular model - would be happy to leave them off to be honest, they don't look like they'll add much to the smooth lines of the fuselage.

Thanks in advance for any ideas!

 

[AlanG]

Vallejo Model Air or Xtracrylicx are my german colour of choice although i love Tamiya paints. Colours all depend on what unit aircraft you want to depict the aircraft from. Steve (Stona) will know more about it

 

[stona]

Cripes there's a bewildering choice of schemes for the Me262,one of the reasons you can never have too many of them. I'd agree with Allyne on the paints.

The A1-a type could be both a Jager (fighter) and a Jabo (fighter bomber).Depending on the bomb rack(s) fitted the Jabo could carry one 250Kg bomb or two 250Kg bombs or one 500Kg bomb.

Do you want to avoid doing mottling? If so I'll see if I can find a scheme for your type without it. Some had very little or negligible mottling. The schemes varied from the standard grey fighter scheme (RLM74/75/76) to a transitional green grey scheme (RLM 82/75/76) and eventually a predominantly green scheme (RLM 81/82/83/76 or aluminium) and just about every combination including squiggles,splinters and mottles in between. Some late production Me262s were not painted at all,they were left in natural metal with the puttied joints between skins (and all of them were puttied so no panel lines!) barely sanded smooth. The fit of removable panels was generally very poor which makes model building a bit easier.

Cheers

Steve

 

[munkster]

Thanks Steve - I think I'm going to "man up" and have a go at some light mottling. The scheme I have (that comes with some decals that a mate donated to me - the same mate who donated some brass I've totally chickened out of using) has just a little of it on the bottom edge of the main camo as it blends into the sky-type colour on the bottom. I'm going to order some Model Air (RLM 74/75/76 funnily enough!!) shortly so will get cracking when that turns up... Have also ordered a Pavla canopy since the one in the kit looks pretty bad, even assuming that I'll probably have made a pig's ear of the masking anyway

 

[stona]

Good luck with that! It should be a fairly straightforward splinter scheme on top with a soft demarcation to the lower colour. It sounds like yours has a minimal mottling which was not uncommon apart from the fin.

I'm planning to build a large scale Me262 down the line. I'm going to do it in flight and "clean",no racks,tanks or bombs,to emphasise those lovely lines. There's a Trumpeter kit in the stash!

Cheers

Steve

 

[munkster]

To be honest I was going to build this one "wheels up" for the same reason (plus I've been getting bored with making/painting landing gears - I seem to be rushing them because I've left them to the very end and not "scheduled them in") then realised there was no pilot so it would be a bit odd on a stand of some sort piloted by.... no-one

As I said I am really enjoying making this one, maybe I should stick to Spitfires and Me262s and not dirty my workbench (make that, "the dining table" then...) with "modern" abominations like MiGs and F15s

 

[Dave W]

For Luftwaffe aircraft i use Xtracolour paints as they do all the RLM colours.These are gloss enamels so no gloss varnish needed before applying decals.If you use acrylics there's the Xtracrylic range although i havent tried them yet so dont know how good they are.