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B-25H interior colors


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Offhand,, I can't see why the bomb bay would be bare metal while other panels were primed.  I'm sure photographs of in-service B-25's would solve some of these questions.   I've spent a fair bit of time working on EAA's B-25, and all the interior surfaces are painted, but this airplane is far removed from its original military life. 

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6 hours ago, Chriss7607 said:

What would be the correct colors for the interior of a B-25H? My guess is dull dark green cockpit area, aluminum bomb bay, interior green aft fuselage. I would like to make sure that I do it correctly. Thanks for the help!

 

Chriss,

 

Others will chime in, but I think you are mostly correct.  I've seen the issue discussed a number of times on various modeling sites.  I seem to remember someone "trumping" the conversation with North American information.  Dare I ask "Have you tried Google?"

 

C2j

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From Hyperscale:  LINK

 

B-25 interior colors...via John Clements and Dana Bell....



March 19 2006, 11:56 AM

Interior Colors for the B-25B/C/D/G

The information below is from Mr. John Clements, a model builder and lucky soul that works on real B-25 aircraft. This color information is in complete agreement with information that I received many years ago from Mr. George Lee. The only addition is that George’s information gives the decking as natural metal or zinc chromate primer (the bright yellow color). Take note that the “Yellow-Green” listed below was the now well known mix of zinc chromate primer, black enamel and aluminum powder. The resulting color was a dark olive green. The name is quite descriptive of the color. This color was not ANA 611 Interior Green. Yellow-Green was not matched to any color specification. And as a contractor shop mixed color considerable variation undoubtedly occurred. For my purposes, I simply mix yellow and black paints to suit. A ratio of 10 parts yellow and 1 part black is my favorite mix. I use Floquil ATSF Yellow and Floquil Engine Black. I think that any yellow or black would probably do. If too dark or light, add or subtract black as suits you.

As an aside, Mr. Clements stated that the interior colors remained the same for the later B-25J version with the exception that the cockpit was finished with Dull Dark Green.

Don

*************************************

“My "B" manual is a copy of the service manual, plus some other interior stuff from another source, mostly cockpit. The copies of the photos aren't the best, but they're clear enough to see what's going on. Unfortunately, there is no color information in this manual. But, I do also have access to a copy of an early C/D maintenance manual, which has a very extensive materials/finishes section. What I've done is compare tonal differences in the black and white photos in the manuals and I believe that the B airplanes and the C/D airplanes were finished the same in the interior. Here's what I have, tell me if it differs with what George Lee gave you. The photos support these notes.

Flight Deck - Bronze Green #9

Seats - Aluminum

Bombardier's Compartment - Yellow-Green (Tinted Zinc Chromate)

Navigator's Compartment - Yellow-Green

Radio Compartment - Yellow-Green

Tail Compartment - Yellow-Green

Bomb Bay - Aluminum

Wheel Wells - Aluminum

Instrument Panels - Flat Black

Sound Proofing Material, Flight Deck - Dyed to match Bronze Green #9

Sound Proofing Material, all other areas - Dyed to match Yellow-Green

John Clements”

John Clements

B-25J Interior Colors

Thu Oct 23 22:21:00 2003

198.81.26.44

I promised the forum an article on B-25J interior colors a couple of nights ago, but I've made a few interesting discoveries while carefully reading the E&M manual section on finishes. I'm trying to get photo confirmation on a few points, which I hope to have tomorrow. I will post a more detailed article at that time, or over the weekend.

I'm consulting the B-25J E&M manual AN 01-60GE-2 with the revision dated 5 August 1944. In a nutshell, here's the Reader's Digest version of what it says:

Flight deck and glare shield are Dull Dark Green.

Everything aft of the flight deck is yellow-green/Interior Green

Bombardier’s station is yellow-green/Interior Green

Bomb bay, engine nacelles, and wheel wells receive no finish coat

Instrument panel is flat black

Now, there are some exceptions and detail differences that are listed, and this is where I'm trying to get photo documentation of what is listed. There are two different charts that reflect early airplanes and late airplanes, and I'm trying to find out where the "cut-off" is. One of the points is that the early airplanes are listed with yellow -green in the aft areas and bombardier's station, while the later airplanes list these areas as Interior Green. According to Dana Bell, they were essentially the same color with two different names. The spec listed is AN-TT-P-656 for yellow-green, and AN-TT-P-656a for Interior Green. Dana, any comments?

Like I said above, I'll have more information tomorrow, and I'll post what I found out as soon as I can.

Dana Bell

Mitchell interiors...

Fri Oct 24 12:40:14 2003

160.111.69.32

Hi John,

I just caught this thread - I've got a few things I can send your way, but I'm pretty backed up with things that I owe folks just now. I'll try to pull some stuff together for you, but it won't be soon.

In the meantime, four things from memory:

- One B-25 factory (El Segundo?) was "excused" from using interior primers, based on the lack of a large paint shop. Color photos of the production lines show the California-built aircraft proceeding down the line in aluminum finish, while the midwest-built aircraft are all primed (inside and out) with yellow zinc chromate.

- Before DDG came into widespread use, early Mitchell’s used Bronze Green on the flight decks. The color shows clearly in some of the early in-flight photos.

- AN-TT-P-656 was the joint spec for tinting (yellow) zinc chromate primer. I believe the "a" revision reflected the deletion of aluminum paste/powder from the formula, but my copies of the spec are buried VERY deep just now. There was more of a color change than the documentation had originally reported (talk about "close enough for government work!") The early aircraft would have used the lighter formula, since aluminum wasn't thought to be a problem. Intermediate aircraft may have use a formula substituting tinting gray for aluminum and black (attempting to look like the earlier formula). And by late 1942, the black-only formula that became known as Interior Green would be making its first appearances. B-25Js SHOULD certainly have used the Interior Green formula.

- Watch for Instrument Black on the panel - it had an eggshell finish, and replaced flat black in nearly everything by mid-war.

Sorry I can't get into the refs just now - one day I'll just sit down and find everything I've promised folks!

Cheers,

-Dana

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