Info needed: correct colours for WWII Aust vehicles

[Lang]

Tony

Appreciate your well thought out replies to my queries and doubts. You really have put a lot of work into this.

Lang

[Tony Wheeler]

Likewise Lang, I appreciate you taking the time to critique my thoughts and ideas and the evidence I present. I find that I learn a helluva lot more trying to defend my pet theories than I do in isolation. Sometimes I prove myself right, and sometimes I prove myself wrong, as with the Chullora date, but I find it equally satisfying as long I’m finding answers, and discovering new pieces of the puzzle. For example I wouldn’t have dug up Cam Finlay’s photos if you hadn’t queried the Chullora evidence. And I wouldn’t have presented the Chullora evidence if Mike hadn’t challenged my “leap” from Special Variation to production. Here again I proved myself wrong, because it turned out to be a repaint!

[Lang]

Tony

I assume it is in the same parade. What is it with the two last vehicles in the parade collection? Same unit, different scheme from the other carriers and from each other?

Lang

[Tony Wheeler]

Lang if you’re referring to the two Mortar carriers and the 2pdr carrier, I believe these are in Khaki Green / Light Earth scheme, which Young criticized on 13 Sept 42: “These colours are useless for disruption as they are much too close in tone and merge at a very short distance.” You can see what he means in that photo.

027529 Sydney 12 Dec 42 carriers parade KG3 Light Earth camo - Copy.JPG

Note also the enlarged frontal pattern on the AT carrier and gun shield compared to the trial pattern, which is otherwise identical. Early disruptive patterns under MC301 were way too small, especially 3-tone patterns, and instructions were issued to make them “bolder”. I believe they were designed originally by Victorian DHS committee and not Dakin himself, although he seems to have approved them. I guess we need to bear in mind that disruptive camo was in its infancy.

4120551 (2).JPG

[Lang]

Yes, I can see the panels in direct sunlight do merge their colours.

Lang

[Lang]

Just had a look at Dakin. Interesting bloke. Absolutely no military experience or qualifications on the requirements of battlefield camouflage but knew a lot about fish.

In the end, a camouflage system can only be judged subjectively by human observation and probably anyone with a bit of common sense could have come up with equally efficient, or inefficient, schemes given the facilities and trials he had access to.

Still, nobody in Australia was an expert in 1940, so they must have figured a bloke who knew how fish avoided being eaten must be just the shot for hiding tanks on a battlefield.

Lang

http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/dakin-william-john-5863

[Tony Wheeler]

Originally Posted by Lang

Absolutely no military experience or qualifications on the requirements of battlefield camouflage

Yes but you could say the same about CSIRO scientists consulted by Army in modern camo development. That’s all Dakin was for the military – a technical consultant. He only had authority over civil camouflage.

Originally Posted by Lang

anyone with a bit of common sense could have come up with equally efficient, or inefficient, schemes given the facilities and trials he had access to.

“In point of fact, excellent results can often be obtained by the exercise of common sense, imagination, and attention to detail; it is only in exceptional cases that the services of a specially trained officer should be required.”

EXCEPT…

“Disruptive painting is a positive menace when executed by the inexperienced; it should be left to experts.”

(Training memo 1940)

Originally Posted by Lang

Still, nobody in Australia was an expert in 1940

Exactly Lang, that was the whole problem, all the experience and expertise was within AIF and RAAF who were absent at the time. Plus of course Dakin had the ear of Menzies and promoted himself as Technical Director of Camouflage.


Simple Rules for Camouflage. Extract from Training Memorandum No.36 of 1940.jpg

War Cabinet April 1941 Establishment of Camouflage Organization. - Copy.jpg