bbi Golden Dragon Hornet colors
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- Officer - 2nd Lieutenant
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bbi Golden Dragon Hornet colors
Can anybody please advise what are the best paint matches to the scheme used by bbi on the Golden Dragons Hornet?
I recently purchased a Hornet which had been repainted (badly) into an aggressor scheme. (having removed the poorly applied paint, i found it started life as a Red Devil)
I'd like to get it back up to standard again using acrylics, but all the paint charts show a flat gray colour for the standard fs colours wheras the Golden Dragon seems to be a blue/gray tone.
Any help greatly appreciated.
Cheers Mad Sam
I recently purchased a Hornet which had been repainted (badly) into an aggressor scheme. (having removed the poorly applied paint, i found it started life as a Red Devil)
I'd like to get it back up to standard again using acrylics, but all the paint charts show a flat gray colour for the standard fs colours wheras the Golden Dragon seems to be a blue/gray tone.
Any help greatly appreciated.
Cheers Mad Sam
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- Officer - Brigadier General
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Re: bbi Golden Dragon Hornet colors
Can't help you with the colour codes, but I am sure somebody will.
Hard to believe somebody would repaint a Red Devils F-18.
These were limited to 500 pieces. They should have used a Golden Dragons.
Hard to believe somebody would repaint a Red Devils F-18.

These were limited to 500 pieces. They should have used a Golden Dragons.

Re: bbi Golden Dragon Hornet colors
Yep, darn near criminal. I guess we can say they are limited to 499 now.snake wrote: Hard to believe somebody would repaint a Red Devils F-18.![]()
"There are some people who disagree with me, they are wrong." --Gen George S. Patton
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- Officer - 2nd Lieutenant
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Re: bbi Golden Dragon Hornet colors
Yes, make that 499. Criminal it sure is, also made for one fairly abusive Brit when I found what I nearly had...
Originally I thought I was going to uncover another Golden Dragon, wasn't expecting they'd used a Red Devil (this is the second time one has got away from me.)
Even though I carefully cleaned off the paint I found nearly all markings had been removed prior to the respray, I did find part of the devil and red trims on the vertical tails.
It will be a Red Devil again, just not an original. I've ordered a set of 1/32 VMFA-232 decals to scale up from, just want to get the camo colors close to a bbi original if possible.
Originally I thought I was going to uncover another Golden Dragon, wasn't expecting they'd used a Red Devil (this is the second time one has got away from me.)
Even though I carefully cleaned off the paint I found nearly all markings had been removed prior to the respray, I did find part of the devil and red trims on the vertical tails.
It will be a Red Devil again, just not an original. I've ordered a set of 1/32 VMFA-232 decals to scale up from, just want to get the camo colors close to a bbi original if possible.
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Re: bbi Golden Dragon Hornet colors
FS 36320 Dark Ghost Gray for the top (of front and rear fuselage, spine, engines, and wings) and a little bit creeps over the top onto the sides of the front fuselage and that small area on the back fuselage under the vertical tails but between the front and back horizontal wings, and also behind the back wings. The fuselage area that holds the engines in other words are half dark, half light ghost gray for the most part
FS36375 Light Ghost Gray for the undersides and the rest of the sides meeting up to where the dark ghost gray meets. Also Light Ghost Gray is used for painting the inside and the outside of the vertical stabilizers.
Note that on the front fuselage the dark ghost gray only extends past the canopy a little bit. The rest is where light ghost gray comes up from the bottom and actually covers the rest of the plane's nose....except for that little tip on the end which is radome tan on some Hornets. You'll have to check your reference pics. some hornets have radome tan some don't.
Also the weapons pylons and stations under the wings are light ghost gray (all over)...same for top and bottom of the tips of the wings that hold the Sidewinder missiles.
Hope this helps.
FS36375 Light Ghost Gray for the undersides and the rest of the sides meeting up to where the dark ghost gray meets. Also Light Ghost Gray is used for painting the inside and the outside of the vertical stabilizers.
Note that on the front fuselage the dark ghost gray only extends past the canopy a little bit. The rest is where light ghost gray comes up from the bottom and actually covers the rest of the plane's nose....except for that little tip on the end which is radome tan on some Hornets. You'll have to check your reference pics. some hornets have radome tan some don't.
Also the weapons pylons and stations under the wings are light ghost gray (all over)...same for top and bottom of the tips of the wings that hold the Sidewinder missiles.
Hope this helps.
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- Officer - 2nd Lieutenant
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Re: bbi Golden Dragon Hornet colors
I just typed in the FS numbers you quoted and that has given me the answer.
Lifecolor have the colors named in their range and the tone appear correct.
My local hobby shop only has the Tamiya and Humbrol ranges, and all theirs seemed too dark.
You describe the same scheme as on the decal sheet i've ordered.
Thanks for the help.
All the best Mad Sam, In England, where It's raining, again.
Lifecolor have the colors named in their range and the tone appear correct.
My local hobby shop only has the Tamiya and Humbrol ranges, and all theirs seemed too dark.
You describe the same scheme as on the decal sheet i've ordered.
Thanks for the help.
All the best Mad Sam, In England, where It's raining, again.
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Re: bbi Golden Dragon Hornet colors
I need to make an edit. Dark ghost gray is also on the vertical stabilizers inside and outside. Except of course when the squadron paints the CAG or CO's plane in full color..
Something to think about if you're doing the Red Devils scheme all over again. Pretty much all of the photographs of that particular plane on the web show it after it has been through some considerable time at sea. So it's not going to have that clearly visible delineation between dark and light ghost gray. The pics I have of it show the sun has faded the dark ghost gray on top and the side of the front fuselage so much that it's barely visible to see the differences. So If you wanted to paint like it has spent time in service, you might want to lighten your DGG just a hair with white to get more accurate. Or you could paint it straight colored and very little weathering to get it to look more like it left the paint shop about a week ago.
Personally I'm not really enamored with the heavily weathered look. If I see a CAG or colored show bird I like it to look as if the squadron takes pride and gets it looking like a new polished penny. But that's me. I'm also a car guy liking classics really well restored so that's why I'm influenced like that....
Something to think about if you're doing the Red Devils scheme all over again. Pretty much all of the photographs of that particular plane on the web show it after it has been through some considerable time at sea. So it's not going to have that clearly visible delineation between dark and light ghost gray. The pics I have of it show the sun has faded the dark ghost gray on top and the side of the front fuselage so much that it's barely visible to see the differences. So If you wanted to paint like it has spent time in service, you might want to lighten your DGG just a hair with white to get more accurate. Or you could paint it straight colored and very little weathering to get it to look more like it left the paint shop about a week ago.
Personally I'm not really enamored with the heavily weathered look. If I see a CAG or colored show bird I like it to look as if the squadron takes pride and gets it looking like a new polished penny. But that's me. I'm also a car guy liking classics really well restored so that's why I'm influenced like that....

Re: bbi Golden Dragon Hornet colors
Holy cow...
The Red Devils scheme is such a great one done by BBI, that and the fantasy black "Jolly Rogers" are right up there as my most treasured 1/18
I can understand he was trying to do an Aggressor scheme, which could be awesome too, but to butcher that...
He must be a Liverpool FC fan!
Good luck with the restoration Mad Sam!
The Red Devils scheme is such a great one done by BBI, that and the fantasy black "Jolly Rogers" are right up there as my most treasured 1/18
I can understand he was trying to do an Aggressor scheme, which could be awesome too, but to butcher that...
He must be a Liverpool FC fan!
Good luck with the restoration Mad Sam!
"Be Water, My Friend..."
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- Officer - 2nd Lieutenant
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Re: bbi Golden Dragon Hornet colors
Black Lion VF-213
Thanks for the advice. The scheme I'm doing has red/white verticals and I'll only be post shading the panel lines to give some definition, so no heavy weathering on this one.
Once I've got the aircraft painted, I'll have to find time to make a replacement for the missing centre line tank, and two new MK84s which have been replaced with 1/32 Stuka bombs made to fit using home made pins.....
gouchy
Cheers for the comments, I hope to eventually transfer Red Devil from 'wish' to 'treasured list' guess I'll just have to be patient.
Liverpool f.c. Ha Ha... I've four staff who follow them, so if you know about soccer, you'll understand why they aren't doing much talking about their team this year..
Anyway, must go, there's another fog bank rolling in, and it won't clear away on it's own...TTFN Mad Sam
Thanks for the advice. The scheme I'm doing has red/white verticals and I'll only be post shading the panel lines to give some definition, so no heavy weathering on this one.
Once I've got the aircraft painted, I'll have to find time to make a replacement for the missing centre line tank, and two new MK84s which have been replaced with 1/32 Stuka bombs made to fit using home made pins.....
gouchy
Cheers for the comments, I hope to eventually transfer Red Devil from 'wish' to 'treasured list' guess I'll just have to be patient.
Liverpool f.c. Ha Ha... I've four staff who follow them, so if you know about soccer, you'll understand why they aren't doing much talking about their team this year..
Anyway, must go, there's another fog bank rolling in, and it won't clear away on it's own...TTFN Mad Sam