Sovietwarplanes

HI

A question got asked on Hyperscale
http://www.network54.com/Forum/149674/thread/1367264818/What+is+a+good+color+match+for+the+overall+gray+used+on+La-11s+in+USSR+and+China-nt

I looked at the paint charts, and get two answers
the overall color is the   A-36g,  gloss light grey-blue, or  PF-36m  matt light grey-blue, use 'Overall  La-9/11/15/17, Yak-9P (1948)' but it has some question marks?

Also, there is no FS595 'match' for either.  I know I asked about this colour sometime, for use of a Yak-15, i thought here but it seems not [probably on ARC] as I think John Thompson gave me a paint match,  
[FS 16495 light grey??  I bought some Xtracrylix of this colour, but this might be a match for Pearl grey as used on early US jets, but I'd have to do some digging to check this]

Any comments or suggestions on this?
 
As I have not found an answer here, i thought it worth a thread, as reference if nothing else.

I think it's the overall color that the preserved Yak-15 is in,
http://walkarounds.airforce.ru/avia/rus/yak/yak-15/index.htm
though it was possibly repainted in the 70's, like their Yak-9?

there are a few colour pics here of Yak-9P's taken in Korea
http://kevsaviationpics.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Yak-9

bort 49
(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ooBsdhe__yw/UMKEmuW0zLI/AAAAAAAAXig/1p6PZ0ycVgc/s1600/Yak-9P+(Frank)+5.jpg)

(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-1uHClCFfGuQ/T1iP93zyh5I/AAAAAAAAG8o/8Ykzw2kGX94/s1600/Yak-9P+%28Frank%29+1.jpg)

(http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-msc2xghTGjE/T1iQCS0qt8I/AAAAAAAAG84/bbYdOM8pl1A/s1600/Yak-9P+%28Frank%29+3.jpg)

bort *2
(http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-8hOGAxo1gKI/T1iQBVdU1aI/AAAAAAAAG8w/92m8JQ6DK-o/s1600/Yak-9P+%28Frank%29+2.jpg)

This one is of a hangar, note the IL-10 behind, I've seen a pic of this IL-10 as well,
[posssibly on VVS hobbyvista, Pilawskii using it as an example of colour.]

(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jT7b9easw8o/UFQqwtCTlEI/AAAAAAAAVl8/GRnNEG4oDpg/s1600/Yak-9P+(Frank)+4.jpg)

cheers
T

Hi Troy,
in this page there are chips of AMT-16, AGT-16 and A-36g and FS matches. http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/color-table.html (http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/color-table.html)
The shade of AMT-16 (or AGT-16) cames from Akanihin himself, photographed side by side with a page of FS-595; the A-36g was extrapolated from this, supposing that it had the same pigments but a more yellowish medium.
Regards
Massimo

From hyperscale thread:


Typical asumptions (author says I really think  :D)

For practical purposes La-9 and La-11 were made in one factory: Factory 21 (Gorkiy, now Nizhniy Novgorod).  Out of about 3,000 planes made, only 75 were made at Factory 99. All remaining La-9 and La-11 were made at Factory 21.

Photos of captured planes confirm that planes were in original Soviet colours.  Hyperscale frum member still thinks that some were field painted with whatever was lying around.  ;D

Regards,
KL

Thanks Massimo

now I look at the page again when I'm not tired it's clearer, but may I suggest adding a footnote to showing the link between these paints,  as the A-36g list the types painted, as does the PF-36m, but no FS595 matches, while  there are  FS 595 matches are shown for AMT-16 and AGT-16, but not type use, now, I know there is mention of the different uses at the top of the table, but it can easily be missed.

I presume the section on camouflage in this era is a work in progress, I would certainly like to know more.
 
Apart from AKAN are there other model paint matches?

HI Konstantin

I did mention that I doubted the in-field repaint.   I now also notice the assumptions made after 50 years of cold war propaganda still linger....
It was a quick reply on my part, and threads quickly disappear there.
Thanks for some hard information on the L-9 and La-11. very useful, I'll add a link to this thread there for anyone who might stumble across it later.

getting away from ignorance about the VVS,  I was about to reply to Massimo's post when the site told me an new reply had been added,  can you shed any light on the various grey-blue paints listed above and their use?

cheers
T

I

Hi Troy,

Yes, I have still to work on these pages. Maybe I'll divide the table into more pages. Besides I have to reduce the amount of photos on the page on painting, moving many of them into pages dedicated to a single type. For now, I have to finish the work on the Il-2.

Regards
Massimo

Hi Troy,
first check my post at http://sovietwarplanes.com/board/index.php?topic=1136.15  ;)

Paints introduced in 1947-48 (AMT-16, AGT-16, A-36g, PF-36m and PF-36g) were all the same colour - grayish blue.  Letter m stands for matt, g for glossy.  First two were nitro paints for fabric, A-36 was oil paint for metal, PF were pentaphtal oil paints for metal.

Original paint is preserved on Lavochkin jet's fragments in HAI and MAI.  IMHO, the closest colour on museum planes could be seen on Yak-11 in Austria and Yak-11 in Brussels.  Google those Yaks and you will see.  Colour of La-9 preserved in China is also close enough.
Yak-11 in OKB Yakovlev museum is repainted in something else.

HTH,
KL 

Hi Konstantin

even a thread I posted in.... I used to have a good memory...

Thanks for adding some details, hopefully this thread will be of use to others as well. 

Massimo, perhaps it would be worth adding some of these details to colour chart, like the uses of paint types, and that they are supposed to be the same colour.

What is HAI and MAI please? 

thanks
Troy

Hi Troy,

Where this is known for sure, it is already written on the table.
Regards
Massimo

Hi Troy,
La-156 wing is preserved at Harkhov Aviation Institute and landing gear of another Lavochkin jet is preserved at Moscow Aviation Institute.
HTH,
KL

Now that I have the information for the exterior of my La-11, can you also point me to the proper interior color?
Thank you all!

Hi Hub

glad you joined up, it's a great site.

As for interior colours, if in doubt, use A-14 steel grey, but others hopefully will know more.

see http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/color-table.html

and scroll down to interior colours, it's nearly at the bottom.

This also lists colours for various otehr internal componenst and pipes depending on use which may help.

cheers
T

both exterior blue-gray and interior gray are visible on Brusseles Yak-11:

(http://aircraftwalkaround.hobbyvista.com/yak11/yak11_17.jpg)
from: http://aircraftwalkaround.hobbyvista.com/yak11/yak11.htm

real colours are slightly darker than photo made with flash.
HTH,
KL

Hi all,
here is an image kindly supplied by mr. Akanihin:

(http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/1945-1950-newtypes/AMT-16.jpg)

Regards
Massimo

(http://storage6.static.itmages.ru/i/13/0503/s_1367563950_1230130_63806ff725.jpeg) (http://itmages.ru/image/view/1010018/63806ff7) (http://storage8.static.itmages.ru/i/13/0503/s_1367564119_4249978_3242ec7977.jpeg) (http://itmages.ru/image/view/1010020/3242ec79) (http://storage4.static.itmages.ru/i/13/0503/s_1367564178_5273313_30635f9686.jpeg) (http://itmages.ru/image/view/1010025/30635f96)

Hi Walker,
what is the wing of the third image? It looks made of wood.
Regards
Massimo

Wing of La-156. This is not wood, it looks through primer.

For what it's worth, here's a couple of photos of an Amodel 1/72 Yak-9P which I finished recently (although it still lacks the aerial wires and pitot tube and needs a touchup here and there), painted in what I thought was a good approximation of A-36g based on the information in this thread:

(http://s12.postimg.org/dv7zyvfrd/Yak_9_P_014.jpg) (http://postimg.org/image/dv7zyvfrd/)(http://s9.postimg.org/kupgc21ob/Yak_9_P_013.jpg) (http://postimg.org/image/kupgc21ob/)

The paint is Gunze Sangyo aqueous acrylic RLM 78; Testors ModelMaster enamel 2087 RLM 78 is nearly identical, both straight from the bottle. It looks just a little bit more blue in real life - the photos were taken under cool-white fluorescent lighting.

John

Hi John,
are them out of the box, or have you done any modifications?
Regards
Massimo

Hi Massimo! Regarding modifications, I moved the wing back by 3 mm as discussed on Scalemodels.ru; when that is done, the radiator housing needs to be moved forward by about 2 mm. I also used a set of Moskit metal exhausts which were made for the P-39 and P-40 and added the extra seventh outlet on each side for the spark plug cooling airflow from small plastic tubing.

The bort number is from the PrintScale Yak-9 decal sheet, intended for a different aircraft and altered slightly to suit this one; the stars are from Techmod, and the stencils are from the Amodel kit decal sheet. The Techmod decals are well printed but require a coat of Microscale liquid decal film to keep them from breaking up - they are very fragile. I had no problems with the PrintScale decals or the Amodel decals.

Here is the information from Scalemodels.ru regarding the Amodel Yak-9U kit; it also applies to the Yak-9P:
http://scalemodels.ru/articles/3974-Amodel-1-72-jak-9u.html
http://scalemodels.ru/modules/forum/viewtopic_t_5103_start_0.html

John

That Yak-9 looks good, John!  I'd wondered where you'd gotten off to - I see you've been busy making models.  Now there's a concept!

Regards,

Jason

Thanks, Jason! I have several more which I'll post (if I'm brave enough) whenever I get a few last details done and some photos taken. I only posted the Yak-9P in this thread because I was interested in whether I'd get any responses on my judgement of the A-36g colour.

John

Hi John,

The FS595 equivalent to RLM 78 is generally given as 35414, whereas AMT-16, AGT-16, A-36g, PF-36m and PF-36g (all the same shade) should be around 34233/14233.

IMHO, even taking into account the color scale-factor, RLM 78 appears to be too light and too blue. See http://www.colorserver.net/showcolor.asp?fs=35414+34233 (http://www.colorserver.net/showcolor.asp?fs=35414+34233)

My 2? only! ;)

Best regards,

Pete57

Hi John,
for me your kit looks very nice. All that modifications really improved it.
However, it is hard to judge the color from the computer monitor. This is chip of A-36g from http://www.mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/color-table.html (http://www.mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/color-table.html):
(http://www.mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/chips/A36g.jpg)

Color of your kit looks lighter and more greyish on my monitor. But it could be caused by light conditions when you photographed your kit.
I am curious for your next builds.
Happy modeling.

      66misos

Thank you for the kind words, 66misos! Yes, it's lighter than the samples; I was trying to get a colour closer to the Yak-11 image in KL's post on the first page of this thread:

(http://s30.postimg.org/qwjvxl1vh/yak11_17.jpg) (http://postimg.org/image/qwjvxl1vh/)

John

Cameras, artificial or natural lighting, monitors etc. make this more complex than it is.

Colour's name was "light gray-blue".  It was a lighter version of AMT-11 (callled "gray-blue").

Averin's photo is a bit misleading - 34233 is green-gray (second digit 4).

All Yak-9U colour photos show a bluish colour, not green.  All Yak-11 photos show a bluish colour not green.

IMHO, John's Yak-9 is OK.  If it is more bluish than what my monitor shows - even better.

HTH,
KL

Hi John,
photos can be misleading, but if you have a FS-595 catalogue in your home, you can check this.
(http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/1945-1950-newtypes/AMT-16.jpg)
Regards
Massimo

Yes, I have FS-595C and 34233 is greenish.
It isn't that simple - I have tried to take photos of FS chips and colours were all over the place.  I took (written) notes and compared them with photos and there were discrepancies.  What I saw as the closest chip wasn't the closest on photos. Can you explain this?

Maybe some different reflections due to different finish?
This image is from Akanihin, and I think that it was representative of what he saw.
Anyway, it is very possible that faded color on planes was different in some way.
Regards
Massimo

Instead of using Akanihin's photo you may use GOST standards from the web.

Go to this page:
http://color-paints.ru/?p=sssrcolor and scroll down to chips number 842 and 843 - those are shown on Akanihin's photo.

Even more exact, rgb and hex colour values:
GOST842 = rgb(100, 133, 127) = #64857f
GOST843 = rgb(103, 133, 131) = #678583

I can't figure out how to find closest FS colours, but this site
http://encycolorpedia.com gives following equivalents:
#64857f between FS34148 and FS14158
#678583 between FS34148 and FS35189

and when you plug those colours into colorserver, you get this:
http://www.colorserver.net/showcolor.asp?fs=35189+34148+34148+14158

Finally, visual check against real FS chips: all 3 greenish chips are too dark, one bluish chip is actually gray.  I would stick to rgb values.
 
Regards,
KL

As Konstantin has pointed out,
The reason is that the FS595 is the US Federal Standard  which are government specified paint colors, but they are not a complete range of colors
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Standard_595


I'm sure many of those reading know this, but for those who may not, given the original nature of the FS595 system, it's not surprising that many 'matches' quoted are a 'nearest match' rather than an exact one.   Far too often FS595 'matches' are posted, which, while widely available system it's has it's limits, but it also seems the reason for the limits are forgotten.

hope of use
T

following links make much better color conversions.  Just enter hex color code and then click "Go".  closest FS maches are listed with similiraty expressed as percentage:

for GOST843  http://www.perbang.dk/rgb/678583/
for GOST842 http://www.perbang.dk/rgb/64857f/

FS36329 Light Gray has 92%, FS35414 Blue has 91%, etc.  Interesting...

Hi,
I am aware of the availability of digital chips both of FS and Russian colors.
The fact is that the visualization of digital chips depends both on scanner settings, the monitor settings and the subjective interpretation, because it is impossible to see the monitor chip and a materially painted surface under the same light.
It has happened that I found the visualization of known colors of Colorserver very different from the impression that they made looking at the real FS catalogue that I have; I don't think that it's fault of the catalogue itself.
Both real planes and models are materially painted, and not with RGB colors; the digital media are only a way to communicate the color of a real plane, or a real chip, to modelers.
This media can distort the color, and create problems of interpretation.
Now, if one has a real FS catalogue, he can correct distortions; else, he can't, and is left to the subjective interpretation of a digital chip that could be distorted.
For example: this altered version of the same photo gives exactly the information of the supposedly right one, when it is compared to the real fs catalogue.

(http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/1945-1950-newtypes/AMT-16alt.jpg)

(http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/1945-1950-newtypes/AMT-16.jpg)

Besides, the  perception changes if it is presented on a white, or a black, or a grey background.

(http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/colors/1945-1950-newtypes/AMT-16dif.jpg)

In this example, people is already aware that it's always the same chip, but in other cases could be fooled by the contrast to the background.

Of course, lacking of a fs catalogue, one can always use any known chip as a reference, or even the cover of a publication, if it is included in the photo; but lacking of such reference, digital colors are indicative only.

Regards
Massimo

It has already been mentioned, rgb colour space is a superior way to describe colour than limited number of FS chips.  In the case of ALG-16, closest FS chips have around 90% similarity.  This also means about 10% difference which is considerable considering how sensitive human eyes are.  We can all clearly see that FS matches are not perfect.

There is also another reason why we have to think digital:  everything around us is digital - photography is digital, music is digital, your profiles can be considered as digital art.  Monitor you are looking at shows you digital colours.

FS595 deck is an anachronism that survives among modellers only because the average modeller is a middle age computer illiterate male.

We (middle age computer illiterate males) should all learn how to calibrate our monitors, how to make photos with realistic colour representation, how to use Photoshop - and forget FS595.

Cheers,
KL   

You can certainly paint planes and models with rgb colors, if they exist in a computer. RGB colors are given by the sum of three lights: red, green, blue.
Material planes, as  material models, are painted with paints that don't emit RGB light, but adsorb a spectrum of frequencies from the light they receive, and reflect what is not adsorbed.
Should I have to paint a material model, I can:
use the photo (both digital or printed) showing the FS chips aside the Russian chip, supposed to be taken under the same light;
then  choose the closer one, even if they are not exactly corresponding;
then have a look to the  material FS chip;
then choose or mix my paints till to match a color that shows, compared to the FS chip, the same difference that I see between the chips on the photo, always supposing to see the paint and the FS chip under the same light.
Now, apart for the subjective calibration of monitors and scanners, could you explain to me how to see a chip on the monitor and a materal paint under the same light, side by side?
Regards
Massimo

Hi,
l found this picture of Korean all-grey Yak-9 at
http://www.vintagewings.ca/VintageNews/Stories/tabid/116/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/394/language/en-CA/WTF.aspx (http://www.vintagewings.ca/VintageNews/Stories/tabid/116/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/394/language/en-CA/WTF.aspx)
(http://www.vintagewings.ca/Portals/0/Vintage_Stories/News%20Stories%20G/Aviation%27s%20Cross%20Dressers/WTF244.jpg)
regards,
   66misos