Model Forum / General / Models / December 2006

Presumably because it's both "black as midnight", and reflection from
the gloss paint might be mistaken for the twinkle of a star under
moonlight.

You'd have to make sure you turned the exterior lights out during
ingress and attack...but that's only tactical.

I've seen several sources that claimed flat black against a star background
at night could be detected. The reflections of the gloss black masked that
effect by providing star like twinkles.

                                                                       Val
Kraut

If you look at the colours used during WW II you'll see a turn away from
dull matt towards gloss. The RAF had their first nightfighters in dull
black,but the rough surface of the paint decreased the topspeed some 5- 10
miles. Later they used greys as nightfighter colours.
The USN used matt colours for the tricolour scheme in early and midwar, and
later gloss blue all over.
The USAAC/USAF used to paint the planes, but in late war had a lot of planes
in natural metal finishes.

My guess is that the glossy surface gave better speed performance and the
camouflage was less nessecary in the late war where the allies had almost
total air superiority.

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I THINK it was to make the plane less visible to searchlights. A gloss
surface acts more like a mirror, with the angle of reflectance equal to the
angle of incidence, so unless the light is hitting a surface perpendicular
to the beam, it will reflect it in a direction not directly back toward the
searchlight (and the searcher). A matte surface, OTOH, scatters light in all
directions, which makes it more visible under beams hitting it from other
angles. You can see the same effect sometimes at night when the road is wet
-- it's hard to see the road surface because less of the light from your
headlight is bouncing back at you.
Pip Moss