1:48 F-100 Super Sabre Vietnam Era Camouflage Paint Masks Set

The Super Sabre in Southeast Asia

The F-100 was the first production machine of the US Air Force to hold supersonic speed in level flight, and yet it flew most of its hours in a role it was not designed for: as an attack aircraft supporting units on the ground. Over Vietnam it flew more combat sorties than any other American type. There the machines lost their bare metal shine and were given camouflage meant to hide them against the vegetation when seen from above.

Three shades for Southeast Asia

The standard scheme of that period rests on two greens and one brown on the upper surfaces. The darker green has an olive cast, the lighter one is markedly more yellow, and the brown is close to sandy or coffee. The lower surfaces carry a very light gray, on some machines almost white. Prepare all four pots in advance and in sufficient quantity, because an interruption in the middle of a coat shows up on an edge.

What to do first

• Seal and mask the cockpit; on this type the glazing is heavily exposed.
• Fill and sand the joints on the fuselage before the first coat of paint.
• Apply a uniform ground, so that the shades do not break up over plastic of different colors.
• Have tweezers, a scalpel with a fresh blade and a burnisher for the edges ready.

The boundary between the green fields is the most delicate place in the whole job, because both tones have a similar lightness and any overspray shows up on them as a haze. It helps to lower the pressure by about a third from what you use on large surfaces, and to lay on four thin coats rather than two generous ones. Remove the films gradually, not all at once.