BC2

Hi, Mark.

Wayne now has editing rights to the calendar and is entering info for Crossroad Historicals.  I deleted the repeating event I had created earlier because when he edited it, events were appearing twice.  Now as you guys schedule events they will appear just once, hopefully!  My apologies for the confusion. 

Dean

For P-47s (and other aircraft) it was my understanding that the invasion stripes would have been painted over after a month or two from D-Day.  I might be wrong on this.  Here is a link to many images of P47 aircraft.  Scroll down a bit and on the right side you will see the listings.  You'll have to scan though them as there are quite a few. 
http://wp.scn.ru/en/ww2/f/350/3

I hope this helps. 

Ken

Very helpful, thanks Ken. So I take it that it's safe to assume that any scenario we do surrounding Operation Cobra the stripes would be appropriate but Battle of the bulge I should go with a straight green scheme? I'm basing my Brigade on the 3rd armored division which as I recall didn't arrive in France until mid August...... I may be wrong on that. Do you think it would be safe to assume that by august any aircraft supporting the 3rd armored would not have had the stripes? I get two planes in a blister and am debating doing one with the stripes and one without. I must say the stripes do look pretty cool. I'm just looking for some input. Also while I'm on the subject what color should I use for the underside of the fuselage? I've seen images that appear to be a light blue color and some that are just a light gray and others that show the plane completely green from top to bottom. Thanks for the help. -Mark

After doing a bit of checking I find that some fighter groups removed the stripes and smoe just left them in place.  Some groups even had traces of them at wars end.  So I suppose you could go either way with them.  I do know that they were usually hand painted so they don't have to be perfectly even. 

I don't recall a blue color for undersides.  But now you have me wondering.  I will check my books and see what I come up with.  I used to build model aircraft and did a P-51b in olive green upper surfaces with a gray bottom.  I think that was a common color combo for much of the war.
Ken

We played a couple of great games at Crossroads this evening. I wasnt really paying much attention to the one I didn't participate in, but the Germans smashed the U.S. 3rd armored division quite handily. Unfortunately the scenario was august 1944 so I couldnt us my pershings. I also learned the hard way that trying to drive dug in tigers out of the woods with shermans and no artillery is next to impossible. Not to mention my air support was aborted nearly every turn. It was definitely a good time either way though. For those who haven't had a chance to try Blitzkrieg Comander 2 yet it's a great system. Very fast paced and just detailed enough to be realistic, or as realistic as any game can hope to be. If anyone is interested in giving it a try we play every tuesday at 6pm with the exception of this coming tuesday when we will be playing FOW. Between us we have a sizable collection of troops, tanks and planes. And as I mentioned in a previous post we would love to see new faces at the table. We hope to see you all soon. -Mark

Not to worry Mark the Soviets smashed their fascist opponents. I lost 1 T-34/85 and 1 OT-34 in destroying all of the German armor.  Eric while superb commander can be counted on to fail any CO moral / break check, and my Guards have learned by bitter experience that the way to deal with the big cats is massed fire power.

Wayne