From: John Seidts (jseidts@astory.com)
Date: Wed Aug 06 2003 - 07:33:00 PDT
USN WWII Vehicles WERE NOT painted gray, as a rule. From my ownership of a
few, and the pictures of a few originals, most of them were painted the
standard olive drab as used during WWII. As reference, I personally scraped
this paint off of three WWII jeeps, a 1942 Autocar Aircraft wrecker, and a
Ford GTB bomb truck- all were USN vehicles by data plate.
This is not to say that NONE of the vehicles were painted gray, and I
believe that this practice was more widespread towards the end of the war,
but most were delivered in good' ol' OD. One of the MB's I owned was
painted a very attractive sea blue over the olive drab- the color was very
similar to the middle color used in the standard USN three color camouflage
for aircraft. I couldn't tell you how it started out in life, gloss, semi
or otherwise, as it was very faded by the time I got it.
Another point. After WWII, most flight line vehicles were painted very
bright yellow. It made them much easier to see and prevented jets from
taxiing over them. I think this was done also in the latter part of WWII,
as I have a Ford GTB which was sold surplus in 1946 and was painted bright
yellow. The color fades to look like a very flat yellow, almost a greenish
yellow. I theorize that this yellow color was the same as that used to
paint all WWII USN training aircraft, which as a rule were painted yellow
during WWII (this is why you will sometimes hear the Stearman biplane called
the "Yellow Peril"). I have yet to see a restored WWII vehicle painted this
way, and would really like to see one...
Don't know a thing about WWII USMC vehicles- I've never owned one and
haven't seen many up close. Good luck with your research.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Skip Woods" <swoods@samnet.net>
To: "Military Vehicles Mailing List" <mil-veh@mil-veh.org>
Sent: Tuesday, August 05, 2003 10:32 AM
Subject: [MV] WWII Navy and Marine Corp vehicle colors
> Hi!
> I have some questions about WWII Navy and Marine Corps vehicle colors.
> 1. US Navy WWII vehicles were painted grey. Was the grey flat, semi-gloss
or
> gloss?
> 2. What color did the Navy paint vehicles in combat areas?
> 3. Did the Marine Corps paint their vehicles Marine Corp Green or Olive
> Drab?
> Thanks for any help you can give!
> Skip
>
>
>
>
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