"Me-110 with high sided lt. Blue a fad?" Topic

I'm painting up 110s for France 40 & BoB. I saw some photos of 110s with the light blue fully up the side of the fuselage to just below the cockpit line like on a Me-109, and light blue vertical tail surfaces. Some had a gray-green mottle on the light blue. It's a slick look, but was it a fad? It seems most 110s in that period had Gray-Green &Dark Green down the sides. Are these images from a very small window of time? Should I just give up on this look and paint the sides and tails the greens?

If you've got a photo to show your detractors you can paint it how you like, They are your models.

Robert

Seems it is a bit of a minefield: link

The aircraft of I/ZG 52 seem to have painted in the scheme you describe but with mottle green vertical tail fins. The underside blue/grey is carried up to about half way up the nose area and continues in a roughly straight line ending up with the rear of the fuselage side from just fore of the tail being totally blue.

Rather than being a seperate paint scheme I think this is likely the interpretation of the official scheme by the squadron fitters. Although hazy in the original colour pictures, the artist renditions I have show the blue/grey is actually mottled with the upper surface green but very slightly and a very pale application.

Well here is a Corgi toy of France 40:

That seems to be the one Rob is talking about, the Osprey book, has a flight over Paris, but other than the high sides, its difficult to see whats going on with the tail.

Well I have 8 to paint, so I think I will split the difference 4 in low side and 4 in high side. I always loved the look of the 110, too bad it sucked as a fighter.

Agreed, but it made an excellent nightfighter.

it seems a great number of them were painted black-green overall on the upper surfaces, and not "high sided" the under surface colors.

Number 3 is what the doctor ordered, with the crisp line between the green and the light blue. Thank You!

Hi

One, germans despite their reputation for taking "marching orders" did not do so with the Luftwaffe. In fact, the british were more wedded to the painting regs than any German. All ground crews did pretty much whatever they felt despite whatever the regs said.

That is the long way of saying that the regulations are NOT rigid and not a real guide. Rather, it is easier to pick a photo and do THAT airplane rather than thinking about the specifications.

Now, the Thinking between "high line/low line" in the egulations was this: initially, the aircraft were to be 70/71/65(green, green, blue grey) with the entire top in chamo. The assumption was to give some concealment when parked on the ground. AFTER the start of the actual campaign in the west, the regs changed because it was thought that the rapid movements of blitzkreig made being hit on the ground less likely, and the blue high line was established for help in hiding the plane "air to air".

At the same time, as color stocks became more inconsistent because of the moving around, 70/71/65 often on an ad hoc basis became 70/02/65 or whatever the local crews had at hand. This shifted to Greys and then other colors as the war went on.

In 43/4 in Italy, there was a german unit that because of supply problems, decided to go to black on top, grey on the bottom.

Again, with the Germans, you pick your photo.

Rocky